ASUS RT-N66U - my review

[G37x]

Ok, so i gave it another go. Disabled H/W before upgrading to .96, and made sure it stayed off after the update, i now been up for 6 hours and no problems at all, port forwarding working right. Can access all my devices thru lan. So far, all seems good to go.
Going to leave it for a day or so, if no problems going to turn h/w back on.
no usb devices plugged in.

You mean you had disable HW acceleration set to no before upgrading correct?

Please advise as this is very important if you will not get the issues again. Also please make sure you try/do a lot of testing.

 

[tonytoronto]

You mean you had disable HW acceleration set to no before upgrading correct?

Please advise as this is very important if you will not get the issues again. Also please make sure you try/do a lot of testing.

I know, wtf were they thinking with some of the naming for settings. Just before updating, i changed the setting to YES---so it means NO, no hardware acceleration. In others words, HW disabled now
Been up and running for 7 or so hours, had about 200GB transferred from Server to USB drive connected to a laptop and all seems well, no hickups or disconnects and dont see nothing weird on logs. Before, with HW enabled, never managed more than a few minutes.
I have not tried screwing around with radio power yet, i'll check tomorrow when just me at home.

edit- just checked the Switch Control Tab on .96, and they may have changed it. attached a pic

 

[G37x]

I know, wtf were they thinking with some of the naming for settings. Just before updating, i changed the setting to YES---so it means NO, no hardware acceleration. In others words, HW disabled now
Been up and running for 7 or so hours, had about 200GB transferred from Server to USB drive connected to a laptop and all seems well, no hickups or disconnects and dont see nothing weird on logs. Before, with HW enabled, never managed more than a few minutes.
I have not tried screwing around with radio power yet, i'll check tomorrow when just me at home.

This can't be that easy, just to have disable hw=YES?
Let me tell you when I upgraded mine it was like that disable=YES, not sure what I did afterwards if I put it back to NO (one would want hw acceleration right?) before the mess started...
Please do mess with radio power. You use port fwd do you? Sorry but so many post here I forgot who does what...

 

[tonytoronto]

This can't be that easy, just to have disable hw=YES?
Let me tell you when I upgraded mine it was like that disable=YES, not sure what I did afterwards if I put it back to NO (one would want hw acceleration right?) before the mess started...
Please do mess with radio power. You use port fwd do you? Sorry but so many post here I forgot who does what...

From memory (and have bad one) on .90, NO meant Disabled, on .96, Yes means disabled, right? or something like that
Yes, Port forward was the main reason i wanted to update, UPNP still not 100% working, Windows Home Server still cannot configure the router thru UPNP, but manually forwarding the ports work. I have app to control my home theater and couldn't get it to work with .90, works now with .96.

 

[G37x]

From memory (and have bad one) on .90, NO meant Disabled, on .96, Yes means disabled, right? or something like that
Yes, Port forward was the main reason i wanted to update, UPNP still not 100% working, Windows Home Server still cannot configure the router thru UPNP, but manually forwarding the ports work. I have app to control my home theater and couldn't get it to work with .90, works now with .96.

For both releases Disable H/W means the same thing:

Disable H/W oYES oNO

For 90 you needed to set this to YES in order for port fwd to work from inside
For 96 port fwd should work from inside regardless of the setting

I use VPN server and a VPN client to control my receiver.

 

[SonyHome]

Anyone have date when Amazon will ship n66u?

 

[NightOwl326]

Anyone have date when Amazon will ship n66u?

They don't even have an ETA date from Asus yet. Been there, done that.

 

[Spitfire69]

But you are not using any NAT loopback or port fwd are you?

Port forward to sat receiver only.

 

[PeeingGuardian]

.96 with zero stability issues so far.

Hi guys,

Just want to let you guys know that I have downloaded the .96 firmware with no problems so far since last week. Sucks for those who are having issues.

I have a pretty basic server and a 3TB drive. I set up the server to see if that was an issue since I think you guys have more complicated setups but I haven't had any stability issues. The NAT loopback doesn't work as mentioned by some unless you disable HW acc.

Hope this info helps

 

[aurelijusb]

Seems like E4200 (not v2) runs much better than RT-N66U, performance charts compared in this site results are better on E4200, 5GHz stream beats RT-N66U on many tests, 2.4GHz stream tests are very similar to RT-N66U...
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanwan/router-charts/bar/85-5-ghz-dn-3s
And... As far as i know Linksys does not have such bugs mentioned in this forum...

 

[TechGuardian]

Hey! Do anybody know, when the Asus RT-N66U will be in stock?

