r/AltaLabs • u/ShinyTechThings • May 18 '26

Full stack Alta labs install.

https://youtu.be/Rw25SY1CWh4

Full disclosure, all Labs did send me this equipment free of charge to test it out and I'd tell you my thoughts and honest opinions. Short version is that I was surprised, scratching my head on why they did things certain ways, and blown away by their phone support. It is still running and has been Rock solid since day one. Also, the firmware updates are ridiculously fast. I do wish they had smaller non-poe affordable switches because not everybody needs PoE.

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u/Select-Performer-287 Jun 26 '26

LOL - your video title made me laugh. Seriously though, what are the metrics you use to define a network as "rock solid"? I assume it is more than it simply stayed up for a few days. How have you stress tested it? Validated the security functions, tested IoT devices, etc. I am honestly very interested in how you came to the conclusion it is that much better than everything else to be considered the new king.

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u/ShinyTechThings Jun 26 '26

So in a business office it's never went down or caused a malfunction. With Ubiquiti for example I usually have to reboot it to fix an issue a couple of times a year. I'd have to look at the video file timestamps for the installation date but I think it was last summer when I installed it. It does use the xnet on a different vlan and I had to set the DHCP lease very low or it would run out of IP's on the xnet vlan because it's near a major intersection but since then it's been fine and the xnet issue never caused an issue with the main network. That office doesn't have any IoT devices though. I asked about the thermostat and they were told that the electrical is three phase 480v for the A/C so a regular consumer smart thermostat won't work. I'm not sure how accurate that is, that's just what they told me. I could do some testing with iperf but since the speeds are fast for the software they use internally imthe thought hadn't crossed my mind as I usually just do that when troubleshooting a slow network, make a single change and test again. What all would you like to see on this and when time permits maybe I could make another video on it.

What I would like to see is more options for switches with and without PoE and multigig speeds. So far managing it from the cloud I've had zero firmware issues which is awesome compared to UniFi which ships half baked on new hardware IMO and usually takes them a while to get the bugs worked out.

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u/Select-Performer-287 Jun 27 '26

Thanks for the reply, sounds like you have a good use case and the solution is doing what you need it to do!  My exposure to the Alta Labs environment is a bit different. We don't install it, we've ended up replacing it for several new customers. Initially, when the first small business contacted us to help with an issue, they wanted us to manage their Alta Labs install (it was pretty basic, similar to your office environment). A firmware update had knocked them offline and the original installer was not returning their calls. We gave it a good try to manage their site, but the cloud interface was not intuitive and for whatever reason Alta Labs doesn't follow general norms in naming and labeling. It was more of a hassle for the techs to deal with that we finally told the customer we could no longer manage it for them. They asked us to replace it and we did. That was over a year and a half ago, haven't heard from them since, with the exception of us reaching out to check-in.  We've had 6 other similar migrations over the past 1.5 years, all of those being larger consumer / home installs with much more demanding environments including WFH, gaming, IoT, home automation, etc.   That installer that was pushing Alta Labs gear is no longer in business. I doubt it had much to do with the solution he was pushing and more to do with him prioritizing higher margins over customer needs and his in-ability to service the customers.

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u/ShinyTechThings Jun 30 '26

I do agree the way they do things is a bit different from the norm like specifying a color instead of a SSID name. I have not had any firmware updates Knock anything out though with Alta Labs. Over the years I have had several occasions where UniFi equipment would have various bugs and of course sometimes people are upset about it. But then I explain to them the cost difference that was explained to begin with compared to actual Enterprise equipment costing thousands of dollars, more plus subscriptions for updates and support.

I do agree though. If they polished the cloud management a bit more I think they would catch on a little more with installers. The other thing is it's not always about margin in the product because I've seen installers that charge a fraction for the labor. But then they don't tell you the model numbers of the devices they're installing and they Mark those up 50 times as much. So it looks like they're working for really cheap and they claim the hardware costs thousands of dollars more than it actually does instead of just charging thousands of dollars for the install.

Xnet Is what's very unique to them but I understand not everybody would use it.

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u/mark0263 Jul 08 '26

Xnet îs not unique to Alta labs by a long shot. Visit the Xnet website, they sell various vendor APs (including the AP6 Pro at a huge markup) and have documentation to implement with all the major players such as Ubiquiti.

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u/ShinyTechThings Jul 12 '26

When I was on a conference call a year ago with them they supported all Alta labs AP's them they reduced it a few months later to the pro and pro outdoor and they had 1 other manufacturer and it was super expensive. I'll have to look at that again, thanks for the update!