Further Adventures in Power-Over-Ethernet Land: POE Extenders

For the past month or so we’ve had a couple of foster dogs on the property. They are a Husky and a Rottweiler, both less than a year old, who were wandering nearby and I (unthinkingly) took them in. This has caused me to want improved coverage of the yard by our security cameras. I need to keep an eye on them so they don’t become destructive.

In particular, I want to add another IP camera to our front porch. The two existing cameras were intended to monitor our on-street parking. So, they are west facing, pointing toward the street. I’d like to add one looking at the porch and the front door. That view would include several chairs. The Rottweiler is inclined to play with the cushions from the chairs on the porch, which I simply cannot allow.

We’re a Unifi House

Each of the existing cameras has a Cat 5e home run to the Ubiquiti Unifi POE+ switch in the central hallway of the house. I selected the Gen 2 managed Unifi switches for the best combination of price, POE+ and a fanless design. I like silent.

While I could run another Ethernet lead, that would be tedious, and hardly seems necessary given the limited bandwidth and power requirement of our Grandstream IP cameras.

These are not the latest and greatest IP cameras, but they are affordable, and we have a few installed. I also have a few on the shelf. They were part of a temporary setup used to look in on the cats when last we went on vacation.

Since we are a Unifi house, I’ve got a couple of Unifi Switch Flex Minis installed. These are cute little managed, 5-port switches that can be powered via an Ethernet to link to the core switch. However, they don’t pass POE onward to other devices. On that basis, they’re not all that useful in this application.

So, I thought I’d try a POE extender. These are basically small, unmanaged switches that accept POE+ input and provide POE output on 2-3 ports. They’re only 100 Mbps, but that’s more then enough for our cameras. It’s passing the power from core the switch that’s really useful.

Further, they’re quite cheap. A 4-port POE extender is under $25 on Amazon. It has a maximum power budget of 30 watts drawn from the core switch, delivering up to 8 watts per port. That’s more than enough for non-motorized IP cameras or a Wi-Fi access point.

The wee switch has two mounting mechanisms; screw-to-the-wall or DIN rail. It was a simple matter to screw it to the wall in the attic above the porch. Then I made the necessary changes to add the new camera.

Extending Our Wi-Fi

While in the attic, I also added a Ubiquiti Unifi AP AC LITE over the porch. This has long been on my to-do list. It overcomes the fact that bronze mesh in our west-facing window screens degrades Wi-Fi coverage in the front yard. This new AP in the attic above the porch is beyond the windows, so Wi-Fi reach into the yard is substantially improved.

I was able to rearrange the cabling so the AP has a home run to the core switch. Its performance is not limited by the 100 Mbps POE extender. That device serves only the trio of IP cameras.

Improved Wi-Fi in the front yard is especially useful relative to the our multi-zone music playback arrangement. The PiCorePlayer music players are hard-wired to the network, but remote control is by way of Squeeze Control on my Android phone. Prior to this new AP, there were times when I had to open the front screen door to establish a solid Wi-Fi connection to change tracks or adjust volume.

Summary

The camera on the porch is just a start. I will surely install a couple more cameras to improve coverage around the yard.

The inexpensive, little POE extender has allowed me to add the porch camera without pulling a new Ethernet lead. By providing power and connectivity to all three IP cameras it freed up a home-run for the new Wi-Fi AP. Best of all, everything is working. I call that a win.