Today’s study is at the higher end of the price spectrum. With the Zyxel WAX630S router, an access point (AP) that costs many times as much as its NWA90AX sibling.
Since the introduction of AX class devices and the growing popularity of MESH capable solutions, the wireless access point market is growing. Instead of monolithic routers, business owners are now deploying ceiling or wall-mounted entry points that use PoE technology to simplify installation.
Some of these are very inexpensive, such as the Zyxel NWA90AX. While others, such as the EnGenius or Netgear Orbi Pro hardware, are significantly more expensive.
What will you see here?
Price
The Zyxel WAX630S router is available in the UK for £448.60. And it has an MSRP of $379.99 through authorized US resellers.
If you’re looking for similar specs, the EnGenius ECW230 costs roughly £435. It is a few pounds less than the Zyxel. It’s worth mentioning that the EnGenius ECW230 offers 4 channels on both 2.4GHz and 5GHz. However, the Zyxel design only has twin 2.4GHz channels.
The Zyxel WAX630S router is the equivalent Zyxel design to the ECW230, and it costs a stunning £744.48 for US buyers.
Design and Features
From the exterior, the WAX630S appears almost identical to the cheaper NWA90AX. The style consistency is somewhat deceiving. This is a bigger piece of equipment, measuring 18cm square and 3.9cm thick. However, as opposed to the 14cm square and 3.75cm thick NWA90AX.
The added capacity within the casing nearly doubles the cost of the Zyxel WAX630S router over its smaller sibling. It would be terrible to have nearly half a kilogram of router fall on one’s head. Therefore Zyxel adds a strong mounting plate that interacts with grooves on the underside.
The mounting means to give support in both vertical and lateral deployments, enabling the Zyxel WAX630S to be perfectly at home on the roof as it is on the wall.
Many MESH access point designs are entirely ceiling-mounted. Although, the antenna may work in either position, giving those with difficult installations some much-needed choices. The router’s underbelly features two RJ45 ports, one for its network uplink. Also, there’s another port for an extra LAN port that you can use for local devices or extend the network.
An extra 12v DC input is also in the box. Although Zyxel does not include a power supply in the box. This router also features an earth line connection beneath for individuals who want additional security against electrical fire.
The problem here is that no PoE injector is there in the box. The literature directs consumers to utilize Zyxel’s PoE12-30W injector, a $45 add-on. Aside from the 2.5GbE PoE connection, this AP may appear uninspiring. However, what’s within its white plastic body is far more amazing.
Use
When evaluating wireless equipment before, even if a router is rated for 1800 or 3000 Mbps of bandwidth, it can’t actually offer such speed to a single user.
This is due to the fact that client hardware can only interact over a single channel, or the uplink to the server is limited by a gigabit LAN port.
The same limitations apply to this hardware. While some bottlenecks have been addressed to make better use of the available bandwidth.
The amount of concurrent streams that this hardware can handle is one of the reasons it costs substantially more than the NWA90AX.
The WAX630S is a dual-radio (dual 4×4+2×2 MIMO) 802.11ax platform with a maximum data throughput of 2975 Mbps.
That’s four streams on 5GHz for 4×4 and two on 2.5GHz for 2×2, with Dynamic Channel Selection (DCS), and Load Balancing. Also, there’s Smart Client Steering making the most of those streams.
Technically, because the uplink is only 2.5GbE, it wouldn’t be able to utilize complete 2975 Mbps if it were for clients accessing network resources. It’s near enough that much of that bandwidth can be used. With enough leftover for clients to communicate with one another over the access point.
Other Enhancements
Organizing the antenna array is another improvement, which decreases the potential of interference from other wireless sources by employing Basic Service Set (BSS) coloration. This feature improves the efficacy of spatial reuse by modifying the antenna layout to prevent signals from interacting with others on the same channel.
Aside from overlapping channel reuse, another issue that companies in cities may face is interference from local 5G/4G antennas. And Zyxel included a filter system inside this router to lessen the impact of those signals.
All of this effort guarantees that people who require solid connections are not hampered by others in the same workplace, in the neighboring building, or from the smartphone tower across the street.
This technology also intends to manage users moving through the facility across many access points effortlessly for those with larger sites.
Management tools, which may be administered locally or worldwide via the Nebular control center service, can perform Load Balancing, which restricts the maximum number of customers associated with each AP as well as the bandwidth that any one client can use.
Performance
It’s difficult to test an access point like the WX630S. The system adjusts in real-time to the signals it senses around it, as well as the ever-changing wireless landscape, making it a shifting target for anyone attempting to analyze it.
As a result, the connection speed of a single client isn’t the most important aspect, because this unit is concerned with the quality of the service rather than the actual top speed that each client obtains.
What we can tell is that client rates of roughly 500mb/s on 5GHz are attainable within the same room and half that in a neighboring room. The 2.4GHz side of this design appears to be sturdy, and the distance where a connection is still viable should easily stretch outside the property if put inside on an external wall.
Zyxel graciously described how this device’s smart antenna’ performs when installed on a wall or ceiling, as well as how it compares to the more costly WAX650S variant.
There is relatively little variation in performance between the two orientations of the WAX630S. The signal performance of the WAX650S is slightly better for wall installation and marginally poorer for ceiling mounting.
Much thought has gone into this hardware’s ability to withstand the barrage of intruding signals that a typical metropolitan installation provides. However, with so many factors at play, only installed on your property can tell if those processes function in that unique scenario.
While Zyxel intended the WAX630S to have the greatest chance possible, there are no assurances in wireless networking.
Conclusion
The WAX630S costs $379.99 as a six-stream capable access point. However, its bigger sibling, the WAX650S, is double that price for an additional two streams.
Ignoring the fact that the WAX650S has a faster CPU, could one of them handle the same volume of traffic as the two WAX630S? No, it’s not even close.
Because, unless there are multiple interference difficulties in the area, each of the WAX630S might utilize totally distinct channels and antenna configurations to avoid interfering with each other. They’d have a 5Gbit Ethernet connection to the network and 12 streams in total.
The trouble is that after you’ve gone down this divide-and-conquer rabbit hole, it’s easy to start thinking that many inexpensive four-stream capable AP could be a better option. It would provide more coverage, throughput, concurrent users, and robustness than a single massively multi-stream device.
Obviously, this solution has drawbacks in terms of cabling, the switch, and a more difficult installation. Even from this vantage point, it appears like the Zyxel WAX630S router is likely expensive, while the WAX650S is significantly more expensive.
If the WAX630S has a saving feature, it’s the 2.5GbE PoE connection. While most 4 access points of this sort only provide 1GbE LAN. However, paying 3 times the price for an extra 2 streams and that 2.5GbE LAN connection is not a good deal.
The additional value provided by this hardware is the subscription-free cloud administration provided by Zyxel with the Nebula control center. The versatile floor or wall installation, and a reputation for producing durable and well-considered gear.
These are solid explanations, but they may not be enough to sway IT Managers’ preferences for this AP.
