[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: So Long, Thanks For All The Help

I received a new networking setup today.
Ubiquiti Cloud Gateway Max and 2 U7 Pro Wall APs.
I also got table stands for the APs so they can be placed where I want them.
First, the packaging was Apple-like. Off to a good start. Build quality and the finish was equally great. Why, they even have a small level on the wall mount template!
So, powered off my AX86U and the AX58U and installed the new gear.
Power it up and after a 10 minute updating session, logged in to the app.
All sorts of information available in the dashboard. It identified my Verizon FIOS and configured things great on its own.
Took me a second to get IPv6 up, but that was on me. Not at all familiar with the new device.
I have a goodly number of IoT devices. On ASUS, they would not accept WPA3. Some were always disconnecting even with WPA2.
Nothing of the sort now. Everyone is connected and have not dropped in the time I've been live with the new kit.
I run a few servers and getting the firewall set for them was a piece of cake, took maybe 5 minutes.
I have stats galore on everything from the router through the radios to the clients. Who, what, when. Including application use.

I had tried a BE router earlier this year and it was a miserable experience, so much so that it went back for a refund within a week.
Look, if you are going to spend that level of cash on one of those, do yourself a favor and take a look at what's available elsewhere.

I couldn't be happier with my new gear.

So, after a long run with Merlin, thanks. For ASUS, humbug.

[Assistant]
Congratulations and happy networking, GHammer! Good equipment choice.

One thing you'll like the most - no reboots on configuration changes. Your system can be up and running while you add networks, change DHCP ranges, assign reservations, change wireless power, add firewall rules, add filtering, etc. You may see "Getting ready..." in the console for few seconds and it continues. I never had to reboot my Cloud Gateway Ultra since it was powered up first time and the software on it was updated.

You may also notice similar to Asuswrt-Merlin + Scripts features are actually much easier to setup and the UI will guide you. If something is greyed out and unavailable the info button will tell you what you need to change or to have running in order to use this feature. Some things will be done automatically for you like DNS interception the moment you activate ad-blocking or network isolation the moment you select Guest Network type.

Stop by SNB Forums for a reset or two...

GHammer said:
I couldn't be happier with my new gear.

So, after a long run with Merlin, thanks. For ASUS, humbug.

You are always welcome here - remember, you do not have to be an Asus Router owner to be a contributing member here on SNB forums.

Just to make it more clear for the readers:

The Ubiquiti equipment @GHammer purchased is total cost of $705 along with 2x PoE 30W injectors and 2x Table Stands.

1x Cloud Gateway Max - $199
2x U7 Pro Wall - $398
2x PoE+ 30W Adapter - $30
2x U7 Pro Wall Table Stand - $78

Folks looking at Gaming marketed home router for $600-800 may want to think twice before clicking that "Buy Now" button.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: GL.iNet Flint 2 (GL-MT6000)

Hi,

I have recently bought GL.iNet Flint 2 (GL-MT6000). I know this forum from my previous router Asus AC66U (which by the way died in multiple ways - firstly - power cord socket was damaged, but worked barely - sometimes, "no touching", secondly - overloading of the power supply - when router was turned on, power supply reacted in powering itself off 9 times over 10, thirdly - it started to "lock up" in all ways, eth, wifi being completely unreachable - it could be memory failing inside or overheating, i dont know, but it became completely unreliable). Since AC66U died in so many ways, and also I had TWO top tier motherboards from Asus that also were faulty and Asus did what they could not to admit that (ultimately, seller returned the cash), so I am now not a fanboy of Asus at all. And I strongly advise not to buy Asus to anyone, I had only three Asus products, and two were broken from the start, third died over time (where my other old routers are still alive like WRT54GL or WRT150 etc).

So, to the point...

I was searching for the replacement, but really reliable one. On this forum, I don't really know why, there are only two subforums/groups - Asus WiFi and Netgear WiFi. This is really strange considering how many types of routers are there. It would be nice at least to create subforum/group like "Other WiFi" or something to have subgroups like "GL.iNet routers", "TPLink routers" etc. Just my 3 cents.

Anyways, I am leaving this post for the future buyers of the GL.iNet Flint 2 (GL-MT6000).

Router came with the firmware already old, so I made an upgrade to the official GL.iNet latest but supported (they also provide latest OpenWRT, but they do not support it officially).

The first impression was that something is off. After half a day of perfectly functioning 2.5Gb LAN, something started to slow down sometimes, and after a whlie router started to be inaccessible. After a reset, few minutes ok, then again, lockup. Router was then blinking its led's like it lost WAN connection, but it also was completely unresponsive on LAN (waited 30 minutes to be sure).
After long and painful investigation it occured that faulty 2.5Gb LAN cable/connection could completely lockup the router like that. Strange, but this was the case. After replacing the cable, everything was fine at least a week after which I have flashed latest OpenWRT op24, so I do not know now how's the original firmware performing for a longer period.

But before the upgrade, there was also strange behavior with the speed of LAN. I could saturate 2.5Gbit connection from PC to router no more than 1.3Gbit or even worse (upload direction), where I was sure that cable is ok (tested on different hardware, PC to PC). The other way around was ok, 2.3Gbit, but when iperf was serving on the router, and PC worked as a client, always 1.3 and on router cpu went crazy. Support from the GL.iNet couln't help.
Also there was a problem with wget grabbing packages for opkg (curl did it fine). There is some whisper on the net that its something connected with wget ssl connections faulty on old frimware, but I did not care at that moment, it was GL.iNet fixing both or refund.

But my colleague suggested to flash the latest OpenWRT op24 and showed me, that his GL.iNet was performing well with the 2.5Gbit LAN after that. So i tried that. And I was completely astonished... Not only LAN went working perfectly with 2.3Gbit throughput, but also wget was fixed, WLAN enhanced (new features, less errors, better speed) and so on.

Since then, everything was performing great. For now, I have only one question with my WiFi which is working fine with PC, but not with the Xiaomi 14 phone. Xiaomi 14 goes as much as 800Mbit and no more on the identical wireless parameters as PC (same place also), where PC throughput is around 1.6Gbit. No change helps. And afaik, Asrock Taichi Carrara motherboard has worse WiFi hardware than Xiaomi 14 but I may be wrong.

So for today, I strongly advise for everyone who wants or bought GL.iNet Flint2 to simply drop the official firmware and install the latest OpenWRT provided by GL.iNet (this is a merge of the latest OpenWRT and the GL.iNet GUI, so you will not loose any functionality from GL.iNet, also you can backup all the settings and restore after flash - as far as I remember, it was also done automagically).

[Assistant]
Glinet has its own forum, admins and employees provide support on daily basis.

GL.iNet
OpenWrt Wi-Fi Routers for Things
forum.gl-inet.com

Maybe you did not read carefully so i will quote here myself: "Support from the GL.iNet couln't help." And i can add: "on daily basis". I have exchanged with them about 30 messages to diagnose anything and they did not have any clue about any problem i had. I solved everything myself. So no, thank you for your advice but no.

KGB7 said:
Lose the attitude. Thanks.
What do you mean by this? PS. Use private mesage for private stuff, thanks


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: WiFi 8 News

Some WiFi 8 News
(..it wont be faster then WiFi 7):

Meet Wi-Fi 8, which will trade speed for a more reliable experience
Wi-Fi 8, the next generation of Wi-Fi, isn't due to be released until several years from now. But we already know what Wi-Fi 8 is going to look like, and how it will improve over Wi-Fi 7.
www.pcworld.com

[Assistant]
- Wifi 8 is coming and it will be...
- [inserts Batman-slapping-Robin meme]


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Rebooting Routers

I've set a plug in timer to reboot my Vodafone router twice a week. [This is after long term testing showing certain devices may disconnect after a few weeks]

I noticed my MotionEye Raspberry Pi stopped uploading photos after that, so this now has a plug in timer with a reboot slightly later than the Vodafone router. Past experience shows Raspberry Pis are capable of crashing anyway, so I should have a timer.

I also have an older Asus router connected to the Vodafone router. I noticed this was very slow to re-establish a LAN service after I powered off the Vodafone router to insert the timer. Long after the Vodafone wifi was working. However, the Asus did re-establish a connection at some point after the timed reboot this morning at 3:00 am.

Would it be wise to also put a timer to reboot the Asus router ? The same timer as for the Vodafone router, or one set a little later to ensure the Vodafone router is connected first ?

[Getting rid of the Asus router would be sensible, but I don't have time for extensive testing before my next holiday. So that's a job for 2025. Right now, I want a reliable result with the minimum of changes]

[Assistant]
Repeatedly power cycling an Asus router is generally a bad idea as there's a chance it may corrupt the flash memory settings (or any attached USB devices). If you need to regularly reboot it use the software option in the webUI.

There is no reason you should have to keep rebooting. Take the time and figure out what is causing your issues.

ColinTaylor said:
Repeatedly power cycling an Asus router is generally a bad idea as there's a chance it may corrupt the flash memory settings (or any attached USB devices). If you need to regularly reboot it use the software option in the webUI.
Thank you. I've enabled the software reboot scheduler on the Asus.

I cannot find a software reboot option on the Vodafone router, so that remains with a plug in timer.

