Asus RT-N56U Reviewed

[RogerSC]

I got a new laptop recently, and found that the upcharge for a 2- or 3-stream network wireless interface card was way more than I'll pay for an external 2- or 3-stream external wireless adapter. So I bought the laptop with the single-stream wireless-n card internal, and this is fine for the time being. Of course, if I need more speed, or both 2.4GHz. and 5GHz. bands, then I'll need to get that external wireless adapter.

Just pointing out that because you have a "sucky" internal wireless adapter for your laptop doesn't mean that it has to stay that way. You can get a decent external wireless-n adapter that includes the 5GHz. band if you want. Personally, I don't have much use at the moment for 5GHz. because of it's range limitations. If I lived in a one-room apartment, life would be different *smile*.

 

[RogerSC]

Well, since the Linksys E4200 that was doing such a good job for me just went up in smoke (actually, there was no smoke), I decided to give the rt-n56u another chance. I was looking at the rt-n66u, and decided I didn't really need all the new features, aside from no immediate availability. Given that was why I gave up on the rt-n56u, because of Asus's buggy firmware, and that's the path that the rt-n66u also seems to be taking, thought I'd give the rt-n56u and the new alternative firmware a try.

So the first thing that I did when I got the rt-n56u was to upgrade to the RT-N56U_1.0.1.7f-p11 firmware version. It looks really good, and the performance is solid. Had it up and working quickly. Now I'm just hoping that the hardware will hold together. Oddly enough, I did like the graphical Asus management interface a lot, so I'm glad to see that the authors of the firmware started with the Asus firmware and basically fixed bugs in it...looks like some features have been added as well, but it was the many basic firmware bugs that drove me away from this router first time around, and I'm not seeing that this time.

If I do decide I need more features later on, I can use this router as an access point. But for the moment it's working well for me, seems really solid and is performing well for all my needs.

 

[RogerSC]

Oh yeah, one of the things that really bugged me in my first encounter with the rt-n56u was that you couldn't have hardware NAT and IPsec passthrough for VPN enabled at the same time. This time I have IPsec passthrough enabled (and am using my work VPN as we speak), and I see:

Hardware NAT: Enabled
Software QoS: Disabled

in the "Port Forwarding Log".

So there *smile*.

 

[RogerSC]

I also see that Issue #69 in the rt-n56u firmware project is to work on IPv6 support for this firmware. I'm rooting for them *smile*.

Apparently the amount of available memory may be an issue for this work.

 

[Unregistered]

I know why it won't work. It seems all of the new laptops have sucky wireless cards in them. They support b/g/n, but not the 5GHz band because it doesn't support 'a' too. So if you want to make sure your new laptop will work in the 5GHz band, make sure it is a/g/n, otherwise you are stuck with the 2.4Ghz band.

I had the same problem with my 4 laptops with dual band radio wifi adapters. The wireless mode was set wrong on all of them. You may have checked this already... go to device manager, select your adapter, select properties, then advanced tab. Make sure "Wireless Mode" is set to 802.11a, 802.11b, and 802.11g which should be the default. Hope that helps.

SS

 

[Unregistered]

Stream music to receiver

Hello,

Just got today this router and everything seems to be working alright. Just cant get this working with my Denon receiver which has Airplay. When I connect and start streaming music to it it plays ok for about 5sec and then stops. Then starts again in about 20sec.
Wired everything works alright, but wireless seems to be problem.

I have tried to turn off firewall, with different modes b/g/n and without any encryption.

Has anyone idea what could be the problem or can someone help me set up the wireless side so that it would have the optimal settings for streaming music over the wifi?

Thank you in advance.

 

[kritiana0]

FYI...

Apparently the N76U has been re-branded to N66U:
http://wl500g.info/showthread.php?t=25929

If what we know so far is accurate, it looks even nicer than the N56U.
And 3rd party fw will be "on the cards" longer-term w00t!

