I bought into the ecosystem while taking my networking cert classes back in 2017. They were much cheaper than Cisco gear for business-grade networking, and overall I’ve been happy with them.
Their security offerings are locally managed, and you can make local accounts, but I just bought a NAS from them and I had to sign in with my ubiquiti account first before I could make a local account, and it seems the cloud account has some privileges that you can’t give to local super admins.
So now I’m having second thoughts. I figure since it’s enterprise-grade stuff they can’t really make it cloud-dependent like you see on the consumer side since a lot of companies need air-gapped networks. On the other hand, on those occasions that I didn’t have internet access and hadn’t yet made a local-only account, I was locked out, so…
Regarding the NAS specifically, I use a TruNAS system at work and it works well enough on a rack server, but since it uses ZFS I don’t know it would be good for home use. What alternatives are there?
Are there any truly FOSS networking options? I figure especially on the switching side you need purpose-built hardware, right? There aren’t generic motherboards with 48 network ports you can buy.
I like my Unifi setup, I’m just scared of a rug pull.
You must log in or # to comment.
Are there any truly FOSS networking options?
PFSense falls into this category for routers. Netgate makes hardware specifically for it, but you don’t have to buy anything from them to use PFSense. I only mention them because their hardware is good and you can buy anything from a normal home router to enterprise level gear.
I had to sign in with my ubiquiti account first before I could make a local account
I used to be pretty into ubiquiti, but this requirement really put me off. I have no desire to do anything ‘cloud’ with my router. This requirement sent me elsewhere and I sold off all my ubiquiti equipment.
TruNAS … What alternatives are there?
TruNAS has a community edition, so you could start there. Other alternatives are a standard Debian install, use mdadm to setup RAID, then setup a network share in the OS, etc.
Pfsense is shady on the OSS side these days. I think. I haven’t gotten into the drama. Opnsense is a popular fork.
Opinion wise: love unifi for networking equipment. Especially since that equipment doesn’t require the web account. For a Nas, I’m in too deep already, I’ll only use equipment I fully control. I wouldn’t buy a Unifi NAS just like I wouldn’t buy a Synology, but I’ll keep leaning on my Unifi stuff as long as it keeps doing its job well.
As for using TrueNAS w/ZFS at home, go for it if you know and like it! I actually was recently given my boss’s old home NAS that used to run his Plex server. When I got it it was still on FreeNAS (same thing, just a few versions behind) and it’s using ZFS. Worked for him, and now works for me, no problem. Both of us also use Unifi equipment for our networks. The only problems we’ve ever had were our own doings.
Tplink Omada doesn’t need a cloud connection. There’s plenty of other reasons to not like Omada but it’s something to consider. It’s also dirt cheap.
TPlink Kasa smart gear didn’t used to need a TPlink account until they made an app update. I would be very wary of anything from them.
I buy TPLink gear, but only because I check to make sure it can be flashed with OpenWRT beforehand. I may not actually do that (my router is running it, but my PoE access points aren’t yet), but I make damn sure I can.
(Also, I almost bought Kasa smart plugs, then checked to see whether they could run ESPHome or Tasmota and picked a different brand instead. You always have to check, every single time!)
True but it’s designed to be on networks that don’t have internet.
I am quite satisfied with the unifi ecosystem so far as networking and CCTV systems go. They are cloud enabled without being cloud dependent. Since the early 2025 networking update, their routers are pretty good now. The UDM SE is a pretty compelling router/POEswitch/NVR in the home context.
Their NAS ecosystem is still very new and I would not it a viable option yet. They are also leaning towards the vendor lock-in direction with drives. Its the same reason I would stay away from Synology and QNAP.
Personally, I run a old desktop as a NAS/homelab running Proxmox(FOSS based hypervisor). I run ZFS on it and its “fine”. It performs fine even with a mixed bunch of disks, provided you have them in pairs or groups of 3 that perform close to identically. I just run a Debian container on the Proxmox as my fileserver and a few VMs for homelabbing.
One player that works well in a home environment is UnRAID. It a Linux distor that runs on commodity hardware and handles redundancy with “just a bunch of disks” better than most. The UI is friendly to non technical users. The catch is that UI is commercial software. Many consider it a fair exchange for the convenience it brings.