Analog-1 said:
There is no reason you should have to keep rebooting. Take the time and figure out what is causing your issues.
In principle, I agree.
However, checking the data, as far as I can tell, my Vodafone router has only had the problem once in the last two months. At that time, rebooting the router fixed the problem.

Troubleshooting a problem which occurs once every two months is difficult AND unfortunately, I don't have time to prove I've fixed the problem before my next holiday. I want the system to work when I am away.

However, I am thinking that one power cycle of the Vodafone router per week will be sufficient & a software cycle of the Asus router.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Real life utility of SoC speed and RAM size in routers

I've always been thinking that a more recent wireless router is a good thing by itself, because of better hardware. But obviously, lots of people seem to get by fine running very old routers with 40+ clients connected on various protocols, generations, and bands, tons of network activity both high speeds and with lots of connections. I am talking in a consumer context here, home routers, but in the possibly most demanding home use cases that can be imagined.

So I guess my question is, what is the practical extent of an SoC with more cores and higher frequency, and larger amounts of RAM clocked at higher speeds? Did everything get 'good enough' at some point (2016, 2020? 2024)? Can some types of common network activities overload a relatively modern router? 50+ wireless clients? 1000 torrents? Several PC's syncing backups of thousands of small files at the same time? Would latency suffer? Reading the CPU and RAM utilization graphs in my Asus routers' interface never really seemed to give me any insights as they always seemed low no matter what I was doing.

[Assistant]
Here's the thing: in most routers of this class, performance-critical stuff happens in custom chips and the data never passes through the CPU at all. So traditional specs like CPU clock rate and RAM size don't matter a bit, at least not for any case that the hardware acceleration logic can handle. That hardware is all proprietary and the manufacturers don't want to talk about it, even if there were any standardized performance metrics for it, which there aren't. So you're really flying pretty blind if you're hoping that published specs will tell you much.

I have seen some router makers quote throughput on quasi-standard test cases like iperf3, but they're invariably talking about wired performance. Wireless performance has so many variables besides the router itself that it'd be hard to quote reproducible numbers anyway.

In general, the main CPU in the SoC will have little to no impact on LAN/wifi network performance. The heavy lifting is handled by the wifi chip itself. Higher end wireless chips even have their own dedicated CPU most of the time, to better handle things like encryption or MIMO.

The main CPU will mostly impact WAN performance (as it will handle NAT), or other services you run on the router (like VPN, SMB sharing, QoS, traffic analysis). NAT is generally offloaded to a separate network packet processor, but it will still require some amount of CPU usage - and that amount will explode if you run any feature that prevents the use of the packet accelerator, requiring the CPU to do the full heavy lifting of processing these packets.

The RAM mostly affect these running services as well, as very little memory is needed per connected client. That's why you can have a router working just fine with 128 MB of RAM, with higher end routers having up to 2 GB. Having hundreds of simultaneous NAT entries (for instance from running a heavy torrent) may require more RAM, but I doubt any of the modern routers currently on the market would run out of RAM in these scenarios.

Thanks, that was educational! I guess the wifi/custom hardware also get better with time, but if I understand it correctly that is independent of the main CPU and we can hardly know the secret sauce without benchmarking, or even just observing it in very complex and hard to reproduce workloads. This is much harder to keep updated on spec wise than PC hardware then


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Router Mess

Currently have my AT&T ONT leading to my AT&T WiFi Gateway. Next to it, I have one ASUS router (connected to the gateway via Ethernet cable) that serves as my “Primary Point” for two other ASUS routers that form my Mesh network downstairs.

I ran one CAT6 Ethernet cable from my Primary Point ASUS router to my second floor of house. From this one Ethernet cable, I’m thinking of getting a switch in order to split it to two other routers. One router will lead to my office for work computer & TV, and the second will lead to the loft’s TV and the PS5. I would like these two routers to work as a mesh network as well.

So in total, I will have four separate ASUS routers connected to my Primary Point ASUS router (two downstairs as mesh network, and two upstairs via Ethernet… I hope).

4500 sq ft home of six, with many WiFi blocking walls/material/appliances. We have over 50 devices connected via WiFi from cameras, to Alexas, phones, iPads, laptops, etc. Hence the need to wire some devices.

Need some guidance on what would be the best setup. Will a switch support two separate routers? Should I connect the two upstairs routers to the gateway instead?

[Assistant] Best configuration is Main Node in Router Mode connected directly to the ONT (WAN side) and if a switch is being used (LAN side) it has to pass VLANs to other Nodes for the purpose of Guest Network propagation. If you can remove the ISP provided Gateway - you don’t need it.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Need help with Transmission in OpenWRT.

I installed Transmission on GL.iNet Slate AX router and it its working well for most part, but im new to OpenWRT and I can't figure out why download speeds are slow.

I have tested same exact dozen torrents on my Intel based MacBook which saturates my wan speeds, but the download speeds via Transmission on the Slate router are all over the place. A lot of times it won't even use half the bandwidth. CPU usage on the router is around 2%.

Here is the config for the Transmission on the router. Please let me know if I need to change anything.

Cheers.

Code:
{
    "alt-speed-down": 50,
    "alt-speed-enabled": false,
    "alt-speed-time-begin": 540,
    "alt-speed-time-day": 127,
    "alt-speed-time-enabled": false,
    "alt-speed-time-end": 1020,
    "alt-speed-up": 50,
    "bind-address-ipv4": "0.0.0.0",
    "bind-address-ipv6": "::",
    "blocklist-enabled": false,
    "blocklist-url": "http://www.example.com/blocklist",
    "cache-size-mb": 2,
    "dht-enabled": true,
    "download-dir": "/tmp/mountd/disk1_part1/Movies/1Temp",
    "download-queue-enabled": true,
    "download-queue-size": 20,
    "encryption": 1,
    "idle-seeding-limit": 30,
    "idle-seeding-limit-enabled": false,
    "incomplete-dir": "//Downloads",
    "incomplete-dir-enabled": false,
    "invalid-key": false,
    "lazy-bitfield-enabled": true,
    "lpd-enabled": false,
    "message-level": 1,
    "peer-congestion-algorithm": "",
    "peer-id-ttl-hours": 6,
    "peer-limit-global": 1000,
    "peer-limit-per-torrent": 100,
    "peer-port": 62983,
    "peer-port-random-high": 65535,
    "peer-port-random-low": 49152,
    "peer-port-random-on-start": true,
    "peer-socket-tos": "default",
    "pex-enabled": true,
    "port-forwarding-enabled": true,
    "preallocation": 0,
    "prefetch-enabled": true,
    "queue-stalled-enabled": true,
    "queue-stalled-minutes": 30,
    "ratio-limit": 2,
    "ratio-limit-enabled": false,
    "rename-partial-files": true,
    "rpc-authentication-required": false,
    "rpc-bind-address": "0.0.0.0",
    "rpc-enabled": true,
    "rpc-host-whitelist": "",
    "rpc-host-whitelist-enabled": false,
    "rpc-password": "{a051a45912396255bb914dc6b01e75a8d4fbf92el4HSeDSC",
    "rpc-port": 9091,
    "rpc-url": "/transmission/",
    "rpc-username": "",
    "rpc-whitelist": "127.0.0.1,::1",
    "rpc-whitelist-enabled": false,
    "scrape-paused-torrents-enabled": true,
    "script-torrent-done-enabled": false,
    "script-torrent-done-filename": "",
    "seed-queue-enabled": false,
    "seed-queue-size": 10,
    "speed-limit-down": 100,
    "speed-limit-down-enabled": false,
    "speed-limit-up": 350,
    "speed-limit-up-enabled": true,
    "start-added-torrents": true,
    "trash-original-torrent-files": false,
    "umask": 18,
    "upload-slots-per-torrent": 10,
    "utp-enabled": true,
    "watch-dir-enabled": false
}

[Assistant]
Update.

I got it working after performing a clean install, but two hours later the speeds went back down the drain again. Im guessing either OpenWrt 21 is outdated or Transmission app needs a lot of work.

When I download torrents on my laptop, I see +2,000 seeds and connect to a hundred under a minute. On the router, I only see about 150 seeds using same exact torrent/s and connect to 40-60 seeds, even after deleting the torrent and adding it again.

Maybe in six months they'll make necessary improvements? Time will tell.

Cheers.

KGB7 said:
I have tested same exact dozen torrents on my Intel based MacBook which saturates my wan speeds, but the download speeds via Transmission on the Slate router are all over the place. A lot of times it won't even use half the bandwidth. CPU usage on the router is around 2%.

You're likely running out of user memory - cut the number of parallel torrents and peers per torrent

It looks like also posted the same for advice on a r/openwrt forum about the same time.
Over there one of the respondants said the router in question does not have support for hardware off-load and will suffer in this configuration. Suggested an alt device which the OP said they now had on order.
Pending your results with the newly arrived GL-MT3000.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: TP-Link routers are being taken over by botnet

Depending on the source, some 8-16k known TP-Link routers have been taken over by a botnet.
Upgrade your firmware, if there is one, or throw away that old TP-Link router.

Thousands of hacked TP-Link routers used in yearslong account takeover attacks
The botnet is being skillfully used to launch “highly evasive” password-spraying attacks.
arstechnica.com

[Assistant]
Not surprised. Seems like bad guys are not happy with just a botnet running anymore.

