Hey everyone, curious what routers you guys use on-stage to wirelessly control ableset.
With one of the acts I work with, the DJ on-stage likes to trigger tracks with an ipad via wifi. We’ve been using a small portable router which works 95% of the time but on larger or more cluttered side-stages the ipad can sometimes have difficulties connecting to the ableset server.
Any suggestions for a heavy duty long range router that can also conveniently fit into a playback rack?
I’m currently going for a wired connection.
Mac>router>ethernet cable> ethernet to lightning adapter>iPad
I could either go Mac>usb c to ethernet adapter>ethernet cable >ethernet to lightning adapter>iPad and not use the router, but it’s there for whenever wireless works😅
Hey @professoroak, welcome to the community!
That’s a good question! Generally, as @agustinvolpe said, I’d avoid using WiFi on stage since there will likely be interference with wireless mics and IEMs.
There are Ethernet dongles available for Lightning and USB-C that you can use to connect your DJ’s iPad to your network, depending on which iPad model you’re using. With some of those, you can inject power as well so you don’t have to worry about battery life.
If you absolutely want to use WiFi, I’d recommend the UniFi AP U6-LR. This is not a router, but just an access point that you can connect to your existing router. You could either connect this to your travel router and disable WiFi on the router or purchase a separate router without WiFi.
Your setup could look something like this:
So far, I’ve had the best experience with the U6 LR. We still experience moments where the connection is a bit unstable every now and then, but all in all it’s been more stable than with other routers.
I should mention that this access point is powered via Ethernet, so you’d likely have to purchase a power injector as well.
I hope this helps!
thanks for the tips!
yea we used to run an ethernet cable to the stage with our old setup… but that 50ft cable was a b***h 
the thing took up half the space in a pelican too
I tried looking into “industrial-grade” routers, but idk enough about networking if it would make an actual difference compared to regular consumer routers
Thanks for the tips everyone. I’m fairly new to ableset and in the process of integrating it into a redundant playback system I’m currently using with a playaudio 12.
Quick question about using a network switch with a redundant setup. Would this switch need to be isolated to ableset connections, or would I be able to use the same switch to additionally network other devices together?
My goal is to use the playaudio 12 or 1u networked with a mioXL via rtp midi to automate some patch switching for a band I’m working with. I’m kind of a networking novice, sorry if this is a dumb question, but I don’t know if everything would still be able to talk to each other through one switch, or if it’d be better to have 2 isolated network switches - 1 for ableset and 1 for the rtp midi connections.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks
Hey @mpeiffer0621, welcome to the forum!
You can use the same switch for AbleSet, RTP MIDI, and other connections between devices. I’d only recommend using an isolated network for Dante and other audio/video over Ethernet solutions.
Let me know if you have any further questions 
Awesome! Thanks Leo!