I have a QNAP NAS in addition to the unas2 mentioned in the OP. Both have WD red drives. I also run Proxmox on an ancient laptop. How does virtualizing a file server work?
In my case, I setup a ZFS pool of my disks in my old desktop PC running Proxmox. Then I allocated some storage to an LXC container running Debian and Samba for file sharing.
In your case, since the QNAP already runs Samba, it would be best to run it directly on the NAS.
But if you want to do it for the learning experience, you can setup an NFS share on the QNAP and link it to the Proxmox. The Proxmox can then use the NAS for storage and you can have VMs or LXC contsiners use for virtual disks.
My biggest gripe with them is consistency. They release products without all the features they promise. They have been known to just abandon entire lines (I’m still salty about their mFi gear).
I like my UDM pro however the SE came out and for almost a year they basically ignored the Pro.
Good hardware that’s usually made or broken by their software.
The switches did get L3. Eventually.
Their PDU-PRO has three network ports on the front and I believe only one of them works. They even gray the other two out on their site. I don’t know what they thought they would do with it but they sure failed.
We use it exclusively at work, it’s great for almost anything
I use their WiFi access points. They’re great. That’s about it.
Try stay away from their cheap consumer side stuff, they underspec the hardware and fill it with (useful) bloat that the hardware can barely run.
I’ve been running the original Unifi Dream Machine (the can, not rack) since it released in 2019. Been pretty solid, no complaints; it replaced my trusty Asus RT-N66U w/Tomato firmware; I think the UDM has been deployed longer than the Asus at this point.
The single built-in AP on the UDM was getting a bit overwhelmed, so recently I bought a U7 Lite AP to help split the load a little better. Working great so far, but now I’m looking into adding an NVR for cameras.
I like my Unifi setup, I’m just scared of a rug pull.
Same here.
I like them. Got the whole house set up with it. Yeah, big corp IT gear will have security risks. I used PoE setups to not need to run electrical to the WAPs, used an AirMax directional antenna to get wifi at an outbuilding without needing to run cable or a powerful outdoor WAP for mesh or whatever broadcasting my wifi all over the neighborhood. Works great, stable, a bit fiddly to set up but once it’s set up it’s golden. I recommend buying used off ebay for all gear except the cloud key controller.
I only use their WiFi because I got some in- and outdoor ap’s for free. The Wifi manager is selfhosted and has no internet access. For upgradesi downoad the deb file, trasnsfer and install. It’s not the best out there, but works for me and i’m still happy with it.
Just use switches and APs and I’m happy. Had 2 generations of AP and will eventually upgrade to the current ones, but am not in a rush.
I have no desire to expand beyond that, but the networking gear works well.
My whole work and home networks are all Unifi stuff. I absolutely love them. Way more reliable than anything else I’ve ever tried.
Not so much to the content of your post but to your title:
Their web interface is nice, reasonably priced (not cheap) prosumer sort of gear. I have 2 APs and 1 router, 1 AP is flaky, it’s the 7 XGS which should be a high end AP. It gets pretty bad coverage with it and it’s flaky, randomly going offline once a week. RMAed it, replaced Ethernet cable, poe injector (ubiquity branded) and tried tweaking settings. Still happening
So to the subject, some good in the web interface but I will not buy again. That said, most network gear has some sort of jank in my experience, flaky, or just bad management interface, etc…
I’d say they offer prosumer options for sure, but they also have what I would consider enterprise offerings as well. Even a large campus can easily be run off their enterprise gear.
I’ve run OPNsense, PFsense, OpenWRT, and high end consumer routers and I’ve found Unifi the most stable. I’m also less able to screw it up and I’ve had to divert functions to VMs because I couldn’t do it on my UDM. But having Internet service fail over with notifications that the normies in the house can understand is helpful. Then being able to find the WI-FI password for the Iot network from the app is helpful. VLANS by port through a pretty simple WebUI is helpful. Their handing of power (do they support NUT yet?) and redundant links is less good. I get errors when I have two routes between switches like I broke something. I’ve brought the network down due to STP not stopping loops but I also don’t know what the hell I’m doing. I’d do it again though.
For NAS, ceph storage plus NextCloud plus WebDAV has been good lately but I’m sure I’m leaving performance on the table. It’s just hard to break.