Malware damaging ASUS routers?
This malware damaging Asus routers has to be described in a sticky thread with a warning sign! Update: Asus is releasing patched firmware for multiple models. Check for firmware updates! The changelog for most firmware releases contains the following: 1. Strengthened input validation and data...
www.snbforums.com

I don't know what it is, but it damages the routers and some are out of warranty or EoL.

I have not looked into the specifics of the tp-link exploit but instead of e-waste wouldn't it make more sense to install openwrt (assuming the exploit is firmware and not haredware vector)?

slidermike said:
I have not looked into the specifics of the tp-link exploit but instead of e-waste wouldn't it make more sense to install openwrt (assuming the exploit is firmware and not haredware vector)?
Well, I did suggest to upgrade the firmware, I didn't specify to what.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User] Title: Do changing antennas ona router or broadcaster matter? Here is the proof

[Assistant]
Yeah, great for 5G mobile but the do nothing for the wifi. Thought I'd just make that clear to save any confusion here with it being a wifi subforum.

I always caution against replace vendor antenna's...

Top vendors do have a clue about RF for the bands their devices cover, and there is the regulatory aspect as well..


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: AT&T BGW320 Gateway + Asus or Netgear Router results in unexpected geo-block from various websites.

Hello,

I have ATT Fiber with BGW320 Gateway when directly connected to a router results in corresponding devices on the network (mobile/laptop/desktop) being unable to access a variety of websites like sling.com and other innocuos websites. The error message when browsing the web is that you are located in a non-US country so you're blocked. I am in the united states. This problem happens with either an ASUS Wireless Router or a Netgear Wireless Router. If I directly physically connect the device to the AT&T Gateway then I can access these websites, if I use any router connected to the gateway I get the blocked message.

ATT Support was less than helpful indicating since direct physical connection or ATT wifi was operational that this was a router problem. Although the same issue happens with all routers connected to the gateway.

I'm wondering if there is some setting I *must* now set on the Gateway in additon to pass through to resolve this, or if there is something needing to be configured on routers when connecting to a gateway.

Thanks for any advice or suggestions.

[Assistant]
I might be helpful to know how the router is networked to the gateway. What is the WAN IP in the router's interface?

Make sure you setup the BGW320 Gateway in passthrough mode and make sure the mac address of the Routers wan port is on the list

You'll get an IP from fixed IP AT&T, should resoulve your issue Netgear or ASUS.
Same as when you connect a devices directly ot the Gateway.

On the Router end, in my case ASUS AX88u set up the WAN to something similar

If tyou want IPV6 then you can also do this

If all is OK you'll get to the bottom of the Gateways status page and see the assigned (public) address like this "x.x.x.x / passthrough" or "Device List"

Geoblocked24 said:
This problem happens with either an ASUS Wireless Router or a Netgear Wireless Router. If I directly physically connect the device to the AT&T Gateway then I can access these websites, if I use any router connected to the gateway I get the blocked message.

Easy answer - just use the ATT RG...


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Trying to Figure Out Why Cable Modem Keeps Losing Connection

Spectrum is my internet provider. I use their modem, an ES2251 HW VER 1.3. My router is an Asus RT-AC88U running firmware version 3.0.0.4.386_48263

The modem only has two indicator lights on it one for power and one for online. For the past two weeks, every few days I lose my internet connection. The "online" light is lit blue indicating the modem is online, but I have no internet. I have to power cycle the modem to restore the connection.

The last time this happened, before power cycling the modem, I disconnected the router and from the modem and connected a laptop directly to the modem with an ethernet cable - the laptop had no internet connectivity. I am assuming the issue lies with Spectrum up to and including the modem, and that a router could not cause the modem to lose its connection. Is that a correct assumption?

I have used the Spectrum self-service support chat tool, and it has indicated that my area is not experiancing an outage when I have lost connectivity. Nothing has changed on my end equipment-wise. Spectrum, howver, recently increased the speed for Spectrum Internet from 300 Mbps to 400 Mbps I am thinking my modem is no longer compatible. I am going to take it to Spectrum and swap it out for another one. Does anyone have other ideas on how I shoudl proceed?

[Assistant]
kc27 said:
I disconnected the router and from the modem and connected a laptop directly to the modem with an ethernet cable - the laptop had no internet connectivity. I am assuming the issue lies with Spectrum up to and including the modem, and that a router could not cause the modem to lose its connection. Is that a correct assumption?
Your logic is sound.

If time permits, do that experiment again - with a twist....

When Internet goes off, connect your laptop again
With the same cable
With a different cable
Restart your laptop
Restart your modem

I swapped modems at the Spectrum store. I got the same model, ES2251. This one is HW VER 1.4 vs the previous one that was HW VER 1.3. I am hoping this ends the once or twice a week dropped internet connections.

Buy an Arris modem at a local store and see if you still have issues. Im guessing that the Spectrum modem is just junk.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: WiFi 5 to 7 Router Upgrade Questions

Currently have a LinkSys EA8500 WiFi 5 router that I have had for 8 years, which does use downlink MU-MIMO and 4x4. We have it centralized in a 2 story house with basement and coverage is good. We have 4 people that could be on the network at the same time, but its only web browsing, productivity and streaming. There is no heavy file sharing or gaming over WiFi, those tasks are hard wired. 600 symmetrical internet connection and would likley never need to go past 1Gbps in the future. The clients are a mix of a 3 WiFi 5 phones/tablets, 2 WiFi 6 phones, 1 WiFi 7 laptop, a few IoT 2.4 devices.

If I move to something like the RT-BE92U that has 2x2 5/6Ghz, will I notice anything with clients losing the 2 extra spatial streams? My thought was that with the new WiFi 6 and 7 technology like OFDMA, MLO, more QAM and channel width, better latency, BSS, TWT, etc, that it would still be better than having an older WiFi 5 router with 4x4. Anything else that I am not thinking about?

[Assistant]
You may be better off with a WIFI 6 router as some consider the current WIFI 7 offerings as overpriced and still in beta. Something like an Asus Pro router will give you the 4x4 in the 5 GHz band and will be supported for quite a while. AX86U Pro or AX88U Pro are the most recommended.

bbunge said:
You may be better off with a WIFI 6 router as some consider the current WIFI 7 offerings as overpriced and still in beta. Something like an Asus Pro router will give you the 4x4 in the 5 GHz band and will be supported for quite a while. AX86U Pro or AX88U Pro are the most recommended.
Thanks for the recommendations. There are some folks who have gotten the newest Asus WiFi 7 routers, the ones that came out at a lower cost range at $200-300, and they report good MLO use, among other things. Beta is a strong word for WiFi7 at this point and for not much cost difference from those WiFi 6 offerings, I would likely invest in WiFi7 on these 2nd wave releases from Asus. There is an option of waiting another year or so, and there could be WiFi 7 routers released that have 4x4 at $300 or less, but it's not for certain.

NismoZ said:
Beta is a strong word for WiFi7 at this point and for not much cost difference for those WiFi 6 offerings, I would likely invest in WiFi7 on these 2nd wave releases from Asus.

Invest, share the adventure experience and thank you in advance.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: 4x4 2,4 Ghz increase coverage?

If I want a AP with maximum coverage, in Europe, In some sites say 4x4 radio increase coverage over 2x2 radio.

My question is if this is true or not

In a WLAN with IOT devices far from AP, 4x4 radio increase REAL coverage over 2x2 radio OR NOT?

Many domestic router have 2x2 radio in 2,4 Ghz (but 4x4 radio in 5 Ghz). Only high end routers have 4x4 radio in 2,4 ghz

I owned unifi UAP-AC-LR with 3x3 in 2,4 Ghz but coverage is similar to RT-AX55 or RT-AX57 that are 2x2

For example, XIAOMI AX-3200 with 4x4 at 2,4Ghz would increase REAL coverage?

[Assistant]
Not true. 4x4 and 2x2 says something about the amount of simultanious streams that can be used, but nothing about coverage.

Are you sure?

Some specilaliced sotes soy like this:

Diversity: If there are more antennas than streams (eg: 2×2 client to 4×4 router),the 'extra' antennas can then be used to improve link quality, and increase range. With multipleantennas receiving the same transmitted signal, the receiver can recombine all of the receivedsignals into a better estimate of the true transmitted signal.
FCC documents discuss that the 'maximum' gain when doubling antennas is 10×log(NANT/NSS) dBi, which for a 2×2 client to a 4×4 access point, would result in a diversity gain of 'around' 3 dBi. OR a 4×4 access point to a 1×1 client means a diversity gain 'around' 6 dBi.
This explain why you really do want a 4×4 MIMO router, even though there may only be 1×1 and 2×2 client devices connecting to it!

@microchip is correct. In reality newer more sensitive 2x2 radio may have better range than older 4x4 radio. I’ve seen examples of this multiple times. More spatial streams supported doesn’t translate automatically to better range. The theory applies only when all other variables are the same, but this is not the case.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Expected speed with two 2x2 clients on 4x4 access point

I bought the WIFI 6 tp-link EAP660 access point with a 4x4 5GHz antenna configuration. When I connect with a single WIFI 6 2x2 client I get speeds of up to 750 Mbit/s. When I connect another WIFI 6 2x2 client simultaneously the speeds more than half. So a total of 600 Mbit/s combined for the two clients. I expected a higher result with a 4x4 access point. It is advertised as reaching 2400 Mbit/s on the 5GHz band. I know that is the phy link speed but I do expect something around 1500 Mbit/s. Am I missing something? If yes, what is the practical benefit of a 4x4 access point above a 2x2 access point?
I use iperf3 on both clients simultaneously connecting to two different computers to test the speeds, the channel width is 80MHz. The access point does not support 160MHz.

