Linksys announced the first Pro Series Wi-Fi access point with the launch of the Wireless-AC Dual Band Access Point (LAPAC1750PRO). The new Pro Series access point offers advanced features to equip Small and Medium Businesses (SMB) with more management capabilities and better performance at an affordable price point. The new model supports cluster management to simplify management of multiple access points from one single interface and a fully customizable captive portal for businesses to welcome visitors in a branded environment. “We are introducing the Pro Series to our Wi-Fi access point lineup so SMBs could take advantage of Enterprise grade features at price points they can afford,” said Steven Lin, director of Linksys business products. “Small businesses usually have to choose between an over-engineered enterprise access point or a consumer grade Wi-Fi product to run their office network. These choices can provide too much or too little of what a small business needs. Our Pro Series Access Point provides the balance of advanced features and affordability that small businesses need to run a productive business environment.” The implemented Captive Portal feature enables secure guest Wi-Fi access that is fully customizable to the company needs. The hotspot welcome page can be fully branded in company livery, company logo and background image for a more professional look and feel. The new Linksys Pro Series access point includes two Gigabit Ethernet ports – one especially built for link aggregation which helps to combine multiple network connections to help increase throughput and provide redundancy in case one of connections fail. The Linksys Pro Series Wireless-AC Dual Band Access Point supports AP clustering to simplify management of multiple access points in a network. A cluster provides a single point of administration for up to 16 access points and lets administrators view, deploy, configure, and secure the wireless network as a single entity rather than a series of separate wireless devices. The Linksys Business Wireless-AC Dual Band Access Point supports the latest 802.11ac technology, which provides up to a three times* performance increase from 802.11n. Enhancements such as wider 80 MHz channels provide greater data bandwidth while operating in the less-crowded 5 GHz band space. – SG
