Asus RT-AC68U - Stable for 1 day then speeds slow to a crawl !

[Mitchen]

Hi all,

My Asus RT-AC68U has been acting up lately.

It is connected to a Fibre connection and I have tested the Fiber connection and it is running at full throttle.

I have updated to the latest Firmware Version:3.0.0.4.384_32799 and done a full reset.

I have left all settings as standard.

Connection stays stable and fast for approx. 1 day then slows to a crawl and is almost unusable.

Both the Wired and Wireless connections both slow down.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

 

[indark]

I will normally just power cycle and clear nvram with wps method first.
power off the router for 30sec, hold wps button while powering on
wait till the power led flashing/blinking, then release the wps button
after it finish booting reconfigure without loading old configuration.

I will also unplug the power from the ONT and unplug the battery for 5 min
let them reset and plug them back in.

If you have done both steps mentioned above but still experience slow network:
Try to bypass the AC68U and hook up the ethernet from PC to ONT/whatever fiber provides. Try that to make sure it's actually the AC68u giving you issue.
use Adaptive QoS page for glance of the network usage to make sure nothing is consuming bandwidth.

If you recently experience thunderstorm/power outage in your area, try to call the ISP and ask them to reset the connection. And they will normally ask you to reset those anyway.

 

[Mitchen]

I will normally just power cycle and clear nvram with wps method first.
power off the router for 30sec, hold wps button while powering on
wait till the power led flashing/blinking, then release the wps button
after it finish booting reconfigure without loading old configuration.

Is this the same as doing a full reset ?
I did a full reset this morning and it lasted 5 hours before slowing to a crawl.
I am now on a go slow connection.

I will also unplug the power from the ONT and unplug the battery for 5 min
let them reset and plug them back in.

If you have done both steps mentioned above but still experience slow network:
Try to bypass the AC68U and hook up the ethernet from PC to ONT/whatever fiber provides. Try that to make sure it's actually the AC68u giving you issue.

I have confirmed its the AC68U
When it starts to slow to a crawl, I connect the PC directly to the Fibre Connection and all runs fast.
I have tried this a number of times and its the AC68U that is the bottleneck as my PC to Fibre maxes out the connection

use Adaptive QoS page for glance of the network usage to make sure nothing is consuming bandwidth.

Done that. Nothing is running to justify the slow crawl speeds.
Ran a speed test with 1 PC as the only device running and the speed is 1/10 what it should.
Pings blow out to double or triple what they should be when its running normally.

It's now driving me crazy that I can't get through a day without it slowing to a crawl

Router had been working ok for the previous 2 years

Do these routers ever fail and if so how would I know (I have had it for 2 years) ?

 

[indark]

Is this the same as doing a full reset ?
I did a full reset this morning and it lasted 5 hours before slowing to a crawl.
I am now on a go slow connection.



I have confirmed its the AC68U
When it starts to slow to a crawl, I connect the PC directly to the Fibre Connection and all runs fast.
I have tried this a number of times and its the AC68U that is the bottleneck as my PC to Fibre maxes out the connection



Done that. Nothing is running to justify the slow crawl speeds.
Ran a speed test with 1 PC as the only device running and the speed is 1/10 what it should.
Pings blow out to double or triple what they should be when its running normally.

It's now driving me crazy that I can't get through a day without it slowing to a crawl

Router had been working ok for the previous 2 years

Do these routers ever fail and if so how would I know (I have had it for 2 years) ?

While it technically should be the same(at least to my limited knowledge), it does address some weirdness symptom that persist after multiple factory reset/initialize for me.
I can't say whether or not it's the power cycle or the clear nvram part helps.
But last time I experience similar issue was high CPU usage after firmware update.
issue persist after multiple reset/initialize, and works fine after 1 - 2 power cycle+clear nvram.

if you have spare power adapter, you can test to see if it's caused by bad adapter, especially if it start happens after thunderstorm/outage

And if those suggestion does not help, might want to check if your router still covered by warranty.

my ac68u still going strong after 5 years, I do hook it up to ups so it doesn't get killed/damaged by power flicker.
It's hard to say how the product will "fail"
can be the day after you no longer able to return
can be the day after warranty expire
or they will just last forever ;p


you can also check out this tjread, to see if there is mising suggestion that you can also try
for troubleshooting
https://www.snbforums.com/threads/b...-ac88u-router-merlin.48881/page-2#post-432338

 

[Mitchen]

While it technically should be the same(at least to my limited knowledge), it does address some weirdness symptom that persist after multiple factory reset/initialize for me.
I can't say whether or not it's the power cycle or the clear nvram part helps.
But last time I experience similar issue was high CPU usage after firmware update.
issue persist after multiple reset/initialize, and works fine after 1 - 2 power cycle+clear nvram.

I just did a WPS + Powerup as you suggested

Speed-test straight after was at Max speed

However, after 10 mins, dropped back down to virtually no speed again

This is getting worse. It's gone being stable for months, then days, then 1 day, then 8 hours, then 5 hours, now to 10 mins

I will put new cables and do one final test.

If that doesn't fix it then its off to a warranty repair ...

It's the first Asus product and will be the last Asus product I will ever buy. Hasn't even lasted 3 years. The Asus RT-AC68U is a cheap and useless router.

Previous ADSL modem (another brand) has lasted 15+ years and is still going strong ....

 

[Grisu]

I just did a WPS + Powerup as you suggested
Speed-test straight after was at Max speed

However, after 10 mins, dropped back down to virtually no speed again
This is getting worse. It's gone being stable for months, then days, then 1 day, then 8 hours, then 5 hours, now to 10 mins

Probably a thermal problem with the hardware.

Maybe only the power adapter going his way dwon, change it before you throw everything away.

 

[Mitchen]

Probably a thermal problem with the hardware.

Maybe only the power adapter going his way dwon, change it before you throw everything away.

You could be right that's its a power thing.

The one off button at the back has been playing up and I have to turn it off & on a few times for the on power to catch

It's still under warranty so off to a service call