[Assistant]
A 2x2 client on 80 MHz client has a max link speed of 867 Mbps, and 660 Mbps is the max throughput one can get. It may even reach 700 Mbps.

1500 is not achievable on 2x2 client cause the link speed itself is limited to 867 Mbps.

See, this is my speed with 4x4 WiFi router on 80 MHz with 2x2 client.

Welcome to the forums @HenryOlsa.

What clients? What is the test setup? Please give more details.

How can one client get ~750Mbps and two combined get a total of ~600Mbps?

If that is correct as stated, I would be returning this TP-Link product now.

"A 2x2 client on 80 MHz client has a max link speed of 867 Mbps, and 660 Mbps is the max throughput one can get."
I don't think that's true. If you look at the Ruckus product guide you can see that every WIFI 6 2x2:2 access point has a maximum PHY rate of 1200 Mbps. Every WIFI 6 4x4:4 access point has a maximum PHY rate of 2400 Mbps.

RUCKUS Product Guide (commscope.com)

I use two laptops with a intel AX200 network card. They both connect to the wireless access point EAP660. I run iperf3 on both of them, both to another computer on the network. If I run the same test using a network cable I get the expected 949Mbps on both clients.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: YouTube app on Roku constant buffering

Sorry I'm posting here but Roku only has forum support and they aren't very good. I have 2 TCL/Roku TVs and a Roku Streaming Stick 4K+. YouTube app constantly buffers on them. I have an LG TV with the YT app and it plays back fine. So I don't think it's my network/WiFi (or am I wrong?). Like I said, I reached out to Roku but they're no help. Any ideas of interference on YT/Roku and none on YT/LG? Any suggestions where else I might post this question? Of course YT is owned by Google and I sent the question to them but never heard back. Very frustrating as I've spent months trying to figure this out and tried all the suggestions they give you. Delete/reinstall app, reset network, reboot router (of course that's it!) etc. TIA

[Assistant]
Where is the LG TV..maybe it's getting a better signal? Can you attach anethernet cord to the one roku tv to rule out wireless?

Streaming Stick is attached to LG TV (so same location). All Rokus (TVs & Stick) are wireless only (no ethernet port).

Very common issue on internet. Lots of posts on Reddit and Roku forums. Not sure it's specific to my setup. Weird thing is it works on my LG. My daughter has Roku Express in Savannah and it works fine there. I bought a Roku Express and same problem, buffering on YT. All other apps (Netflix, Prime etc.) all run fine.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: New ISP router - has no Guest function - looking for suggestions

First post.. for the longest time I had ran the previous ISP router in bridge mode and did all the work from a AC68U (DHCP, WiFi and Guest WiFi)

I have switched speeds and my provider has now switch to CGM4981 router. To take advantage of the speed increase I could eliminate the AC68U and use the WiFi from the CGM4981.
The problem is and confirmed by talking with the ISP tech support there is no "guest" WiFi option

In the past my home setup was very simple - just a few connected devices that I would connect to the guest WiFi (TV and Firestick) having these isolated away from my LAN (NAS drive and laptop)

We will be adding camera's soon which I wish to isolate as well.

Now that a guest network is no longer I could put the CGM4981 into bridge but the AC68U is a bit long in the tooth in comparison.
Could I run the CGM4981 as is and connect the AC68U WAN port to a LAN port on the ISP router and use the 2.4 channel in WiFI and Guest.

Or is the suggested solution involve different hardware or configuration (VLAN? which I know of but never used and would need to learn)

Suggestions? - (or am I just over thinking things)

[Assistant]
With the ASUS gear I've used, it's possible to put the router into "AP-only" mode so that it just acts as a wireless AP, no routing or DHCP functionality. Running that downstream of your new ISP modem should work as a stopgap solution.

It's generally recommended to use a separate VLAN for security cameras, so if you are headed in that direction you will eventually need VLAN-aware switch(es) and should probably also switch out the AC68U in favor of AP(s) that can associate the guest SSID with a separate VLAN. But you don't need to spring for all that right away.

Are you in a hurry to upgrade the AC68U to get better wifi performance? If so, what are you concerned about --- speed, coverage, both?

Thank you..

No hurry on the AC68U at this point - coverage is pretty good (but could be improved upon) faster WiFi speed from the ASUS in AP mode would be nice as my new laptop and any new devices can take advantage of that.
I read that it has reached the end of support - but then if set as a "AP" that really isn't an issue.. when I replace it I'd would want something that can take 3rd party as I have been using Merlin for a while. I'm not stuck on ASUS but I just scratch my head when looking at all the choices out in the market.

With limited knowledge of implementation - would the ISP router feed a configured managed switch with a VLAN/AP combination for the cameras and another VLAN/AP for "guest"?
As well I would prefer to have my LAN (home office stuff) behind something that I control (and have up to date) - so another router behind the ISP router (not sure if this is making things overly complex)

What to look for when looking at AP's ?

Tutorial - How to use VLANs on your non-pro Asus router with 386 or 388 code (no scripting required)
You didn't answer whether the satellite routers are in Mesh or AP mode. Aimesh parent is in AP mode, satellite routers are in Aimesh node mode off the parent.
www.snbforums.com


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Access Point mode issue, airplay not working.

I've been having some issues with my Asus Ai-Mesh setup in access point mode. For some reason, AirPlay isn't working. I tried switching to router mode and found a setting called "enable multicast routing" which seemed to briefly fix the issue with AirPlay. However, I'm unsure if I set up the router mode correctly, as I have PfSense as my main router.

Can anyone help me with the router mode settings? What settings do I need to turn off in router mode so I do no have double NAT, and should the incoming connection from PfSense be directed to the WAN or LAN port?

Thanks in advance.

[Assistant]
ali. said:
I've been having some issues with my Asus Ai-Mesh setup in access point mode. For some reason, AirPlay isn't working.
A router operating in AP mode should act as a pretty transparent wifi-to-LAN bridge. So this should work, and I recall that it did work for me when I had ASUS wifi gear; and it still works with the non-ASUS APs I use now. We ought to drill down on why it's not working ... but you've provided zero detail about either what your network layout is or what problem you are having exactly. Where are you trying to Airplay from and to, and what network gear is in between?
ali. said:
I tried switching to router mode and found a setting called "enable multicast routing" which seemed to briefly fix the issue with AirPlay. However, I'm unsure if I set up the router mode correctly, as I have PfSense as my main router.
Even if it worked, which it sounds like it didn't after all, this'd be a jury-rig setup. You don't want more than one router in a home network, unless maybe you're doing fancy failover stuff.

Since you mention using pfSense, I wonder if you are doing anything with VLANs and if so whether you're trying to Airplay across VLAN boundaries. I can believe that'd be tricky; you might have to forward more stuff across the boundary than you are doing.

tgl said:
A router operating in AP mode should act as a pretty transparent wifi-to-LAN bridge. So this should work, and I recall that it did work for me when I had ASUS wifi gear; and it still works with the non-ASUS APs I use now. We ought to drill down on why it's not working ... but you've provided zero detail about either what your network layout is or what problem you are having exactly. Where are you trying to Airplay from and to, and what network gear is in between?

Even if it worked, which it sounds like it didn't after all, this'd be a jury-rig setup. You don't want more than one router in a home network, unless maybe you're doing fancy failover stuff.

Since you mention using pfSense, I wonder if you are doing anything with VLANs and if so whether you're trying to Airplay across VLAN boundaries. I can believe that'd be tricky; you might have to forward more stuff across the boundary than you are doing.
Click to expand...

I am using PfSense and I do have VLANs, previously I thought PfSense was the issue since I was trying to AirPlay from one VLAN (on Wifi) to another VLAN (wired connection to my TV). However, to drill down to the root of the problem I removed that complexity: now all devices (to and from) are in the same VLAN.

After changing my setup couple of different times, I have settled on GT-AX11000 in router mode with DHCP, Firewall and NAT disabled. Reason why I am sticking with this Jerry-rigged setup is because of Cake QoS, I have noticed that my WiFi is snappier in this configuration than it is in access point mode.

Keeping all of that aside: the issue seems to be with the Sony TV and its implementation of the AirPlay. And the reason why I am saying this is because I have another TV of LG brand and that one seems to connect without any issue.

The Sony TV appears on the list of AirPlay devices but refuses to connect, whereas LG TV does not.

I will keep the GT-AX11000 in router mode with PfSense handling the DHCP duties, unless I run into some unforseen issues with IP assignment since I like the Cake QoS as it seems to have made the WiFi more snappy. And yes I did confirm that all general and professional wireless settings are exactly the same in AP mode and Router Mode, so I can only attribute better performance to the Cake QoS.

Many will wonder why not buy VLAN aware access points instead of doing this whole shenanigan with Asus routers. Reason is that I had bought multiple Asus routers before I implemented PfSense: I have too much money invested in the AiMesh eco system which works great for my use case as I get full throughput. I have no reason to sink more money into buying dedicated AP points.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Wifi 7 NICs questions

Hello everyone.

