ASUS RT-N66U 2.4 GHz capped at 3Mbps randomly

[baldinbro]

I'm at my wits end. I love this router, but it's got one major flaw - for the life of me I cannot get good quality bandwidth out of my 2.4 GHz signal.

I've got a 15Mbps plan with Time Warner and over ethernet and 5 GHz I never ever dip below that level. With the 2.4 GHz channel 80% of the time I can only get 1-3Mbps. Sometimes a router reset will fix it (and give me 15Mbps) sometimes not.

I've messed with my wifi channels, but they all get about the same bandwidth. I've moved the router around the house to no avail. I've amped up the power (I'm at 100 now) I've updated the firmware to the official ASUS builds and now I'm on Merlin (3.0.0.4.374.39).

No one else is sucking bandwidth from the Network, but like most buildings in New York the 2.4 channel is incredibly crowded. Still, the fact that restarting the router frequently gets me good bandwidth leads me to think it has to do with the way the ASUS is set up.

Googling, it definitely seems to be an issue with other people (when you type in ASUS RT-N66U 2.4 ... google fills in SLOW), but none of these threads had a solution so I thought I'd post on here once more.

Attached are my router settings. Please help!

 

[L&LD]

What may work if you haven't tried it yet is to do an upgrade to the latest 374.39_0-em firmware (even if it is already installed) and then do a full reset.

At this point; setup the router manually and only change the defaults one by one, testing for a couple of hours in between.

You will either find what setting needs changing, or you may find that the firmware update and the reset cured your issues, with any luck.

 

[baldinbro]

This was what I did earlier today. Same firmware with a factory reset.

Problem hasn't gone away.

 

[CooCooCaChoo]

How's your wireless neighborhood look like? If there are tons of 2.4 GHz wireless networks surrounding you, then you will have to do more tweaking.

 

[ceabbott2]

Holy Crap!

I passed out with my phone on my chest typing this message at 1:30 am

Fudge tried to copy and paste but it didn't work. OK not retyping too long. I HAVE THE EXACT SAME PROBLEM!


I flashed .39 build worked great for a couple of days but then the 2.4 ghz went to 15 sometimes less than 1 mbps. It supposed to be 30. The Cable guy TWC came out messed with a few wires then replaced modem (he didn't think that was the problem) but did it anyway.

First thought change channel on access point 80 feet ( a couple of rooms) away they seem to be on the same channel since I flashed 4 alpha. Everything else is stock default. What about channel bandwidth should I change both Asus and WDMyNet900 access point mode to different bandwidth settings?

Last can some point me in the direction of the proper way to flash firmwares on our Asus? I THINK I'm just flashing over. I have many rooted android devices and I know the problems with dirty flashing.

Thank you to you Obi One you're my only hope

P'S Going out of town this afternoon for a fire fighting conference trying to get this fixed while I'm packing and maybe some one on one with the wife before I leave after lunch.


Charles

 

[baldinbro]

How's your wireless neighborhood look like? If there are tons of 2.4 GHz wireless networks surrounding you, then you will have to do more tweaking.

My wireless neighborhood is extremely crowded. Channels 1, 6, & 11 all have multiple WIFI networks broadcasting on them. Maybe 15 networks total are visible to me. Measuring this morning my "signal strength" was at -40dB.

As far as local interference. My router is nestled in an entertainment center with my TV, A/V Reciever, two traditional speakers, one sound bar, and a record player. I don't think any of those devices interfere, but thought it could help to point them out. I've tried moving my router to different points of the house to see if any of those units could be causing the issue and I still get awful bandwidth.

 

[CooCooCaChoo]

Hrm I would suggest the following changes to the 2.4 GHz wireless settings under the Professional tab:

Preamble Type -> Auto
RTS Threshold -> 2346
Optimize AMPDU aggregation -> enable
Optimize ack suppression -> enable

And quite possibly back to default

TX power adjustment -> 80

More power doesn't quite necessarily mean better signal.

What devices do you have using the 2.4 GHz wireless band?

 

[baldinbro]

Hrm I would suggest the following changes to the 2.4 GHz wireless settings under the Professional tab:

Preamble Type -> Auto
RTS Threshold -> 2346
Optimize AMPDU aggregation -> enable
Optimize ack suppression -> enable

And quite possibly back to default

TX power adjustment -> 80

More power doesn't quite necessarily mean better signal.

