ASUS Makes AiMesh Official

[Dave123]

I've been using the beta firmware for a couple of months with 2x AC68Us, the primary as an AP and the secondary as a node, both with wired backhaul to my main switch. It's worked flawlessly, in at least that I can never tell it's working (or not). That is, all I see on a daily basis is great wifi coverage and speed.

As I type this I'm updating to the official, non-beta firmware. Let's hope my luck holds!

 

[kaiguy]

It's worked flawlessly, in at least that I can never tell it's working (or not). That is, all I see on a daily basis is great wifi coverage and speed.

As I type this I'm updating to the official, non-beta firmware. Let's hope my luck holds!

I hope it continues to work for you! Just picked up another 68U after seeing this official release, and I am finding that with wired backhaul my speeds from the node are quite slower. In fact, both download and upload seem to be halved or more with internet test speeds. Definitely strange.

 

[Lars]

Im testing two ac68u.using one ac68u as main router and one ac68u as node.
Can i get one SSID,I can se that i have one 2.4ghz and one 5ghz two ssid,can i get one SSID(2.4 and 5ghz togheter)
I now have netgear rbk53 one router and two satellites.
Got me two ac68 testing,maybe i will gett one ac5300 and one ac88u,and use my two ac68u,my family and kids like that i have one SSID.
Maybe i will replacing my netgear system,have a big house.i need some advice,how to make my best system one ssid.

 

[SeanFL]

Mesh update: I'm hardwired for the mesh node and get full speeds when connected to the node (155 down, 170 up on fios).

When I log into the main router, click on aiMesh, click on the node, then click "more config" it seems to show the mesh is wireless. Under connection priority, it's set to auto. If I change that to "ethernet" still get the same speeds. Guessing it's a small bug?

Can anyone comment on if the handoff between mesh nodes works well or does a phone/laptop seem to hang onto the one that's farther away as you move about the rooms? My phone (pixel 2) seems to handoff well. Haven't tried enough devices yet to know how well it works for most.

 

[thiggins]

Can anyone comment on if the handoff between mesh nodes works well

Mesh nodes/APs don't "hand off" devices (STAs). Devices decide when and where to roam.

If a device and AP both support 802.11k,v,r (singly or in some combination), the roaming process can be sped up. But if a device doesn't want to move, the only thing an AP can do to make it move is to kick it off (deauthenticate). Most APs are reluctant to do this, however, because then they get blamed for being unstable.

So the question more likely to get you a helpful answer is: "Can anyone tell me what their experience has been with Device X roaming and AiMesh?"

 

[SeanFL]

Tim, thank you for the clarification on how the roaming works.

For what it's worth, I'd been interested to see how successful roaming works on cell phone wifi-calling for others. So far I've lost a couple calls when moving from one location to the other...but not enough examples to know for certain that it's a roaming/handoff issue.

 

[thiggins]

Tim, thank you for the clarification on how the roaming works.

For what it's worth, I'd been interested to see how successful roaming works on cell phone wifi-calling for others. So far I've lost a couple calls when moving from one location to the other...but not enough examples to know for certain that it's a roaming/handoff issue.

It's not surprising you dropped calls. ASUS says they support only home built roaming assistance. No 11k,v,r support.

 

[thesrod]

Does anyone know where I can submit a bug report to Asus. I tried connecting to 68u's but they keep disconnecting every 10 minutes.

 

[maxbraketorque]

Mesh nodes/APs don't "hand off" devices (STAs). Devices decide when and where to roam.

If a device and AP both support 802.11k,v,r (singly or in some combination), the roaming process can be sped up. But if a device doesn't want to move, the only thing an AP can do to make it move is to kick it off (deauthenticate). Most APs are reluctant to do this, however, because then they get blamed for being unstable.

So the question more likely to get you a helpful answer is: "Can anyone tell me what their experience has been with Device X roaming and AiMesh?"

ASUS must be doing something to encourage hand-off because they are suggesting such capability. I think its just a modified version of their Smart Connect. And if it doesn't work, what's the point of AiMesh over standard router+AP mode. I wonder why they don't incorporate 802.11k,v,r,s support.

 

[thiggins]

ASUS must be doing something to encourage hand-off because they are suggesting such capability.

It's called marketing....

 

[glugglug]

It's not surprising you dropped calls. ASUS says they support only home built roaming assistance. No 11k,v,r support.

I find that extremely disappointing. Without supporting any of the roaming related protocols, and no Mesh guest Network yet, I'm really not seeing any advantage over plain old access points with the same SSID. From the discussions so far, I think maybe it just introduces more bugs?

 

[DaveMishSr]

Looks like they removed AC66 from the listed devices with future support (even if limited)... That sucks

The MIPS routers are getting AiMesh? I thought not. Am I mistaken? I have an old AC66U. If it does get AiMesh that will be sweet!