If there is an M.2 Wifi 7 card that generally supports all hardware (Intel/AMD/Arm) and is 4x4, it is optimal.

If not, which network cards support all hardware and are 2x2?

If there is no 4x4 Wifi 7 card - why not?

Which M.2 is recommended?

Is there a link to a website with new/recommended cards?

Is it still an advantage to buy a 4x4 router for a 2x2 card?

Regards

[Assistant]
Stardust said:
If there is no 4x4 Wifi 7 card - why not?
You generally will not see 4 stream clients and definitely not in M.2 form.
Power and space are at a premium in mobile devices, so 2 stream is the rule.

You might see a PCIe format card for desktops. But that usually is an M.2 card plugged into a PCIe adapter.

Intel is pretty much it for M.2 Wi-Fi cards. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/details/wireless/wi-fi-7-series/products.html

Thanks @thiggins

Now I am in no hurry to buy NICs and/or router.

Later - maybe 2025 - I will buy router as minimum.

There are USB options available. Wifi 7 won`t saturate USB 3, so the bandwidth will be sufficient.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: how to remove padvan firmware

Hi there Any one can help me regarding my router firmware actually my router is running padavan Firmware so how can i switch my firmware to openWrt i have tried to reset my router but nothing works
Router Name : DIR-853 A3
Regards

[Assistant]
ramzan said:
Hi there Any one can help me regarding my router firmware actually my router is running padavan Firmware so how can i switch my firmware to openWrt i have tried to reset my router but nothing works
Router Name : DIR-853 A3
Regards
Hi
It is really really easy just follow the steps:
1. Download any SFTP client (e.g filezilla, WinSCP etc. )
2. SFTP into the router using your username and password you.
3. Go to /tmp.
4. Paste your firmware .bin file.
5. SSH into your router.
6. Do cd /tmp
7. Paste this command :
mtd_write -r write <firmware_file_name> Firmware_Stub (make sure to write the full name with extension and not in the arrows.)
8. Now your router will reboot and boom there you go. ENJOY!

Note: use original firmware .bin file first and flash the OpenWRT
from that.

CyberFox said:
Hi! I see you want to switch from Padavan firmware to OpenWrt for your DIR-853 A3 router. Here’s what you need to do:

Preparation: First, make sure you have internet access and can connect to the router via an Ethernet cable. This is important to avoid wireless connection issues during the process.
: Go to the official OpenWrt website and download the appropriate firmware for the DIR-853 A3. Make sure you select the correct version.
Click to expand...
Typical AI generated carp. If you want to post an answer to the original query then please do, but if you don't understand what is being asked, nor have any experience then please don't.

You can introduce yourself here
New User Introductions
If you feel the need to announce yourself, do it here.
www.snbforums.com
You read and agreed to the terms and rules when you signed up, didn't you? I don't have the link but I'm sure someone will be along with a link for you.
The terms and rules are here
Terms and rules
You must agree to these terms and rules before using the site.
www.snbforums.com
A link to the terms and rules is also at the bottom of every page.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Outdoor WiFi access for iot devices

My pool cleaning robot connects to the internet by using wifi only from its control box. This control box is in the far corner of my back yard and it frequently experiences dropouts. I have two ASUS routers connected in AiMesh mode with the main router centrally located in the house and connected to the internet, and the node router located by a window at the rear of the house facing the back yard to help improve wifi signal in the yard and also provide indoors for that part of the house. The indoor wifi signal is now strong all over the house with no issues however the pool robot still experiences occasional dropouts.

I am currently in the process of trying to learn how to improve our home network by creating various networks using VLANs to control the way each device can connect to the internet and be isolated from the main network. I have started another thread to ask about isolating networks here.

There are currently 3 devices in the backyard that need better wifi signal. The pool robot, an ip camera that only has wireless connectivity and a wifi only irrigation controller. The irrigation controller is in a metal shed and with the shed door closed there is almost zero wifi signal inside. The camera is mounted on the outside of the shed and the pool robot control box is at the opposite end of the back yard about 15-20m away. There is an existing unused underground conduit leading from the house to the shed which I installed when building the shed years ago for a possible future need to run a lan cable to the shed. My thought is to run a lan cable from the house to the shed and inside the shed I can use an old router in AP mode to serve the irrigation controller and camera. Even though the AP will be inside the metal shed, I could mount it right behind where the camera is located so they can be as close as a few cm apart, so hopefully the camera would still have a pretty strong signal. The problem is getting a reliable wifi signal to the pool robot. There is a power outlet right next to the robot control box where it is plugged into. This wiring to the robot power outlet is on the same circuit as the shed. I could use a powerline adapter setup with one device connected to the shed AP by Ethernet and the second device plugged in to the outlet next to the robot box to act as an AP for the robot. In theory I believe this would work but it seems messy. Also I haven’t found any powerline adapters that are rated for outdoor use. One possible solution is to mount the adapter in a waterproof enclosure, but probably not ideal. I have never used powerline adapters before so don’t know how much heat they generate, especially if inside a sealed enclosure. The old router I have is a Billion 7500G which has two antennas. Not sure if it’s possible to replace those antennas with outdoor antennas on a lead so I can mount one on the outside of the shed and one inside. The 7500G might favour one antenna over the other or maybe not work at all, either way not achieving what I want.

I also have an AVM FRITZBOX router and a TP-link ISP supplied router that could be used as an AP. The tp link is one of those isp only models which I don’t want to use at all, it’s still in its box. The FRITZBOX from memory is a 7390 model, not currently at home to check. It used to be our main router when we had a dsl connection but I think the modem part got damaged during a storm one time. The rest of the router still worked which is all I would use in AP mode if it’s worth using. The billion or FRITZBOX would be part of one of the vlans and not have access to the rest of my home network.

[Assistant]
This might all be overcomplicating matters. The first thing I'd ask is how old is that window the node is sitting behind? If it's at all recent then it might be made of low-E glass, which is remarkably effective at blocking wifi. You might not have to do more than move the node so it reaches the back yard through a wall not the window --- counterintuitively, the wall may well be more wifi-porous than the window.

tgl said:
This might all be overcomplicating matters. The first thing I'd ask is how old is that window the node is sitting behind? If it's at all recent then it might be made of low-E glass, which is remarkably effective at blocking wifi. You might not have to do more than move the node so it reaches the back yard through a wall not the window --- counterintuitively, the wall may well be more wifi-porous than the window.
The house is about 20 years old, brick veneer construction. I live in Australia, don’t know what low-E glass is, but I don’t think there is anything special about our windows. The windows are fairly large, pretty much floor to ceiling and there are also some glass folding doors (4 sections) at the back part of the house. The exterior walls have fibreglass insulation batts between the outer bricks and inner gypbrock. Oh, the windows and glass doors all have aluminium frames which “might” affect the wireless signal, but probably not much. There is definitely wifi signal outside the house. The camera on the shed is only about 4m from the router in a straight line which connects to the wifi no problem. The pool robot is at the opposite end of the back yard and is the only device that needs wifi access in that area which is why I was thinking of some sort of outdoor rated powerline adapter if it exists. The irrigation controller is even closer to the node than the camera is, but it is inside a metal shed with no windows so receives next to no wifi signal, so some sort of wifi access device is needed inside the shed which led me to consider one the old routers in AP mode for the outdoor wifi.

Maybe an outdoor AP, something like this (TP-Link EAP110-Outdoor), would work? It has PoE so installation is easy only needing a single Ethernet cable connected to it and can be mounted on the outside of the shed which would hopefully be physically close enough to the irrigation controller inside the shed, so the signal inside the shed isn’t attenuated too much for a reliable connection. The pool robot would be about 15m straight line from this outdoor AP with nothing in between besides air. Could one of these outdoor AP’s have the opposite problem of having too strong of a signal? I live in suburbia and don’t really want my wifi too far reaching that it interferes with my neighbours’ networks.

The main problem I see with the current node, even if it can be relocated for better outdoor wifi signal, is that I plan to connect the outdoor iot devices to a different network than the main home network so they can’t access computers, phones, tablets, etc. The node is an ASUS DSL-AC68U and I don’t know if it’s possible for it to handle any vlan networks when it is in mesh mode. I currently have one of the guest wifi networks enabled for the ip cameras as a temporary solution but I don’t think that will work in the long term after adding an NVR because the guest network doesn’t allow devices within its network to talk to each other while restricting access to the main network. Still learning about vlans and how to set them up with my existing hardware (ASUS RT-AX82U - main router, DSL-AC68U - aimesh node with wireless backhaul. Wired backhaul is not an option for this model because it only has a DSL WAN port. Maybe Merlin firmware has a way to assign one of the LAN ports as WAN while in mesh mode?). I found this thread, which I will need to read through again, that may offer a solution to at least set up the isolated networks and use my existing hardware with the exception of maybe buying a couple vlan compatible managed switches.

As long as the switches will pass VLAN tags, then they can be cheap unmanaged switches.
For the metal shed, you will have to put something inside, perferably you can use LAN cable to connect to the controller rather than wireless inside, since it is so small. Otherwise, maybe have a project to put a window in the shed ? If the walls are corrugated metal sheet, you could substitute a fiberglass version, i think, as that should be RF transparent. Or can a remote antenna hung under the eave work ?

