EnGenius ECW230 WiFi 6 Wireless Access Point Review

The EnGenius ECW230 is the current flagship Cloud Managed indoor wireless access point, offering most of the expected features from the WiFi 6 standard, such as OFDMA, Target Wake Time (for IoT devices), MU-MIMO (4×4) and the device is also the only one (so far) from the series to have a 2.5 Gigabit PoE port. Yes, the WiFi 6 and the 2.5Gb port should go well hand in hand since a Gigabit port would have limited the true potential of the wireless access point, but it’s important to understand from the get-go that this device is targeted towards SMBs and not really suitable for the consumer audience.

The reason is mostly the software which is built to help manage multiple sites with more than one wireless access points and to use it, the user needs to be comfortable with the Cloud management platform (which again, is an advantage mostly for SMBs).
Of course, the EnGenius Cloud platform, even though it’s following the enterprise guidelines, it’s still perfectly usable for home users (the tech enthusiasts), especially thanks to the app. I know that the adoption of any new technology in the enterprise world is perceived as being a lot slower than on the consumer market, but a lot of businesses already use Ethernet switches with multi-Gigabit ports, so an access point that can leverage this advantage is always a welcomed addition to the network.

That being said, let’s have a closer look at the EnGenius ECW230 and see whether they got it right implementing the new WiFi 6 technology.
Note: The EnGenius ECW230 is pretty much identical to the EWS377AP (hardware-wise), the difference being that the latter is On Premises AP, while the former is purely Cloud Managed.

Design and Build Quality

I have recently tested the EnGenius ECW120 which is a part of the same Cloud managed indoor WAP series and I was surprised to see that the far more powerful ECW230 is actually more compact, managing to achieve a very unobtrusive look when mounted on the ceiling. And that’s mainly because the case is very slim, despite sporting some generous proportions (it measures 8.27 x 8.27 x 1.31 inches) and has a flat, minimalist top. Indeed, besides the light gray logo and icons, and the slim LED bar, there is nothing else going on the top of the device, the visible section being entirely covered by a white matte finish. While the top part is made of plastic, the bottom is metallic (zinc alloy, maybe) and it’s covered by a gray finish, relying on four screws to keep the two sections together. Since this is a ceiling-mount wireless access point, there are no external antennas (it does have an intricate system inside the case) and, on the bottom side, there are two sections that allow mounting the device using the provided brackets or relying on a couple of screws (in case you want to put it on the wall).

The slim profile does help give the the ECW230 an unassuming look and I do think it’s one of the best designed WiFi 6 wireless access points out there, but what about the heat management? More often than not, slim wireless access points (such as the Ubiquiti UAP-AC-Pro) suffer from poor heat management since there is little room inside and sometimes, the case is completely sealed. And, at first glance, the EnGenius ECW230 may suffer the same fate since the only cut-outs that I could see are on the bottom, near the mounting ears. The good news is that after I opened the case, I saw that EnGenius has added thermal conductive pads on almost every chip, as well as aluminum covers to dissipate the heat. I also saw that the IPQ8072A chipset has a large pad that gets in direct contact with the metallic case in order to push the heat towards outside.

Despite all that, the metallic case still gets warm to hot exactly were it gets in contact with the chip pad. The LED bar may be subtle, but the LEDs are very bright (you can turn off each of them individually from the controller) and, from the left, there’s the Power LED, the LAN LED, as well as the 2.4GHz and the 5GHz LEDs. The Power LED will blink orange until you pair the access point to the Cloud controller (at which point, it will become steady orange), while the rest of the LEDs should be solid blue, unless something goes wrong with the WiFi network or the LAN connection to the router/switch. As for the ports section, things aren’t that ideal. You can find it on the bottom in a carved-in rectangular section and, unfortunately, there is no cut-out for the cables. It’s still not a big issue considering that the mounting ears slightly protrude outwards, but it’s not the most elegant solution.

That being, said, here, you’ll be able to find a small recessed Reset button (press and hold it for 10 seconds to return the access point to its default factory settings), a 2.5 Gigabit PoE port (it supports 802.3at PoE and it requires a maximum budget of 19.5W) and a 12VDC/2A power port. You can use a non-PoE port for connecting the access point to the router and a power cable to power the device, but, ideally, you should either rely on a PoE Ethernet switch or on a PoE adapter. Unfortunately, besides the mounting brackets and the ECW230 itself, nothing else is provided in the package, so you have to purchase what you need separately (and it’s not really an inexpensive wireless access point). Other than that, I have also noticed that there is a Kensington slot on the side of the device.

The article was taken from MBReviews.com, written by Mark B

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