What devices do you have using the 2.4 GHz wireless band?

I will try these settings tonight and let you know how it goes. I've definitely tried fruitlessly to use the default settings and I only just recently messed with bumping my power to 100, but obviously it's not working so I'll put it back to 80.

As far as devices go - A Chromecast and my Girlfriend's phone are the two that use that frequency. The Chromecast is what I'm trying to give better bandwidth to so I can stream video to my TV in better quality. Right now it looks like crap.

For a while I thought it was just the Chromecast that was the problem, but I started doing speed tests on the 2.4 GHz channel using my phone and laptop and realized that I can't get good bandwidth off of it no matter what the device.

 

[baldinbro]

Hrm I would suggest the following changes to the 2.4 GHz wireless settings under the Professional tab:

Preamble Type -> Auto
RTS Threshold -> 2346
Optimize AMPDU aggregation -> enable
Optimize ack suppression -> enable

And quite possibly back to default

TX power adjustment -> 80

More power doesn't quite necessarily mean better signal.

What devices do you have using the 2.4 GHz wireless band?

So I tried these settings last night and unfortunately it didn't help. Still getting really spotty bandwidth to my 2.4 GHz channel.

Any other suggestions? There's got to be more people having issues with this channel on this router. Nobody has a solution?

 

[CooCooCaChoo]

The only other thing I can suggest then is to try an older firmware. The one that works really well for me, and the one that I'm probably gonna stick with for a long time, is 35-4 SDK5.

Everything else, I have problems with, and my main problem is the 5 GHz channel dropping out after a few hours.

For me, 35-4 SDK5 is super stable, the wireless is stable and the performance is stable. Which is what I need.

 

[baldinbro]

The only other thing I can suggest then is to try an older firmware. The one that works really well for me, and the one that I'm probably gonna stick with for a long time, is 35-4 SDK5.

Everything else, I have problems with, and my main problem is the 5 GHz channel dropping out after a few hours.

For me, 35-4 SDK5 is super stable, the wireless is stable and the performance is stable. Which is what I need.

Good to know - I'll definitely try that. Personally, my 5 GHz never has problems. How old is this firmware and do you have the same router as me?

As far as flashing it I don't need to do anything special except load it up in the ASUS network manager right? Obviously I should do a full reset as well, right?

 

[CooCooCaChoo]

Yeah, I have the N66 as well. Its a little on the older side, but some of the bugs/vulnerabilities don't affect me because I don't use the features that are affected.

Flash it like any other firmware and do a reset because the wireless driver is different. Hopefully this solvers your problems. If not, it could very well be the router that is defective or your devices.

 

[parcou]

Hrm I would suggest the following changes to the 2.4 GHz wireless settings under the Professional tab:

Preamble Type -> Auto
RTS Threshold -> 2346
Optimize AMPDU aggregation -> enable
Optimize ack suppression -> enable

And quite possibly back to default

TX power adjustment -> 80

More power doesn't quite necessarily mean better signal.

What devices do you have using the 2.4 GHz wireless band?

Changing these numbers what does it affect...newbie?

 

[baldinbro]

So, I installed the 35-4 SDK5 firmware and I've been using it for three days.

I've definitely noticed a difference, BUT my bandwidth is still not where it needs to be. What I'm seeing now is bandwidth that is A LOT more up and down. Good and bad bandwidth comes and goes and the quality of my streams show it.

I've also noticed that "prime time" streaming hours (from 7pm - 11pm) are when the bandwidth suffers the most. I think what's happening here is my 2.4GHz stream is insanely crowded (15 - 20 wifi networks) and no matter what channel I select when my neighbors are streaming video all at the same time I simply can't get better than 2Mbps which is not good enough to stream HD video.

One thing that's frustrating is that a router restart or a new channel selection will give me good bandwidth for an hour or so, but slowly yet surely the bandwidth degrades until it's back to 2Mbps. With the new firmware I will get patches of 10 minutes of great quality / bandwidth, but I'll also get patches of awful bandwidth where the stream looks like a blurry mess.

