AC68U WiFi@5G can only deliver 50Mbps

[techlander]

AC68U WiFi@5G can only deliver 50Mbps out of 100Mbps hardline

I just bought an AC68U in the hope to fully utilize my household 100Mbps broadband over WiFi@5G. For test, I used Netgear A6200 wireless card on my desktop. Also I used iPhone 5S and iPad Mini Retina (Both on iOS 7.1.2). For comparison, I used Netgear R6300 V2 router. The router is placed within 20 feet of sight, and there is no walls in between.

All the speed tests were carried out through Speedtest.net, or Speedtest app for iOS at the same testing site. My subscription is 100Mbps down and 10Mps up. The wired connection gave me a 94Mbps down and 10Mbps up. Neighbor wireless signals are all at 2.4G, so there is no 5G interference.

With AC68U: [tried default settings, or 80MHz, 40 MHz and 20MHz, switched channel number to 161,153 etc. disabled Beamforming nothing changed. Open system, or WPA2 with AES]
A6200 gets around 55Mbps down and 10Mbps up [actual file downloading speed: 4.3MB/S]
iPhone 5s, 50Mbps, 10Mbps
iPad Mini Retina, 52Mbps, 10Mbps

With R6300 V2: [all setting by default, only modify 5G to 1300Mbps, WPA2 with AES]
A6200 75Mbps down, 10Mbps up [actual file downloading speed:5.9MB/s]
iPhone 5S, 52Mbps, 10Mbps
iPad Mini Retina, 75Mbps, 10Mbps

If I connect A6200 with both routers and transfer a file from another PC connected by wire to routers, file transfer speed is 36.6MB/s, reaching exactly the bottleneck of A6200, limited by its USB2.0 interface. For this, I assume the network is working alright.

I also used the app WiFi SweetSpots to test the throughput. For both routers, the results are excatly the same.
iPhone 5S, 102Mbps
iPad Mini Retina, 152Mbps
It seems the app measures the in and out traffic altogether, so the actual speed is half the result, which resonates with Speedtest resutls.

I have tried to flash AC68U with latest official firmware (3.0.0.4.378_3873), Merlin's latest (3.0.0.4_376.49_5), Tomato, DD-WRT, and all yield the same performance. I also tried to disable HW acceleration, and there is no difference. Tried tinkering with all settings, minor improvements in results did happen but only within 5Mbps increase. I tried to set the router into AP mode, and this time, AC6200 can get 60Mbps off it, but still it is far from 75Mbps, or even 90+Mbps I am aiming for.


So did I get a AC68U with hardware defect?


Update:

I wrote an email to ASUS support and they responded.

"You speeds for the AC 5GHz you should recieve is around 70-80 Mbps. The only way you will get 100 Mbps out of your 100 Mbps line is to hardline it. With all WiFi there will be a difference in speed from a hardlined connection, as this is constant and has a wire for the infomations to travel at the speed of light, in stead the speed of radio waves. "

I am really confused. I hope that's not the case. Otherwise, I will NOT upgrade my wireless router any more, as there will be no difference in the end.

 

[L&LD]

Stop using i devices to test for highest speeds. They simply won't do it.

Did you do a full reset to factory defaults and then manually setup the router when changing firmware versions? Did you create a new ssid each time?

Did you try lower channels? Did you reboot the router and your devices in-between tests?


To test your wireless network, don't use speedtest.net. You need to be testing between a wired computer with a fast HDD or SSD to a wireless computer with an equally fast drive.

 

[Vaesel]

Im cut off to 50mbit down and 20 up on 5g with 376.49_5 and came from 376.48_1

So this build is a no go if you want fast wifi.

/Vaesel

 

[john9527]

Definitely follow L&LD's advice....

When I did my testing, I used NetIO from this link
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanw...ee-more-ways-to-measure-network-speed?start=1

Using that on my LAN (measuring an AC7260 mini-PCIe adapter) I get about 120Mb/s upload, and 250 Mb/s download with the wired-to-wireless configuration L&LD described.

 

[techlander]

Stop using i devices to test for highest speeds. They simply won't do it.

Did you do a full reset to factory defaults and then manually setup the router when changing firmware versions? Did you create a new ssid each time?

