About ac68u

[ozgurcnbyz]

Hi there,
I am planing to buy an asus ac68u as its considered to be the best router out there. The only thing i find quite interesting though is that customer reviews tend to be different than the professional reviews. I have seen alot of user reviews which complain about the performance degradation after a day or two and that people often warning about the 2.4 ghz band
Since i know that not every environment is the same and that there are bunch of parameters that could affect the performance i though i'd ask you guys about it. Any known common issues regarding this router ? and lets assume that i dont really need all the features that this router offers. Do you still think its a good idea to choose asus over airport extreme 6th gen which i am evaluating at the moment ?

 

[L&LD]

AE 6th gen works well in an apple environment but does not give the best performance or features that Asus, Netgear or other consumer wireless routers offer at this time (and it never will, most likely). By a long shot. Considering it is close to the same price; it is not in the running for me.

If you're willing to currently work a little harder to make the RT-AC68U work for you - (if needed in your specific situation and while the firmware is perfected even more) then it may be a good fit.

Others have reported that the RT-AC56U (same hardware/features except for external antenna) works much more stable with the latest firmware than the RT-AC68U does. If ultimate range is not a requirement; this may be a better option.


When considering the performance (and performance improvements with the last couple of months of firmware updates), features and price of the RT-AC68U and also consider that future firmware will not only make it better while adding even more features in the next couple of years or more; I think it is the best choice right now when you want the most power, feature rich and affordable router right now.

If you need to buy a router today and will not replace it in less than 2 or 3 years or more.

 

[ozgurcnbyz]

thank you very much for this detailed response. Even though you havent mentioned any specific problems, i gathered that there are still some stability problems with this router. I've had a really bad experience with the rt-ac66u which didnt last long. I replaced it with an AE6 and to be honest it is way more reliable. I cant say the same thing for the performance though. The range is not as good as the rt-ac66u and there are some dead spots as well. My house is only 2200 sq ft single story apartment and the router is located in a room that is only 20 ft from my living room where most of my wifi devices are sitting. I have an apple tv, roku3, xbox 360, macbook pro,3 iphones and an ipad. My internet connection is fiber optic which provides 100 mbps down and 10 mbps up. When i am connected wireless the speedtest results are around 40 mbps. when wired though its around 100 mpbs which is the expected result. Thats the problem i've been trying to solve recently. To solve this problem i might actually get an ac56u (just for the looks i hate those antennas) and place it in my living room.

 

[jlake]

thank you very much for this detailed response. Even though you havent mentioned any specific problems, i gathered that there are still some stability problems with this router. I've had a really bad experience with the rt-ac66u which didnt last long. I replaced it with an AE6 and to be honest it is way more reliable. I cant say the same thing for the performance though. The range is not as good as the rt-ac66u and there are some dead spots as well. My house is only 2200 sq ft single story apartment and the router is located in a room that is only 20 ft from my living room where most of my wifi devices are sitting. I have an apple tv, roku3, xbox 360, macbook pro,3 iphones and an ipad. My internet connection is fiber optic which provides 100 mbps down and 10 mbps up. When i am connected wireless the speedtest results are around 40 mbps. when wired though its around 100 mpbs which is the expected result. Thats the problem i've been trying to solve recently. To solve this problem i might actually get an ac56u (just for the looks i hate those antennas) and place it in my living room.

My home is 3 levels and 3800 square feet. I use Rt-n66u and don't have any dead spots or wireless problems with 2.4 ghz or 5ghz. . I don't have close neighbors. If you live in an apartment with close neighbors, wifi is always going to be a little tricky especially on the 2.4 ghz band. 40 Mbps is pretty good for wireless. You're not satisfied with 40 Mbps?

Try the basic troubleshooting steps:

http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/showthread.php?t=12453

 

[ozgurcnbyz]

i am not happy with losing 60% of my bandwidth.

 

[KGB7]

If you want the range and speed of ac68u, then you will have to wait a while longer for Asus to fix most of the issues. And looking at current history, Asus has been moving at a snail pace, so you might have to wait a month or two.

The other option is R7000 router, plus it has better support from DD-WRT then ac68u.

 

[ozgurcnbyz]

i think i am gonna go buy an ac56u . it looks better

 

[ozgurcnbyz]

found out today that the price difference between ac56u and ac68u is almost 100 usd . (asus routers are not really popular) . even though 100 usd is alot of money, i just dont want to have another bad experience with a router. do you think ac56u would be able to perform good from a 20 ft distance (different room) ?

 

[KGB7]

20 feet will be fine, just as long as your house is not built like fort knox, with walls made out of lead.

 

[ozgurcnbyz]

i dont know what they are made of but i know that they have some steel inside them. at 20 ft distance my transmitrate was around 160 mbps on 5ghz with rt-ac66u..Does that mean it might get lower than that with ac56u?

 

[Adamm]

The main difference between the AC56U and AC68U is that the latter has external antennas and 3 streams. At the moment most AC devices support only two streams, but the AC standard is fairly new and the adoption rate is starting to pick up.

So it really comes down to how 'future proof' your want your device to be. I personally pulled the trigger on the AC68* and have had no issues so far. Like with every new chipset there were initial teething problems but Asus seems to have solved the majority of them and is frequently pushing updates when others are discovered.

 

[ozgurcnbyz]

the only reason i am seriously considering ac56u is the looks (i hate those external antennas) and the 100 bucks. Other than that i am pretty sure ac68u is the router to buy

 

[Adamm]

the only reason i am seriously considering ac56u is the looks (i hate those external antennas) and the 100 bucks. Other than that i am pretty sure ac68u is the router to buy

If your buying online I suggest searching for the AC68R (same as the 68U but specifically for retail stores) as for whatever reason they are listed much cheaper then for 68U on eBay etc.

 

[RogerSC]

i dont know what they are made of but i know that they have some steel inside them. at 20 ft distance my transmitrate was around 160 mbps on 5ghz with rt-ac66u..Does that mean it might get lower than that with ac56u?

I'm sorry that you had a bad experience with the RT-AC66U. According to this review:

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-reviews/32234-asus-rt-ac56u-80211ac-dual-band-wireless-ac1200-gigabit-router-reviewed

(see the last graph in the "Closing Thoughts" section), the RT-AC66U should actually perform somewhat better than the RT-AC56U. If you got a bad one, though, as it seems that you did, then that wouldn't be the case.

The reviewer does give the RT-AC56U a really good review, and now that price is less of an issue, performance-wise it will most likely do what you need it to do.

Personally, I'm a fan of the external antennas despite the odd look. The routers that I've had with external antennas have worked better for me, due to the shape of my house. But if you are putting your router in the center of your house, that may not matter...my router is at the opposite end of my somewhat longer than wide house as my living room where I often use my wireless clients. So having the external antennas allows me to direct the wireless output of my router where I need it to go. This has proved useful.

I wish you better luck with your next router. If you do have problems, hopefully it will be during the warranty period *smile*.