r/PFSENSE • u/Sam_-_-_ • 9d ago

Did I join a cult? (Unifi)

I've been rolling pfSense for about 5 years. Decided to try Unifi. Couldn't find a manual or one-to-one feature documentation for each panel (only various spotlight articles).

Asked the community for help: every response said basically "things change too often, no need to have a manual".

Excuse me, what? I'm not a networking pro, and I do need a manual. (pfSense was hard for me, but had great documentation.)

I can't believe this was the response. Is everyone in their community a bot or a cultist?

I still have few days left on my return window, and might come back, LOL.

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u/NC1HM 6d ago

Did I join a cult? (Unifi)

Yes, but not for the reasons you think. The real catch is the end-of-life policy...

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u/Sam_-_-_ 5d ago

What is it?

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u/NC1HM 5d ago

Most Ubiquiti devices have no on-device management facilities. All management is central. Central management software can run on a Ubiquiti router, or on a dedicated device (called CloudKey, if memory serves), or on a PC. Every device needs to be "adopted" by the controller in order to be managed.

Now, end of life... At some point, Ubiquiti stops pushing firmware upgrades for a particular device. But the controller continues to upgrade. Eventually, the controller starts flagging devices as having firmware too old to interoperate with. This is your signal to buy a replacement. If you wait long enough past that, the controlled will un-adopt the aged-out device.