HN Reader

This is not for me as I'm not a professional network engineer, but I do want to say that Ubiquiti has made home networking SO fun for me. Everything truly "Just Works."

My setup is definitely more on the prosumer side, but it's been so build out and inspect my network with their tools.

For those outside the IT/networking realms, SFP use uniform connectors for both the networking device and the fiber cable, but the major vendors (Cisco and friends) have used firmware flags and settings to provide vendor lock-in for at least the last 15 years.

It used to be that in the event of a major outage or hardware failure you would need to issue additional debug commands to the effect of "I know this isn't your approved SFP but please just try it," if you were trying to replace a first party SFP with a third party one. TAC would more or less laugh at you and hang up if you sought support.

I'm not sure if this product will _actually_ change any of that, but here's hoping.

Ubiquiti is awesome, but their IPv6 support leaves something to be desired.

I have two ISPs, one with IPv6 (Starlink) and one without (Frontier).

I want to use Frontier for all IPv4, with IPv4 failover to Starlink, and I want to use Starlink only for IPv6.

UniFi networking won’t let you configure this, and I’m not going to SSH in to my UDM to manually set routes, that will be lost at next boot.

FiberStore (fs.com) have offered vendor neutral and reprogrammable SFPs and other modules for years (they're also dramatically less expensive).

Early this year I started redoing the backbone of my home network with 10 gb. Some of it's fiber, some of it's 10 gb copper Ethernet. It's been genuinely frustrating the weird incompatibilities between switches and SFP+ modules.

All my switches are MikroTik. My SFP+ modules are MikroTik, Ubiquiti, and some 3rd party ones from before I knew better.

I've had modules that will only run at gigabit in one switch but will give me the full 10 gb in another. I've had modules that refuse to work in one MikroTik switch but will happily work in a different MikroTik switch. I've just had a world of pain.

I've got everything basically working after months of fiddling and I'm inclined to just not… touch… anything.

I love this. However, I'm very interested to see the maths on "offering up to 1000% savings compared to industry standards"

The technical information for this thing seems to be light on the ground. What kind of diagnostic stats are provided? How is it figuring out true Rx/Tx power without a light meter?

Also, reading "Just insert any brand’s SFP or QSFP module, select Copy, and insert any UI module to write the profile." suggests that this only works to reprogram UI optics

Isn't this exactly the same as flexoptix and FS have been doing for years?

Interesting, that's pretty much the same thing I developed 6 years ago, though with a nicer display and QSFP slot: https://github.com/carrotIndustries/hubble/

Does it only clone the EEPROM from one SFP module to another (so you need to physically posess both), or can you write arbitrary data?

And does it only write to SFP modules from Ubiquiti (looking at you FS BOX)?

Another tool you can use for this (without a nice UI) is the SFP Buddy: https://oopselectronics.com/product/SFPB

The same excitement I used to feel in the late '00s/early '10s for Apple is what I now feel for Unifi. I must have it all. They are capitalizing on autism better than anyone else in the history of the world, except for maybe Lego.

UniFi SFP modules work fine in Dell and Synology servers, so contrary to most of the anecdotes in this thread I’ve always just bought the 20 packs and had no issues.

Didn’t need reprogramming.

The quality is fine, oldest modules more than 5 years old and only 1 failure in 100.

"The SFP Wizard is a pocket-sized powerhouse that checks the health of any SFP or QSFP module and programs them in just seconds."

I never knew you could program them. How smart are they? Are there ones capable of running Linux?

some context that's perhaps not obvious to non-networking people: essentially all networking hardware above 1G doesn't have rj45 or fibre ports in it, it has holes that you put modules in, "SFP+" modules for 10G, "SFP28" for 28gig networking, etc.

most manufacturers of devices - the things with the holes, NICs, switches, routers - make their devices only officially work with modules that claim to be manufactured by that same manufacturer. so, you can either buy modules from that manufacturer, or buy modules from some other company (e.g. fs.com, 10gtek) who programs the modules to claim that they are from that manufacturer. "officially" can mean anything from "we won't help you if you open a support case" to "the device will make a whiney log message on boot if it's not one of our modules" to "it simply doesn't work unless you hack an EEPROM on the device".

this is somewhat annoying, since it means you need to buy specific modules for specific devices, you can't just keep a pile of SFP+ 10G-LR modules around, you need some "Intel SFP+ 10G-LR" and some "Cisco SFP+ 10G-LR", etc.

so, these third party manufacturers of the modules, like fs.com and 10gtek, will also sell you programmers for the modules, which lets you change what manufacturer the module claims made it. these programmers have been, historically and hilariously, tied to the actual manufacturer of the modules! so you can buy some 10G-LR SFP+ modules from fs.com and a fs.com programmer to set make some "Intel" and some "Cisco", but if you buy some 10gtek 10G-LR modules, you would need to buy a 10gtek programmer.

~so, this device that Ubiquiti has made is the meta-programmer - it can apparently program any module, from any actual manufacturer, to claim to be made by any manufacturer.~

edit: the post seems deliberately confusing - what they are actually selling is a device that can re-program Ubiquiti SFP+ modules by copying the manufacturer code from another SFP+ module that you insert into the programmer. so it's the same as what fs.com and all the other sell, but Ubiquiti's is ~1/10th the price (e.g. https://www.fs.com/uk/c/fs-box-3389).

Anybody go through the trouble of outfitting their entire home/condo with fiber? Probably overkill for residential but I am also thinking it might need to be shrouded in EMT conduit

Most innovative and disruptive (and generally just profoundly interesting) company that hardly anyone knows about in the grand scheme of things.

Seems to have only basic usefulness as a diagnostic tool.

> Instantly tests SFP and QSFP module health, including Rx/Tx power.

Most SFP modules will fail due to heat, like LED bulbs. So an instant test is of course instantly useful, but not indicative of production-use SFP health.

As a programming tool, of course it's awesome.

Of course, in typical ubiquiti fashion, it's out of stock with no way to backorder.

Way more affordable than other solutions, like the $370 FS BOX from fs.com:

https://www.fs.com/products/96657.html

Which, while it works, is the poster child for how NOT to develop desktop software as it's a really shitty .NET GUI app they shoehorned onto non-Windows platforms.

Just bought an SFP+ module that works with Cisco, Dell, Juniper but won't work with Unifi. Is this supposed to test all generic modules even the cheap Chinese brands ?

Why is this spam on the front page?

WTF is 'SFP'?

Sold out already.

Looks cool but their text on that page is very clearly written by LLM and pretty exhausting to read.

This will make the life soo easy for many

>updates via the UniFi mobile app

Oh come on!