To reach the pool robot, an outdoor AP under the roof eave of the house , POE powered from a switch or by using POE injectors would work well and cover the rest of the backyard. i assume the IOT devices are only using 2.4 GHz band, so make sure the AP device config will allow reducing power on that band, perhaps at the IOT device and at the AP.

Some folks have had luck direct burying CAT 5e cable for short distances. The powered device at the other end needs to have the same earthing point as the power for the house though, at least in the US. Consult local electrical codes. Otherwise can get into a ground loop issue.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Using a mesh system as a wireless access point

I want to make sure that I'm thinking this out properly. Let's say that I purchase a two unit mesh system for a 2 story house. I'm thinking of putting the parent node upstairs to act as a router, so that upstairs wireless devices connect to it. This unit will also be used to connect to wired Ethernet in my house.

I'm thinking of placing the child node downstairs so that the downstairs wireless devices will connect to it. I'm connecting the two units by wired backhaul.

Would I just choose "router" in the settings for the upstairs unit and "WAP" for the downstairs unit? How do I make sure that the wireless devices connect to the correct unit? Also, would I connect the downstairs unit to its WAN port?

[Assistant]
Why don’t you check the user manual of the “mesh” system you are interested in? Use scenarios and connections are explained there. Different systems have differences in options.

Knickknack said:
I want to make sure that I'm thinking this out properly. Let's say that I purchase a two unit mesh system for a 2 story house. I'm thinking of putting the parent node upstairs to act as a router, so that upstairs wireless devices connect to it. This unit will also be used to connect to wired Ethernet in my house.

I'm thinking of placing the child node downstairs so that the downstairs wireless devices will connect to it. I'm connecting the two units by wired backhaul.

Would I just choose "router" in the settings for the upstairs unit and "WAP" for the downstairs unit? How do I make sure that the wireless devices connect to the correct unit? Also, would I connect the downstairs unit to its WAN port?
Click to expand...
You would only select "router" on your upstairs one if you are planning on replacing your ISP router, or you'll get double NAT.

If keeping your ISP router you choose AP for upstairs and plug the WAN port (or any LAN port dosen't matter) to the LAN port of your existing router.

The downstairs Mesh node, you will join the Mesh using the GUI or the app. In the app you can then select the type of backhaul you want, Wired or wireless. On the ASUS ones this all done for you in AiMesh.

Once a mesh is created the wireless devices select the appropriate device themselves, you don't need to fix it. That's the whole point of mesh, your clients will then seamlesly roam between the two. No need to over think this .

seamless is a relative term, not an absolute as the client device controls when the switch occurs, if it occurs. You can, and the AP and controller software can try to nudge the client to the better AP, but it is up to the client. Controlling overlap between the RF power plots of the APs is critical.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: WAVLINK Intel be200

hello all

I purchased this wifi 7 adaptor for my AMD setup. It does work but problem is 2.4,5 & 6GHZ are all limited to 20MHZ in the settings . Would there be anything that I have done wrong or am I best just sending back.

I can connect to the 2.4ghz & 5ghz band but the 6ghz one connects but says no internet.

I’m trying to connect to ASUS GT-BE98 router

[Assistant]
Send it back and get the Qualcomm NCM865. It comes in a couple of flavors with or without the antenna backplate. MSI sells it with the backplate for $50.

https://us-store.msi.com/HERALD-BE-NCM865-WI-FI-7

There's some issues with using Intel inside of AMD.

I’ve just looked and it’s out of stock. Also it’s a bit pricer than what I want to pay. Do you know any UK Sellers who may have any different ones.

Tech Junky said:
NCM865
Search for the model and you should be able to find either the card or the kit.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Need help with WDS Bridge Setup.

Hey guys,

I've been running a WDS Bridge between my ISP provided Nokia G-2425G-A ONT and a TP-Link C50 Router(also provided by my old ISP with customized firmware) and the setup works well until it doesn't.

I use an Android phone and a Windows laptop. While the Windows laptop stays connected 24/7 and has no issues, my Android phone stays connected for sometime and then starts loosing connection to some apps and services. The frequency at which this issue happens is also extremely random, sometimes it takes over 6 hours for my phone to start having issues, sometimes it takes just 30 minutes. It doesn't have a fixed pattern for me to diagnose.

When the connection drops, my phone stays connected to the actual WiFi network but can't do WiFi calling anymore. Apps like Snapchat, Reddit and Telegram keep loading infinitely and some apps have partial but delayed responses- Instagram DMS take over 3 - 4s to be sent and the comments under reels take a long time to load in while reels themselves have no trouble loading.

If the phone is connected to Nokia ONT, there seems to no issues at all. It works really well for as long as it's connected to it.

It's not possible for me wire up the 2 routers in my home, there are simply no provisions for it. I'm also unable to buy any new gear unfortunately.

The only workaround so far for me has been to disconnect and reconnect to the TP-Link until the connections drop again. This issue has been driving me mad, hope someone can point me in the right direction to fix it!

Thank you!

Setup details-
Nokia G-2425G-A --> (WDS) --> TP - Link Archer C50
Nokia's DHCP Server - On, TP Link - Off
Same SSID, Password and Encryption protocol on both routers.

[Assistant]
TBH I'm surprised that that setup works at all. WDS was never standardized, so it'd be very hit-or-miss whether it works across vendors. This old SNB article (sadly now overstuffed with ads) goes into the problems with WDS. It does have some hints for ameliorating things, which you could try, but I'm not predicting success. Even if you can stabilize it, the claim in that article that WDS is limited to WEP encryption is scary as heck: that was okay 20 years ago, but today you might as well be broadcasting in the clear.

I think you really need to find some spare change to replace your gear.

FYI.

WDS is NOT a wifi standard, so incompatibilities are quite common unless it's the same hardware/firmware. Even then, I've seen incompatibilities between devices from the same vendor! Once you start mixing devices, it's a roll of the dice. That's why using wifi standard protocols is much preferred.

Granted, such incompatibilities usually manifest themselves rather quickly when they exist. But even when things seem to be working over longer periods, I still wouldn't trust it fully given its proprietary nature.

Wireless distribution system - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org

That article is outdated but I'll scan through it for any new ideas nevertheless.

Both of my routers are using the WPA2 standard for their networks btw, WEP only WDS isn't a thing anymore I think.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: UPS to protect ONT, router?

Any recommendations on a good UPS that isn’t overkill for use with an ONT, router, hub in my basement to protect against power outages due to storms, etc?

[Assistant]
neil0311 said:
Any recommendations on a good UPS that isn’t overkill for use with an ONT, router, hub in my basement to protect against power outages due to storms, etc?
My Amazonbasics 400VA one has been good to me for my router and ONT.

portets said:
My Amazonbasics 400VA one has been good to me for my router and ONT.
Is that a good size for that load?

neil0311 said:
Is that a good size for that load?
To my knowledge and for my usage, yes. If my rough napkin math is right it'll run my ONT and router over an hour which is all I need. Possibly up to 3 hours depending on device current consumption and load


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Warnings on Router Logs

Don’t have much understanding of networking as such however just got a new router and was checking the logs to ensure nothing stood out to me, however have a lot of:

wl1: dhd_prot_ioctl: status ret value is -23 iov=mbo

Warnings and just wanted to make sure it was nothing to worry about, if it is what is it and how can it be fixed?

[Assistant]
means nothing unless we know the router make and model .

degrub said:
means nothing unless we know the router make and model .
It’s a Technicolor DGA4135

Are the logs separated by function or part of the router ( modem, wireless, lan, etc ) ? If so which section is this appearing in ?
If not -
Is the time interval between messages roughly constant ?
Turn off wireless radios for a while, longer than the time interval. Did it go away ?
If it did, turn off 2.4GHz radio for a while - did it go away ? Do same for 5/6 GHz radios.

it could be something as simple as an IOT device trying to talk with the router wireless Access Point section.

You may have to ask level 2 tech support from your ISP.
It is most likely nothing to be concerned about and from some wireless issue.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Blocking some devices to connect to the network or accessing the internet

Hi everyone. I'm having a challenge to accomplish one simple thing (seems simple at least).
I have the following in my network:
1. AT&T router, from internet provider. The Wifi on this router is disabled.
2. Asus Rapture GT-AX11000 - This is the main router which provides the IPs to the clients. This router is connected to the AT&T router.
3. NighthawkNighthawk X6 R7900 - I use this router as an access point. It is connected to the Asus Rapture
4. NighthawkNighthawk X6 R8000 - I use this router as an access point. It is connected to the Asus Rapture

What I would like to do:
Prevent some devices to connect to the internet. Some examples of what I was looking at to accomplish that and the problems with it.
- Prevent the device to connect to the router:
- I tried to set on the two access points to not allow new clients to connect, blocking the new clients. The new clients are listed as blocked but those can still access the network and internet. Not sure why it is happening this way, the feature is not really working. I cannot block specific MAC address because iPhones and Samsung phones uses random MAC addresses
- I tried to see if the Asus Rapture have that same feature, to block new clients but it does not have. I can block only by MAC address and only for Wifi connection. The phones connected to the APs show on the Asus Rapture as wired connection.

