MikroTik - hAP ac lite

tl;dr; just buy a few things and grow/adapt as you learn I have a 60's split level and have settled into the following setup over the last 8+ years: 1. HEX RB750Gr3 running Wireguard and Capsman (v3 and v2) 2. Feeding an 8-port POE Texas passive POE injector 3. Provisioning a mix of hAP AX2, 2xcAP AC, hAP AC Lite, hAP AC2 over wired CAT5e 1. Garage: HEX + AC2 2. Upstairs Hall: cAP AC 3. Living Room: AX2 4. Backyard: cAP AC 5. Downstairs media cabinet: AC Lite for 100mb ethernet Fire TV stick It's a completely ghetto rigged setup, and one cAP AC has been removed from its case and shoved in a weatherproof box mounted to the outside of the house to replace a wAP AC that died. The CAT5e is from a spool I bought 25 years ago! But, I put it together piecemeal as I learned and it works well enough for my 300mbit AT&T service that is shared between 60+ devices. I have one central UPS powering the whole bit from the garage so it even works for a few hours during power outages. The hAP AC Lite is the thorn in my side as it is 100mbit only and is the last remaining capsman v2 device out there. If money were infinite, and I were starting over, I'd likely just get a RB5009 or L009 and run cat6e to a mix of cAP AX or hAP AX2s and be done with it. That would let you easily run 1Gbit service and share it out via 600-700mbit wifi to everything. My next goal is figuring out how to move equipment to get rid of that AC lite, but spending $100-200 on more networking isn't quite in the budget yet.

I've used hAPs before with CAPSMAN, had no complaints other than the slow adoption of the new WiFi standards. I've since switched to Unifi AP ACs with OpenWRT and usteer installed, works a treat.

NGL I think it’s smarter to buy older gen wifi or used with one of the managed solutions, rather than bleeding edge unmanaged wifi 7 Potentially OP if interested in one node might dig in and research Mikrotik hAP very closely to see if it can do the needful WiFi VLAN. They’re not known though for strong wifi. My hAP is only used as a firewall as a Temu UDM , with the WiFi as an emergency fallback during a power outage, when I don’t power my APs

Do you have any references comparing firewalla to UniFi, Mikrotik, and PFsense/other x86 software firewall? I got some “upgrade to 1/10Gb fiber ads and am tempted”. Currently at 0.6/0.6, which my hAP can do no problem

Yeah, it is but bang for buck Mikrotik can't be beat. From home gear to their cloud core gear, unbelievable value for money.