Did you try lower channels? Did you reboot the router and your devices in-between tests?


To test your wireless network, don't use speedtest.net. You need to be testing between a wired computer with a fast HDD or SSD to a wireless computer with an equally fast drive.

I also used A6200 wireless card, which supports 802.11ac, though only at 2T2R. The result is the same as you can see from my post.

I did full reset to factory defaults every time after I flash a firmware. I didn't create a new ssid each time though I did change them for once as I don't think that could be the reason. I did try lower channels, or higher, but they didn't affect the final results. During the test, I would power off the router when the other was in testing, and vice versa, so there was no need to reboot them. For desktop, I did reboot several times only to see the same results.

What I am doing is not actually testing my wireless network throughput. I just want to extract the maximum speed out of my wireless connection. I got a 100Mbps connection, and hardline test shows it works as it should. However, with all the devices connected to 5G channel, N or AC mode, I can only get 50Mbps, half the speed that I had subscribed. This just makes no sense.

And, how can we explain when using Netgear R6300V2 as router can I get 75Mbps wirelessly? Also be noted, actual file downloading speed all resonated to my test results through Speedtest.net.

To me it is more like a firmware bug instead of hardware failure.

Here is the info on the wireless A6200 shown in system log.
MAC IP Address Name RSSI Rx/Tx Rate Connected Flags
20:E5:2A:------ 192.168.1.4 * -51dBm 866/866 Mbps 00:10:04 S AU

 

[techlander]

Definitely follow L&LD's advice....

When I did my testing, I used NetIO from this link
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanwa...-speed?start=1

Using that on my LAN (measuring an AC7260 mini-PCIe adapter) I get about 120Mb/s upload, and 250 Mb/s download with the wired-to-wireless configuration L&LD described.

Wow. But that link doesn't work now.

 

[techlander]

Im cut off to 50mbit down and 20 up on 5g with 376.49_5 and came from 376.48_1

So this build is a no go if you want fast wifi.

/Vaesel

So what is your speed at 387.48_1? And what is your subscription speed? I will try lowering it to 48_1 now

update: I just lowered it to 387.48_1 by merlin, and test results showed a 5Mbps increase, now 55Mbps off wireless. Did restore defaults before and after flash. I'm thinking it's more like a firmware bug. I should get 90+Mbps off wireless. I had seen this kind of performance in many posts online.

 

[john9527]

Wow. But that link doesn't work now.

Duh...my fault....I cut and pasted from another post, and it copied the 'shortened' link. Here's the correct one (also updated my original post).

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanw...ee-more-ways-to-measure-network-speed?start=1

 

[techlander]

Duh...my fault....I cut and pasted from another post, and it copied the 'shortened' link. Here's the correct one (also updated my original post).

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanw...ee-more-ways-to-measure-network-speed?start=1

Thank you for the update!
I have tested my connection with TamoSoft and NetIO, from wireless A6200 to wired PC through AC68U.

The TamoSoft results,
TCP Up: 96.14 Mbps (Ave: 122.55) UDP Up: 151.55 Mbps (Ave: 183.13), Loss: 0.3%
TCP Down: 112.84 Mbps (Ave: 100.41) UDP Down: 246.24 Mbps (Ave: 257.55), Loss: 34.5%
Round-trip time: 2.1 ms

NetIO results,
Avg TX;20093.56
Avg RX;17714.50

If I copy a file from wired PC to wireless desktop, I can get 36.3MB/S. All these tests showed adequate bandwidth for 100Mbps wireless transmission.

I'm not sure about how these test resutls matter for the actual WAN speed you can use through wireless. I mean, I used iPerf to test my connection the other day and it showed 200+Mbps from wireless to wired, but they cannot translate into better speed than 50Mbps when in actual use.

 

[techlander]

I just noticed my AC68U is version A2. I don't know if there is any change that caused such problems.

 

[john9527]

Unfortunately, I can't give you any direct results on the Wireless to WAN performance. My service is sold as 50 Down/5 Up......actually get's 60 Down/10 Up on both my wired and that same AC wireless connection.

One other bit of data...I was checking Traffic Monitor the other day while I happened to have a backup (windows wbadmin to a vhd on my main PC/server) going on the wireless AC PC....it showed 271 Mb/s.