 

[DaveMishSr]

Im testing two ac68u.using one ac68u as main router and one ac68u as node.
Can i get one SSID,I can se that i have one 2.4ghz and one 5ghz two ssid,can i get one SSID(2.4 and 5ghz togheter)
I now have netgear rbk53 one router and two satellites.
Got me two ac68 testing,maybe i will gett one ac5300 and one ac88u,and use my two ac68u,my family and kids like that i have one SSID.
Maybe i will replacing my netgear system,have a big house.i need some advice,how to make my best system one ssid.

The FAQ says yes. Both bands can have the same SSID.

 

[tallytr]

I find that extremely disappointing. Without supporting any of the roaming related protocols, and no Mesh guest Network yet, I'm really not seeing any advantage over plain old access points with the same SSID. From the discussions so far, I think maybe it just introduces more bugs?

I just got a new RT-AC86U as main router and replaced wired AP (RT-N66U) with former main router (RT-AC68U) for better basement coverage.
Set up as AiMesh and really like it. Now one SSID throughout the house and management through main router interface.

Instructions here:
https://www.asus.com/us/support/FAQ/1035087/

 

[Eric Lieb]

The MIPS routers are getting AiMesh? I thought not. Am I mistaken? I have an old AC66U. If it does get AiMesh that will be sweet!

The original AIMesh BETA thread said AC66 was a future supported (but would have some limitations) but they may have meant the B1 and not the original AC66. I already got a TM-1900 and flashed it to a AC68U to use as a mesh node, and eventually I am going to get a AC86 as the primary and use my AC68R as another Mesh node.

 

[Kris Paul]

AiMesh Noob checking in.
Pre-aimesh setup : 68U as the router, and AC3100 as the APs, all wired via ethernet . I would routinely get 400-500 mbps on all wireless clients, and 800mbps+ on gigabit wired clients.

With AiMesh setup (same topology, wired APs), all wifi fell to crawling (relatively) 70-100mbps. Wired was 800+ still.

The weird thing is with AiMesh, I noticed that ALL wifi clients connected to the 68U router instead of APs. I rebooted, re-installed AiMesh, and set those up again, and still nothing. I used the latest version from the Asus AiMesh support site. Handoffs didn't happen, didn't matter where I went.

Another thing that bothered me was that I could NOT reach and configure APs - it was hidden behind the 68U router page and there was no way that I found where I could go to the specific ap and configure anything. nada. FWIW, the mobile app looks cool.


Overall, other than a fancy animation etc on the app and the fancy setup process, a well thought out basic setup far outperforms AiMesh as it stands today. Surprisingly it took me a LONG time to revert back to the basic setup - that is a post for another day

 

[RamGuy]

Is there any way to tell what access point a client is connected to? I would like to monitor and test the hand-off between nodes and see if it actually does anything in order to make sure the client moves from one access point to the other or not.

 

[OzarkEdge]

Is there any way to tell what access point a client is connected to? I would like to monitor and test the hand-off between nodes and see if it actually does anything in order to make sure the client moves from one access point to the other or not.

Yes. Go to the AiMesh node list and select a node to see a pop-up client list. Unfortunately, this list omits band information, but that info is visible in the other client lists.

Notice that in the main client list down the right side, if you hover over the signal quality bars, a pop-up will have more signal details like strength and Tx/Rx rates.

OE

 

[thiggins]

Is there any way to tell what access point a client is connected to? I would like to monitor and test the hand-off between nodes and see if it actually does anything in order to make sure the client moves from one access point to the other or not.

If your device reports BSSID in its connection properties you can match that to the radio MAC address in the AP.

 

[RamGuy]

Okay, I did some testing using the latest AiMesh firmware for my Asus RT-AC5300 and Asus RT-AC68U. I'm currently using Google WiFi and I'm very pleased with it, but DNS Rebinding is making it impossible for me to use my local Plex-server without routing everything over my external connection which is stupid.

So I decided to test this and see how it fares compared to Google WiFi. My results thus far is really bad. I simply updated both, restored to factory defaults ran the setup on my RT-AC5300 and connected the RT-AC68U using the AiMesh feature and changed from AiMesh Router mode to AiMesh Access Point mode and placed the RT-AC68U in my bathroom using LAN not wireless and started testing.

It seems to be moving my iPhone and MacBook from the AC5300 in the living room to the AC68U in the bathroom just fine. At least according to the Web-UI my devices gets listed under the RT-AC68U when close to the bathroom. But the performance is abysmal. Even when in the living room connected using 802.11ac reporting Tx Rate of 1300Mbps on my MacBook I'm only getting 15mbit down and 11mbit up according to DSLReports. Its the same on my iPhone. Using Speedtest while in the living room close to the RT-AC5300 I'm only seeing 10-15 mbit. Moving into the bathroom its pretty much the same.

Going back to Google WiFi I have 300 mbit on my iPhone and 540 mbit on my MacBook both in the living room and in the bathroom.


EDIT:

Its really hard to tell if the AC68 is using LAN or wireless. Even with the Ethernet cable connected its still showing wireless bars in the Web-UI so I guess its just ignoring the Ethernet cable?