I'm going to break down and get Ethernet service in my condo so am looking for a router that can take advantage of the speed.

The ISP recommends the Apple Airport Extreme (but have heard it might have issues with non-Apple devices), but I'm also considering the ASUS.

Not a gamer, so latency, etc not a huge issue, neither is range (my place is small). I'm looking for a speedy RELIABLE router (my Linksys isn't great) that works well with PCs and ipads and iphones.

 

[MrTunkio]

Music stream to Receiver

Hello,

Bought this router yesterday and I am "quite" happy with it. The major problem seems to be streaming music to Denon receiver through Airplay.

I have my ISP coming to Cisco EPC3825 which is in bridged mode.
From that it is connected to this Asus.
Denon is connected through wire to Asus.
My laptop is Win7 64bit
The distance between router, laptop and device is not more than 2meters.


When I stream music ,so that all the devices are wired Airplay works great, but as I put the laptop to wireless it streams for about 5sec and then loses it for about 15secs and then starts again.

I have tried with this with firewalls, and antivirus turned off from laptop and router. Without WIFI encryption and so on. Also tried so that both laptop and denon are on wireless network.

So does anybody have any idea why the wireless is so poor compared to wired connection. Bought this router, because of the wireless capabilities but thinking of sending it back.

If somebody could assist me getting the optimal settings for streaming music over wifi.

Or if someone has streamed music over wifi to their receiver, I could hear some thoughts about that too.

Thanks in advance!

 

[ikecomp]

Had a trivial question. What is the optimium setting, HW NAT on or OFF, and how do you enable/disable this? I loaded the new firmware but do not see a simple on off for HWD NAT, though didn't dig thoroughly. Glad to see someone custominzing this firmware.

Is there a tutorial on all the functions available through telnet into the router(I assume you can?)

Thanks

I would also like this answered

 

[ronster22]

I would also like this answered

Check this Apple article about the TCP / UDP ports for Airplay

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1629

 

[Harsh132]

Hi guys! We have a new firmware 1.0.1.8е-р1(3) by Padavan
http://code.google.com/p/rt-n56u/downloads/list
- All patches cumulative migrated to new firmware 1.0.1.8e.
- Updated NVRAM driver. Fixed squashfs corruption after settings reset.
- Updated RTL8367M GigaPhy switch driver. Fixed smi bus errors, new ioctl control map, added RJ45 LED
events configuration, added jumbo frames relay configuration. Improved stability of Ethernet PHY link
for all ports.
- Updated IGD miniupnpd to v1.6.20120320.
- Reconfig Samba server 3.0.37 to multicall binary, decreased binary size, add last upstream patch.
- Added UPnP mediaserver minidlna-1.0.24 with last patches. Updated minidlna dependent packages ffmpeg-0.6.5,
sqlite-3.7.7.1, libjpeg-8d.
- Fixed drop mDNS (Bonjour/ZeroConf) and SSDP multicast packets with enabled IGMP Snooping for both WiFi AP.
All applications based on mDNS protocols (e.g. Apple AirPrint) now work with IGMP Snooping ON.
- Fixed some fatal bugs (raising kernel panic) in WiFi drivers.
- Fixed server socket handle bug in httpd daemon.
- WiFi driver RT3090_ap (2.4GHz) restructured to single kernel module rt3090_ap.ko (from 3 modules).
- Added usb-hid drivers.
- Firmware image changed to nopadding schema - no gap between kernel and rootfs, no more kernel size manual
calculation, more efficiency NOR flash space utilization.
- Rollback pppol2tp kernel driver and rp-l2tp daemon to original version by reason - L2TP auto-reconnect issues.
- PPTP conntrack restored back to loadable module mode and load to kernel only if necessary.
- Disabled inserting DNS servers, obtained by DHCP to route table for Dual PPPoE connection.
- Reset settings action now reset /etc/storage content.

