Wireless Access

Hi,

 

     I'm new to Aruba and had been looking to upgrade the AP for my home use (I'm a bit of a wifi nut) and I've used/deployed Ruckus, Xirrus, and Ubiquity in the past. I'd done what I thought was a decent amount of research but it seems I may have screwed myself. I am the owner of a new AP-325.

 

Not a IAP-325.

 

It would appear if I want to use this hardware I will *have* to have a controller and cant take advantage of the Aruba Instant capability? If so this is sort of upsetting because I never saw any disclaimers on the Aruba Instant marketing to indicate that this was only available on specific SKU's. Why is this the case if so? Ruckus doesn't restrict their standalone mode or their Unleashed capability by SKU like this. Xirrus inherently doesn't have this issue due to their particular approach to architecture.

What can I do here? Help!

You would either need to return the AP and swap it for an IAP version or
acquire a controller.



Aruba offers the most flexibility on the market.

Seeing as how this was purchased via ebay that option doesnt sound like its available for me.

Without sounding like Captain Hindsight, the data sheet identifies the different part numbers and thir role. There are a HOST of reasons why we have separate parts. Some customers (think high security like financial, government, etc) where they don't ever want the APs being able to work autonomously. In those cases they buy AP-325s. For others where they want autonomous, or don't have security restrictions/policies against it, can buy IAP-325s. Because the IAPs have to come up as Instant fisrt, they can be converted, but if you are a high security, or government customer, where they can't allow an IAP to come up on it's own, the IAPs are not an option.

 

Best bet, to be perfectly frank, re-sell the AP-325 for hopefully as much as you paid (maybe for even more if you're great at Marketing), and then buy an IAP-325. Or look for a 7xxx based controller (the 7005 will be lowest cost) to run the 325. You get a small bit more features with the controller-based solutions if that interests you.

Fair enough, I get those reasons. I just wish I could do something like a firmware swap to flip the behavior on the hardware. I mean....I sort of doubt you guys have hardware level differences in these two SKUs. It's just a firmware swap or EEPROM you guys flash differently in the factory. Or is their an actual difference in the hardware?

It is an FCC 'thing' so they are not field convertible. 

Just out of curiosity whats the lowest end controller that will support the AP-325?

The 7005 controller.  http://www.arubanetworks.com/products/networking/controllers/7000-series/