Good alternative devices for VT-Rachel micro-server are the GL-iNet products AR150, AR300M and AR750
These devices use OpenWrt natively and so are suitable for flashing with third party firmware, which is an increasing issue with devices that use proprietary OEM operating systems being locked down.
AR150 is entry level with 64MB RAM, single 2.4GHz radio, non-MIMO. (Same spec as MP02)
AR300M has 128MB RAM, and 2x2 MIMO 2.4GHz radio
AR750 has 128MB RAM, 2x2 MIMO 2.4GHz radio, 5GHz radio, and supports both USB and micro SD memory storage.
The AR300M is a good basic device for classroom use as the additional RAM and the MIMO radio improve performance for large numbers of client devices such as in a classroom (eg 30 students attached).
The main library content, plus any local content is stored on a USB device. (This may be an SD card in a USB adapter).
The AR750 adds microSD support, which may be used for the main library content, leaving the USB available for setting up local content.
It also has 5GHz radio which can be used to mesh the devices together to form a network to share an upstream Internet connection for example. It may also be used for a second AP on the less congested 5GHz band.
In single radio devices, mesh is also available, but the radio resources are shared between the AP and Mesh functions. The dual radio devices allow these functions to be independent and run at full bandwidth.
Attached is the VT-RACHEL home page showing the content we are using for current deployments. This content is largely taken from the OER2GO web site (
http://oer2go.org/) and amounts to some 40GB of data and so we are using 64GB microSD cards for the library storage. There is 20GB of spare space left for additional content.
Regards
Terry