 

[ikecomp]

I'm currently using padavan's firmware and have a couple of questions regarding some settings on the "Professional" tab

What does WMM DLS do and should it be enabled? (it's disabled by default)

Multicast Rate (Mbs) is currently set to: HTMIX (2S) 13-30 Mbps
should this be set to HTMIX (2S) 26-60 Mps for better performance?

Just exploring some of the options on this router and was curious about these settings. I tried googling but didn't see any decent explanations on the subject and what scenarios these settings are useful in.

 

[Harsh132]

I'm currently using padavan's firmware and have a couple of questions regarding some settings on the "Professional" tab

What does WMM DLS do and should it be enabled? (it's disabled by default)

Multicast Rate (Mbs) is currently set to: HTMIX (2S) 13-30 Mbps
should this be set to HTMIX (2S) 26-60 Mps for better performance?

Just exploring some of the options on this router and was curious about these settings. I tried googling but didn't see any decent explanations on the subject and what scenarios these settings are useful in.

1) WMM can leave off.
2) Multicast settings depend on how the flow is transferred to you their IP TV should be limited to what would not receive the multicast storm. Normally 15 ~ 30 is enough, if there is dispersal pictures, you can increase them

 

[ikecomp]

1) WMM can leave off.
2) Multicast settings depend on how the flow is transferred to you their IP TV should be limited to what would not receive the multicast storm. Normally 15 ~ 30 is enough, if there is dispersal pictures, you can increase them

Thanks for the reply. I don't really use IPTV so I will leave this at the default. This firmware is awesome by the way. I'm getting great speeds on 5ghz wireless and haven't had any disconnects thus far. keep up the good work.

On a separate note, would you recommend updating to the 8e-p1_3 firmware even if everything is currently working fine? I'm still on 8d-p3. If there are some fixes considered to be crucial I will update but if not, I can hold off until the next version. I mainly use my router media streaming to my wireless bridge (DAP 1522)

 

[Harsh132]

I think yes, I can recommend it to you. It has some fixes for drivers WiFi on 2.4G and 5G

 

[ikecomp]

I think yes, I can recommend it to you. It has some fixes for drivers WiFi on 2.4G and 5G

Thanks, I'll give it a go this weekend

 

[RogerSC]

Just noticed this note on the Padavan firmware download site. Since it mentioned IPv6 and guest networks, it caught my eye:

In the nearest future new beta release will be available for downloads.
This will be the firmware, built with another kernel.
( many thanks to Wive-NG project! )
The firmware will have almost the same functionality as 8d-p versions
at the begining. Then, when most of bugs will be fixed, IPv6 and MBSSID
(guest networks) will be switched on for WiFi.
Later, the source will be available with functions of custom firmware building,
so that almost everyone could build firmware with applications he needs.

These applications will probably be included:

OpenSSL, SFTP, another useful network applications, which require OpenSSL
(i.e. OpenVPN, OpenSSH and so on)
up to date samba 3.5.x or 3.6.x
transmission-daemon

 

[RogerSC]

Hi guys! We have a new firmware 1.0.1.8е-р1(3) by Padavan
http://code.google.com/p/rt-n56u/downloads/list

I just upgraded to this firmware, and the highest 5GHz. wireless channel I see is channel 48? This seems wrong, is it me, or are there supposed to be the upper channels (like 161, 165, etc.)?

 

[RogerSC]

I just upgraded to this firmware, and the highest 5GHz. wireless channel I see is channel 48? This seems wrong, is it me, or are there supposed to be the upper channels (like 161, 165, etc.)?

Doh!!! I just saw the channel settings based on "Region"...my only excuse is that it's at the very bottom of the page, where all the unimportant stuff is *smile*.

And, of course, the last place that I looked *smile*.

 

[Harsh132]

DO NOT FORGET TO DO A HARD RESET!!
IT IS REQUIRED AFTER UPDATE TO 8e-p1
factory default in WEB GUI router