How can I accomplish this? Is there a way to separate the traffic, selecting specific devices to have internet access and any other will go to a different route (without internet)? I tried to separate devices on the Asus Rapture, using VPN option but it didn't work.

Thank you

[Assistant]
To prevent wireless connection to the router, just don't apply SSID credentials to the device.

Can't you toggle off the device's random MAC function?

For connected devices, did you try this?


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Does MLO negate DFS channel dropouts?

Since the 2.4 band will remain active does that mean if the router is on a 5ghz DFS channel that the client signal won't drop out due to channel scanning and DFS channel switching?

I know there are two MLO methods, one being where one band is TX and one is RX. The other being simultaneous per band. I take it the latter wouldn't have droupouts but the former would? Unless it can change MLO modes quickly.

I know MRU/puncturing will also fix this issue, but puncturing is mostly unavailable still and may mostly come to 6ghz bands

[Assistant]
The MLO implementations are still very much in flux due to requirements of the component bands - e.g. 6GHz requires WPA3, where 2.4 and 5GHz do not...

MLO operations in 5GHz, well, there's more commonality obviously...

An AP running in a DFS channel, if it gets a DFS detection hit, should fall over to a non-DFS channel, and this is normally going to be an 802.11 Action Message telling the clients what to do.

MLO, like other features, should be fairly transparent in my opinion - sadly, there are complications around auth, mesh, and a bunch of other things that make MLO an extra level of complicated...

sfx2000 said:
The MLO implementations are still very much in flux due to requirements of the component bands - e.g. 6GHz requires WPA3, where 2.4 and 5GHz do not...

MLO, like other features, should be fairly transparent in my opinion - sadly, there are complications around auth, mesh, and a bunch of other things that make MLO an extra level of complicated...
Click to expand...
Ah so basically I'm asking this question too early. I found a Qualcomm whitepaper talking about MLO negating DFS channel switching latency and disconnection issues. I'm unsure if that'll be true of all Wi-Fi 7 devices or just certain Qualcomm chips.

For anyone reading this in the future, it appears MRU and preamble puncturing will be coming to all Asus Wi-Fi 7 devices based on some posts from Asus China I found. Including ones lacking the 6ghz band like the RT-BE88U. Likely in late 2024 or 2025. This means if you use a 5Ghz channel that's non-DFS but overlaps into the DFS spectrum(like say channel 36 set at 160Mhz), the router will intelligently cut out the DFS portion when sensing interference, seamlessly reducing you to 80Mhz with no channel drops or lost packets or latency of any kind. I'm unsure what would happen if using entirely DFS spectrum, like channel 100. This is where I'm hoping MLO comes in, seamlessly dropping you just to 2.4Ghz-only temporarily.

Pretty much - I think the QC whitepaper is more about level-setting expectations perhaps to the the pros/cons of MLO - it's a complex topic...

In 5Ghz/2.4 combo - for example, if the control channel is in a non-DFS block, it should be transparent if one is running 160MHz channels, as one just disables the supplementals for the required clearance time if the DFS recheck passes - much like what we see in HT mode for 2.4 and wide channels if we get a CCA hit from an overlapping neighbor AP/BSS...

Mesh will offer some interesting scenarios where MLO could get into a situation where one has 2.4 on Node1 and 5 (or 6) on Node 2 - how to manage things there where the device initially camps on node1, but RF conditions trigger the upper band client connection ID to transition to node2...

That along with connection load balancing and airtime management - it'll be interesting times for sure


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Why are MLO-enabled networks usually guest networks?

I've noticed multiple companies' new Wi-Fi 7 routers create an alternate MLO-enabled "guest" or virtual SSID when you turn on MLO. Non-Wi-Fi 7 devices all seem to be able to connect to this MLO SSID with no detriment. Why isn't the main SSID MLO-enabled? Why the need for a separate virtual SSID?

[Assistant]
From the Asus FAQ:
[Wi-Fi 7 Wireless Router] What is MLO (multi-link Operation) and how it works?
Wi-Fi 7 introduces two advanced modes of operation for Multi-Link Operation (MLO): STR (Simultaneous Transmit and Receive) and EMLSR (enhanced Multi-Link-Single-Radio).
I belive they use a separate physical CPU (that controls a 2.4GHz radio and a 5GHz radio) to be used for MLO, so it is probably not just a virtual SSID. But it just what i belive, i just started to read about it a few days ago...

portets said:
I've noticed multiple companies' new Wi-Fi 7 routers create an alternate MLO-enabled "guest" or virtual SSID when you turn on MLO. Non-Wi-Fi 7 devices all seem to be able to connect to this MLO SSID with no detriment. Why isn't the main SSID MLO-enabled? Why the need for a separate virtual SSID?

Perhaps so one can "kick the tires" and experiment without affecting the primary client stations, many of which may not be MLO aware, along with legacy ERP/HT/VHT/HE clients...

sfx2000 said:
Perhaps so one can "kick the tires" and experiment without affecting the primary client stations
I had a feeling it may be this. Probably safe to assume this is the answer for now. I wonder if eventually the main SSID will have an MLO toggle instead of this virtual SSID setup


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Anyone have experience with Ruckus Channelfly?

I purchased 3 Ruckus R710's off ebay and they have been incredible compared to anything I have used in the past. The only persistent problem I'm having seems to be related to Channelfly and maybe background scanning? When Channelfly is enabled it aggressively switches channels whenever a client starts transferring large amounts of data. This promptly kicks the client from that AP during the switch. All of my 5Ghz clients are apple devices of some kind. Iphone 13 pro max, 2021 macbook pro 16", home pods etc.

According to Ruckus here:
Commscope Technical Content Portal
docs.commscope.com
When ChannelFly changes channels, it utilizes 802.11h channel change announcements to seamlessly change channels with no packet loss and minimal impact to performance.

My guess is there is just some kind of incompatibility between this functionality and my apple devices but I wanted to check with the forum if there was something I may be missing? For now I just have channelfly and background scanning disabled for 5ghz, it's a home environment but it's been a challenging one to serve reliably with wifi over the years for some reason and these Ruckus have been head and shoulders better than the Engenius EWS377ap's and Aruba IAP-335 ap's they replaced. Thanks for any help!

[Assistant]
I know this is a super old thread, but only one of the few which come up on an internet search related to channelfly.

So if the OP is still around:
Yes I have experienced problems with channelfly on my Ruckus R550. My Android TV box (Nvidia Shield TV pro) disconnects when watching IP TV (which leads to a lot of data transfer). The AP's logs say that channelfly changed the channel at the same time this STA disconnects and re-connects.

I am going to try this: I am going to setup my WiFi system so it does NOT change the channels. I am reasonably far away from other homes in my neighborhood that their wifi APs should have no/significant interference. I am going to use a WiFi Analyzer app on my phone, find a good channel and tell the Ruckus AP to stick to it. If the neighbors want to change channel, let them ;-)


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Wifi ax 2.4G real life speed vs Wifi n 2.4G

Hi,
I am using an AC router (Asus AC3100) and considering upgrading to AX (perhap AX88U) as most phones and laptops are AX now. My main target is improving wifi speed over 2.4G wifi AX, as 5GHz signal could not well cover my house (due to the house design I cannot cable backhaul 2 routers).
So my question is:
at the same range (e.g 10m), same client (AX capable) connect to 2.4G Wifi 4 and 2.4G wifi 6 hotspot.s: Will 2.4G Wifi 6 case provide much better speed in real life?

[Assistant]
For maximum range (20MHz vs 40MHz channel, 3db difference) and due to Wi-Fi environment factors (limited channels, heavy use) most people use 20MHz wide channel on 2.4GHz band. Close to the AP/router 802.11n 2-stream client has PHY rate 144Mbps and data throughput about 90Mbps, 802.11ax 2-stream client has 287Mbps PHY rate and data throughput about 180mbps. This is the maximum you can get in relatively quiet Wi-Fi environment and up to about -60dBm signal level, further away from the AP/router and with lower signal levels the speed will drop. In short - AX can be 2x fast compared to N on 2.4GHz band, but nothing even close to AX on 5GHz band.

That's 2x improvement is good. Thank you for clear response.

Tech9 said:
For maximum range (20MHz vs 40MHz channel, 3db difference) and due to Wi-Fi environment factors (limited channels, heavy use) most people use 20MHz wide channel on 2.4GHz band. Close to the AP/router 802.11n 2-stream client has PHY rate 144Mbps and data throughput about 90Mbps, 802.11ax 2-stream client has 287Mbps PHY rate and data throughput about 180mbps. This is the maximum you can get in relatively quiet Wi-Fi environment and up to about -60dBm signal level, further away from the AP/router and with lower signal levels the speed will drop. In short - AX can be 2x fast compared to N on 2.4GHz band, but nothing even close to AX on 5GHz band.
Click to expand...

There is a catch - higher modulation schemes in 802.11ax require better SNR. If there is activity on the 2.4GHz band around you this 2x speed may not happen at the same distances - your AX client has to be closer. In my real life testing in my Wi-Fi environment I could get around 70-80Mbps to 2-stream client in N-only mode and about 100-140Mbps with AX enabled. Still better, but not really 2x. Also N speed is more consistent, AX speed jumps up and down.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Amazon Sidewalk - What do you think?

