AC-87u support

[Nigel Jones]

Are there any specific limitations to be aware of when running merlin on the AC-87u that might be a little quirky/unexpected when compared to the AC-88u or AC-68u?

(More general question on this HW posted to https://www.snbforums.com/threads/ac-87u.39315/ but wanted to explicitly check merlin status)

Thanks

 

[elorimer]

I've been happy with the 87u. I picked it up on a refurb, and after a week the LAN ports malfunctioned. Asus took it under warranty and replaced the board, and it's been fine the last year. I was tempted by the 3100 refurb today at Newegg for $100, though. I have four Asus/Merlin routers already!

 

[Zirescu]

Been happy with mine for the last couple years. If you're using a VPN service & have a higher bandwidth connection you might get some better performance from the other two.

 

[galen2]

I was thinking on buy this router too, but i pass because quantenna 5g wifi driver dont include powersaving mode and drain battery from my phones/tablet so fast. I own one EA-AC87U with same wifi chip and had to replace it, now i have connected one RP-AC68U and its ok. My next router to replace RT-AC66U will be RT-AC88U

I was searching recently if that "bug" on 5g wifi was corrected, because asus know that problem since 1 year ago, but i cant find anything, if someone that own this router could check if 5g wifi driver now support powersaving mode i will think again if buy this router but i readed last week one post from merlin saying that wifi driver on this router was not updated time ago so... :S

 

[Nigel Jones]

that's a good point about the powersaving -- I just did some reading around it. Over in the netgear forums I see a similar device (was it the 7800?) also had the same issue with quantenna drivers, but there's some indication it was addressed in a firmware update, so I was wondering if it's still an issue now? it's sometimes tricky knowing what was fixed in a firmware update.

My devices are iOS, windows mostly... but it seems a crazy omission/bug... enough to likely make me skip.

 

[Nigel Jones]

I see there was a firmware update "added workaround for android power drain issue", and a post by asus engineer seemingly saying the issue was caused by 5Ghz connect/reconnect. So it's still unclear if fixed or still present!

 

[joegreat]

I see there was a firmware update "added workaround for android power drain issue", and a post by asus engineer seemingly saying the issue was caused by 5Ghz connect/reconnect. So it's still unclear if fixed or still present!

Why not enable WLAN power saving on the Android side? Under WLAN Settings you can avoid WLAN connection when then SmartPhone is in sleep mode...

I am more then happy with my AC87U which replaced a died AC68U - the overall performance is much better (CPU, WLAN, ...) and I had no issues with it running many services as outlined below.

 

[oversim]

I am more then happy with my AC87U which replaced a died AC68U - the overall performance is much better (CPU, WLAN, ...) and I had no issues with it running many services as outlined below.

Me too! Same replacement 2 years ago, my 87u works fine!

 

[Beherit]

Are there any specific limitations to be aware of when running merlin on the AC-87u that might be a little quirky/unexpected when compared to the AC-88u or AC-68u?

AFAIK, only hardware/manufacturing issues. Judging by the posts on this forum, it seems to be a bit of a gamble when buying an AC88U - either it works perfectly or reboots randomly and needs to be returned and exchanged for a new one.

I've only had minor, self-inflicted issues with my AC88U. All of them caused by me insisting on enabling and using many of its features and installing and running plenty of stuff on it. All of them also fixed by enabling swap and installing the custom ntpd-server to reduce memory usage.

...quantenna 5g wifi driver dont include powersaving mode and drain battery from my phones/tablet so fast.

I've never had this issue, neither with Android, iOS nor Windows devices.

Powersaving mode can be enabled/disabled individually on each WiFi band. I don't think there would be a switch for it on the 5 GHz band if the feature wouldn't exist.

 

[MarioCaires]

I was thinking on buy this router too, but i pass because quantenna 5g wifi driver dont include powersaving mode and drain battery from my phones/tablet so fast. I own one EA-AC87U with same wifi chip and had to replace it, now i have connected one RP-AC68U and its ok. My next router to replace RT-AC66U will be RT-AC88U

I was searching recently if that "bug" on 5g wifi was corrected, because asus know that problem since 1 year ago, but i cant find anything, if someone that own this router could check if 5g wifi driver now support powersaving mode i will think again if buy this router but i readed last week one post from merlin saying that wifi driver on this router was not updated time ago so... :S

There was a bug about a year ago that would drain battery on Android phones when connected to the 5GHz band, however that was already addressed a long time ago. Regarding the powersaving mode, not showing the option doesn't mean the feature is not implemented, it is just not available to Turn On/Off as I'm pretty sure the QTN have some kind of Powersaving enabled on their chips!
That being said, the AC87 may be far from being the best Asus router however no big complaints on my end excluding when the above bug was present around a year ago!

 

[Beherit]

Regarding the powersaving mode, not showing the option doesn't mean the feature is not implemented, it is just not available to Turn On/Off as I'm pretty sure the QTN have some kind of Powersaving enabled on their chips!

I wrote the opposite, that the option IS there - hence it must be available.

As @Nigel Jones wrote, the battery drain had nothing to do with power saving modes. It was a problem with some, but not all, Android devices that cause the Quantenna kernel driver to constantly disconnect and reconnect to them.

AFAIK, ASUS/Quantenna call it a "workaround" and not "fix" because the bug causing this repeat-cycle of reconnections is in the hardware or kernel drivers in the Android devices, not the Quantenna chip. That's why the problem doesn't occur with all Android devices. Unluckily for Quantenna, all Samsung devices have this problem and they're the most widely sold..

 

[Nigel Jones]

thanks for the tips. I ended up ordering an AC3200. Right choice or not I don't know, but I was caught between the 'safe' AC-68u and the well rated but expensive AC-88u. the AC-68p, AC3100, AC1900 are not available in the UK. Both the 67 and 3200 are well discounted. but both have 1 Ghz CPUs so I decided to skip the quantenna for now... though I probably would have been happy with either!

If anyone knows of any strong reasons why my decision was a bad one please say. Amazon returns are possible