 

[techlander]

Unfortunately, I can't give you any direct results on the Wireless to WAN performance. My service is sold as 50 Down/5 Up......actually get's 60 Down/10 Up on both my wired and that same AC wireless connection.

One other bit of data...I was checking Traffic Monitor the other day while I happened to have a backup (windows wbadmin to a vhd on my main PC/server) going on the wireless AC PC....it showed 271 Mb/s.

Is all your server and client local? I tried to copy files from wired to wireless clients, and it gave me 36.6MB/S, about the same performance you had seen.

 

[john9527]

Is all your server and client local? I tried to copy files from wired to wireless clients, and it gave me 36.6MB/S, about the same performance you had seen.

Yes, it's local (5G wireless)....about 20ft thru 2 sheetrock walls and two full closets line of sight

 

[anon2015]

I think it is a firmware bug. I am seeing something similar. An Ookla speedtest on a hardwired connection gives me around 190 Mbps. In December my Android (ac capable) would measure around 150 Mbps through this router. After updating the firmware on the router in Jan, the same phone in the same location tops out around 50. The odd thing is that my laptop, with a "N" wireless card still gives me wireless speeds through the router that match the hardwired connection.

 

[Shonk]

My phone's only 5Ghz 150 capable and im getting 60mbit which is about right
for a single stream 150 device

 

[techlander]

I think it is a firmware bug. I am seeing something similar. An Ookla speedtest on a hardwired connection gives me around 190 Mbps. In December my Android (ac capable) would measure around 150 Mbps through this router. After updating the firmware on the router in Jan, the same phone in the same location tops out around 50. The odd thing is that my laptop, with a "N" wireless card still gives me wireless speeds through the router that match the hardwired connection.

Thank you! Yeah. That's how I felt about this. There must be something wrong with the firmware. My. Your N wireless can deliver 190Mbps while my AC card can only give me 50Mbps. I tried N as well, but they can only yield 45Mbps.

Another observation is that I mentioned better Speedtest result out of R6300 V2, however, after I upgraded that router to its latest firmware, everything connected to it can only yield 52Mbps at most. Exactly like AC68U. Nothing changed except the firmware version. Actual file downloading speed also significantly lowered. I'm thinking some kind of driver incompatibility. I really look to Merlin for some solution in his new builds.

Of all the AC68U build I can download from ASUS official website and Merlin's repository, I had tried every one on my router, and the results were all the same. Maybe earlier builds can restore the blazing fast wireless.

 

[techlander]

My phone's only 5Ghz 150 capable and im getting 60mbit which is about right
for a single stream 150 device

What is your subscription speed? Is that 100Mbps?

IMO, the displayed rate is not accurate. My A6200 has a display rate of 866Mbps for all the time, but it can only give me 6MB/S downloading speed out of my 12MB/s hardline connection.

 

[techlander]

Update:

I wrote an email to ASUS support and they responded.

"You speeds for the AC 5GHz you should recieve is around 70-80 Mbps. The only way you will get 100 Mbps out of your 100 Mbps line is to hardline it. With all WiFi there will be a difference in speed from a hardlined connection, as this is constant and has a wire for the infomations to travel at the speed of light, in stead the speed of radio waves. "

I am really confused. I hope that's not the case. Otherwise, I will NOT upgrade my wireless router any more, as there will be no difference in the end.

 

[XIII]

If this helps, on my iPhone 6 (with AC support) my RT-AC66U (running Merlin's 376.49_5 firmware) gets to 110 Mbps down and 11 Mbps up (my subscription speed is 120 Mbps down and 12 Mbps up, so it gets pretty close).

 

[techlander]

If this helps, on my iPhone 6 (with AC support) my RT-AC66U (running Merlin's 376.49_5 firmware) gets to 110 Mbps down and 11 Mbps up (my subscription speed is 120 Mbps down and 12 Mbps up, so it gets pretty close).

It really does! Thank you!
I think iPhone 6 is 1T1R on AC, while iPhone 5S is 1T1R on N. I am not sure if iPad Mini 2 shares the same 2T2R on N with iPad Air, yet I'm sure Air 2 is AC.
Seems I need an Air 2 to hit 100Mbps on the wireless.