Not sure if anyone saw this, but I have some real concerns with Amazon implementing this type of technology and the potential security risks associated. Thoughts?

A new feature is launching on your Echo device: Amazon Sidewalk.

Amazon Sidewalk is a shared network that helps devices work better. For example, if your device loses its wifi connection, Sidewalk can simplify reconnecting to your router and help set up new Echo devices. Sidewalk can also extend the coverage for Sidewalk-enabled devices, such as Ring smart lights and pet and object trackers, so they can stay connected and continue to work over longer distances.

When enabled, Sidewalk uses a small portion of your Internet bandwidth to provide these services to you and your neighbors. This setting will apply to all of your supported Echo and Ring devices that are linked to your Amazon account.

Learn more about Amazon Sidewalk.

Sidewalk is coming to your Echo device later this year, but you can disable this feature at any time from the Amazon Alexa app.

[Assistant]
I just read the email. I love how they always make stuff like this an opt-out instead of opt-in. If it truly only uses the minuscule amount of bandwidth they claim, then the only thing it can really be used for is location tracking and eavesdropping. They were probably doing it already but decided they had better market it as something beneficial before an insider revealed the truth. Maybe it’s time to make my home dumb again and divest myself of these devices.

It looks like we were behind the curve on this as CNET talked about this back in October.

Amazon Sidewalk will create entire smart neighborhoods. Here's what you should know
Now live on Echo speakers, Ring products, Tile trackers and more, Amazon's low-bandwidth Internet of Things network lets your smart home stretch beyond Wi-Fi range.
www.cnet.com

bones5050 said:
Not sure if anyone saw this, but I have some real concerns with Amazon implementing this type of technology and the potential security risks associated. Thoughts?

A new feature is launching on your Echo device: Amazon Sidewalk.

Amazon Sidewalk is a shared network that helps devices work better. For example, if your device loses its wifi connection, Sidewalk can simplify reconnecting to your router and help set up new Echo devices. Sidewalk can also extend the coverage for Sidewalk-enabled devices, such as Ring smart lights and pet and object trackers, so they can stay connected and continue to work over longer distances.

Learn more about .

Sidewalk is coming to your Echo device later this year, but you can disable this feature at any time from the Amazon Alexa app.
Click to expand...

Amazon Sidewalk... crowd-sourced neighborhood networking over your home network and Bluetooth Low Energy (near) and 900 MHz (far) Amazon Sidewalk Gateway IoT devices and Amazon and third party cloud servers!

What do I think? Hell no! And you're an idiot if you buy an Eero network and/or Amazon IoT devices.

OE


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Need Help to Setup a Mesh Netwotk

I currently have a RT-AC88U Router and need to extend coverage in my home (2600 sq ft). I’ve been using just a TP Link extender to increase coverage, but the problem I’m having is that devices on the far side of the home end up on a different Network, so I can’t tie in all my IoT devices on one network. I’d like to be able to link my IoT devices throughout the home on one Network.

If I understand correctly, a Mesh Network will fix this problem, but my knowledge of Networks is limited. So my questions are:
1. What ASUS product would you recommend I purchase to use in tandem with my RT-AC88U Router to create this Mesh Network?
2. Which device (the new ASUS product you recommend) or my existing RT-AC88U device should be used as the main and which one as the node?

[Assistant]
Gymbow said:
I’ve been using just a TP Link extender to increase coverage, but the problem I’m having is that devices on the far side of the home end up on a different Network

Your extender is not configured properly. You can fix this and save a new device purchase.

Set the "TP Link extender" to AP mode.
Currently it is probably working as a router and separates wan/lan ports to different networks.
If you still need coverage and have money to burn, than:
1. What ASUS product would you recommend I purchase to use in tandem with my RT-AC88U Router to create this Mesh Network?
Any Asus, but your AC88U has Broadcom chipset, so would be better to use the same chipset manufacturer and fw versions.
2. Which device (the new ASUS product you recommend) or my existing RT-AC88U device should be used as the main and which one as the node?
You can even buy better (AX, AXE or even BE) models, and you can transfer your current settings to that new one, so you can use your current AC router -after a factory reset- as an Ai Mesh node. But even if your budget is not limited, you could turn that money into more IoT devices. -Or to food, nowdays...

Thank you for the replies. Note, the Extender I have doesn’t support Mesh capability. I’ll give the AP mode a try. However, if I were to upgrade to a newer version ASUS Mesh Router, which one would you suggest to pair up with the RT-AC88U? There are so many options that it is confusing. Let’s say my budget would be $250 max.

Edit: OK, I did a bit more research and it looks like the RT-AX88U Pro would work as it’s available within my price range. Any comments or feedback would be appreciated.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: AMPLIFI Alien as Access Point

Hello,

New this forum and also kind of newbie in home networking.

Question: can I use AMPLIFI alien as an access point?

So, we just recently moved and got fiber internet for the house. The fiber gateway/router is in the basement but the WiFi coverage is not that great as we move higher up the floors. There are couple Ethernet cables running to the main floor from basement which the fiber ISP tech helped me connect those to fiber gateway/router so I can use those Ethernet ports on main floor.

Now I have AMPLIFI alien router which I used at my old house. My intention is to improve WiFi coverage on main and top floors using this Alien router. My question is, can I use the alien router as an access point by the hooking it to the Ethernet port on the main floor? I don’t want to disable routing capabilities of the ISP provided fiber gateway/router since that will cover the basement. I want the alien to cover main floor and possibly improve coverage on top floor. Is this possible to do? I have heard about putting alien into bridge mode, will it do what I want it to do in bridge mode? Also, if both of these routers will be providing WiFi, will both of them have different SSID? I am assuming that is the case since it’s not exactly a mesh network. Pardon any technical ignorance on my end. Any help would be appreciated, thank you!

(By the way I am aware that I would be better off just buying a mesh network routers but I want to use what I have first before I go and buy something new.)

[Assistant]
First of all, great choice to think before you buy! The only thing i know about alinens is that they love to capture celebrities.
Bridge mode can work, but if not, just turn off the DHCP server on your Alien and make sure that it is using the exact same SSID. If the channel is fixed on the ISP router, you can also set the same on the Alien.
We are basically just discussed the same thing here:
Need Help to Setup a Mesh Netwotk
I currently have a RT-AC88U Router and need to extend coverage in my home (2600 sq ft). I’ve been using just a TP Link extender to increase coverage, but the problem I’m having is that devices on the far side of the home end up on a different Network, so I can’t tie in all my IoT devices on one...
www.snbforums.com

Cric123 said:
Question: can I use AMPLIFI alien as an access point?

Information here:
https://help.amplifi.com/hc/en-us/articles/220979347-Enabling-Bridge-Mode

Thank you guys, I will try Bridge mode and see how it goes. Appreciate the suggestions!


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: WiFi Access Points & Security Cams

Total noob here. Naive, late tech adopter.

Need to link surveillance cam mounted in unattached garage to Modem about 35 yards away. Wifi originates from conventional modem signal and is NOT 5G. The WiFi signal needs to penetrate wall from front of house to the outdoors and then penetrate garage wall to indoor surveillance cam. Is an access point recommended? And if so, will I run into compatibility issues between access point and modem? Do access points need to be hardwired?

Also - any other trouble-shooting issues I should anticipate?

[Assistant]
Do you really mean "modem"? Sounds like you're talking about a wireless router. What is the make and model number?

SecurityAmateur said:
Do access points need to be hardwired?
Access points are hardwired to the main router. Repeaters or wireless bridges on the other hand connect to the main router via Wi-Fi.

What is the wall construction at the house wall ? Same for garage ?

Is there a window that the wireless router can sit in instead of behind a wall ? Same for garage ?

Is the garage powered from the house main electrical panel or does it have its own panel and grounding/earthing rod ?

An outdoor rated point to point AP, powered over ethernet cable, mounted under the roof eave of both buildings, with line of sight between the two should be the most reliable setup if you have to use wireless to link the two buildings.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Can I use wifi on bridged modem?

I am changing from a virgin connection to 5G. My previous system was using the virgin hub in modem mode to my ASUS RT-AC87U. I want to keep all the configuration of the Asus, and the extra LAN sockets, so I have put the 5Gmodem (Zyxel NR5103EV2) in IP Passthrough mode, and all seems to be working well, with comparable speeds to Virgin.

But the modem has wi-fi 6, now reporting no internet connection. Is it possible to use that as well as the ASUS?

[Assistant]
i believe IP passthrough removes the router function, so no.

olbas said:
But the modem has wi-fi 6, now reporting no internet connection. Is it possible to use that as well as the ASUS?
I doubt it, but whether or not would be specific to that device. The manual does not address this question. The post below implies that the Wi-Fi would only be used as a way to access the Zyxel's admin interface. That person managed to disable the Wi-Fi and use ethernet to connect to the Zyxel just like the VM Hub does.

Re: NR5103Ev2 IP Passthrough mode
I did some more experiments and read everything relevant that I could find on the Internet. Finally I found the solution. I needed to change the LAN network address on the NR5103EV2. By default it was 192.168.1.1 which overlaps with my home network meaning that my TP-Link ER605v2 router could...
community.three.co.uk

olbas said:
my ASUS RT-AC87U

Likely time to replace that device...

As to the other things - it's like the old adage - keep it simple.