Anyway, what are my options here? Is the 2.4GHz channel just not usable anymore? I hadn't realized this was happening, but with so many people streaming video these days (I live in NYC and it's REALLY REALLY prominent) maybe it's becoming unusable. I have ONE neighbor parked on channel 9, should I track them down and tell them to move to 11, 6, or 1? I'm definitely not getting any interference from other electronics.

Are there any other settings I can mess with on my ASUS router to fix this? Thanks for all the help so far, these forums are really fantastic.

 

[jlake]

So, I installed the 35-4 SDK5 firmware and I've been using it for three days.

I've definitely noticed a difference, BUT my bandwidth is still not where it needs to be. What I'm seeing now is bandwidth that is A LOT more up and down. Good and bad bandwidth comes and goes and the quality of my streams show it.

I've also noticed that "prime time" streaming hours (from 7pm - 11pm) are when the bandwidth suffers the most. I think what's happening here is my 2.4GHz stream is insanely crowded (15 - 20 wifi networks) and no matter what channel I select when my neighbors are streaming video all at the same time I simply can't get better than 2Mbps which is not good enough to stream HD video.

One thing that's frustrating is that a router restart or a new channel selection will give me good bandwidth for an hour or so, but slowly yet surely the bandwidth degrades until it's back to 2Mbps. With the new firmware I will get patches of 10 minutes of great quality / bandwidth, but I'll also get patches of awful bandwidth where the stream looks like a blurry mess.

Anyway, what are my options here? Is the 2.4GHz channel just not usable anymore? I hadn't realized this was happening, but with so many people streaming video these days (I live in NYC and it's REALLY REALLY prominent) maybe it's becoming unusable. I have ONE neighbor parked on channel 9, should I track them down and tell them to move to 11, 6, or 1? I'm definitely not getting any interference from other electronics.

Are there any other settings I can mess with on my ASUS router to fix this? Thanks for all the help so far, these forums are really fantastic.

Why are you fighting with 2.4 ghz in NYC? Doesn't make any sense. Just use 5Ghz.
I live in a 3 level 3800 square foot home and can stream HD video in every corner of every level on 5ghz with rt-n66u.

 

[baldinbro]

Why are you fighting with 2.4 ghz in NYC? Doesn't make any sense. Just use 5Ghz.
I live in a 3 level 3800 square foot home and can stream HD video in every corner of every level on 5ghz with rt-n66u.

I have two devices that can only use 2.4Ghz :

- Chromecast
- My old butt phone

Otherwise I use 5Ghz or ethernet for everything else. I didn't realize when I bought the Chromecast that the 2.4GHz channel was unusable in my building, but it's starting to seem like that's the case.

That's actually part of the question I'm asking - should I be resigned to not being able to use this frequency? Is it possible it's still a problem with my router? And if it is just an unusable frequency, why the hell did Google release a new device that can only connect on it?

Probably gonna buy a Roku if this keeps up, but I really like the Chromecast otherwise. Also, I'm kind of obsessed with this now and thought maybe it was something to do with my router and I can go over the top trying to solve a tech problem.

 

[jlake]

I have two devices that can only use 2.4Ghz :

- Chromecast
- My old butt phone

Otherwise I use 5Ghz or ethernet for everything else. I didn't realize when I bought the Chromecast that the 2.4GHz channel was unusable in my building, but it's starting to seem like that's the case.

That's actually part of the question I'm asking - should I be resigned to not being able to use this frequency? Is it possible it's still a problem with my router? And if it is just an unusable frequency, why the hell did Google release a new device that can only connect on it?

Probably gonna buy a Roku if this keeps up, but I really like the Chromecast otherwise. Also, I'm kind of obsessed with this now and thought maybe it was something to do with my router and I can go over the top trying to solve a tech problem.

It's not the router. You live in New York City and have too much interference on 2.4 ghz.

Everybody makes mistakes when they're a beginner learning. $35 is a pretty cheap mistake. I've made much more costly mistakes over the years. Sell your chrome cast and buy roku or Apple TV. They both use 5 ghz. Why do you think they have 5 ghz? Because a lot of people have too much interference on 2.4 ghz. Buy a phone that can use 5ghz.

Edit: some old roku don't have 5 ghz. So shop wisely. Do your homework.