 

[njweb]

Seems like E4200 (not v2) runs much better than RT-N66U, performance charts compared in this site results are better on E4200, 5GHz stream beats RT-N66U on many tests, 2.4GHz stream tests are very similar to RT-N66U...
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanwan/router-charts/bar/85-5-ghz-dn-3s
And... As far as i know Linksys does not have such bugs mentioned in this forum...

For those who need NAT loopback, apparently disabling HW acceleration, via the configuration GUI, is required.
For others it already runs fine without any settings changes.

Wifi performance (check the location charts) of the RT-N66U is better than the E4200 overall, especially in locations furthest from the router where it matters most.

I owned the E4200 for 10 months.
I ran tests with both routers (E4200 v1 and RT-N66U)., separately, using LAN Speed Test for throughput testing and my wifi utility for signal strength testing. The RT-N66U performed better.
The results for the E4200 are in my Amped Wireless thread. See this Asus thread for my Asus tests.

I do not use DLNA, so I can't comment on that.
I do know that multiple users have hard drives attached to the RT-N66U with the latest firmware and are reporting success. They can hopefully comment as to whether DLNA also works or not.
Asus is reportedly releasing another firmware later this month. As you can see they are quick to release updates.
The E4200 v1 had a media server issue (huge thread in their forums about it) that took 100 days for the fix to be released. This issue was introduced in a new firmware that came out 5 months after the router hit the market... I can't wait 100 days for a major issue to be fixed (luckily the media server did not affect me at the time since I was not using the USB ports on my E4200 v1).

Depending on one's wifi needs (if ones doesn't have clients located far from the router and / or simply don't need the best throughput performance and strongest signal in far locations), the E4200 v1 may be sufficient and is a very nice deal at $99 shipped for a manufacturer refurbished unit.
It does have far slower USB performance than the V2 though (v1 wifi is better than the v2 in some situations though).

You could try both the Asus and the Linksys and judge for yourself. That is how I made my decision (Tim's wifi tests helped me confirm my results - I also had only tested 2.4 GHz since that is what I use most, so it was nice to see that it also did well on 5 GHz).

Buy whatever works best for your needs.

 

[njweb]

Has anyone noticed any upstream 'lag' online (as in when performing an action in an online game) or skipping during streaming with the latest firmware?

The latter also happened with my Amped and I suspect it might also just be my power supply for my Hauppauge HD-PVR video capture and playback device's power supply going bad.
http://valkyriemt.wordpress.com/2011/04/09/a-defect-with-the-hd-pvr-will-eventually-fail-for-all/

The online lag is different though.
I may go back to the previous firmware ('Beta Version 3.1.0.3.90') to see if the lag is there or not. It worked fine for my needs and seemed to have better signal strength (did not get a chance to test throughput in that location with the latest firmware) Long term, I would prefer having the latest firmware of course since I may use the media server / DLNA and / or NAT loopback some day in the future.

 

[G37x]

For those who need NAT loopback, apparently disabling HW acceleration, via the configuration GUI, is required.
For others it already runs fine without any settings changes.

<snip>

Can you please comment which router is better from only the hw point of view? I asked this question weeks ago and no one commented, although there seem to be such debate between 4200 and N66..

Thanks!

 

[tonytoronto]

This can't be that easy, just to have disable hw=YES?
Let me tell you when I upgraded mine it was like that disable=YES, not sure what I did afterwards if I put it back to NO (one would want hw acceleration right?) before the mess started...
Please do mess with radio power. You use port fwd do you? Sorry but so many post here I forgot who does what...

So, i have been checking the wireless performance, using inSSDIer on the laptop to check. In order to have the same signals in my bedroom (further from router) i need to set power to 80mw, if i go above 80- i tried 100 and 120, the signal becomes unstable, my phone had a hard time staying connected at higher power. 80mw sweet spot for me, seems to be identical to the 40w setting on .90 firmware.
i now been up 24 hours on .96 and still stable, no weird stuff or reboots with HW disabled.

 

[G37x]

So, i have been checking the wireless performance, using inSSDIer on the laptop to check. In order to have the same signals in my bedroom (further from router) i need to set power to 80mw, if i go above 80- i tried 100 and 120, the signal becomes unstable, my phone had a hard time staying connected at higher power. 80mw sweet spot for me, seems to be identical to the 40w setting on .90 firmware.
i now been up 24 hours on .96 and still stable, no weird stuff or reboots with HW disabled.

To recap, you had:
Disable hw set to ? before the upgrade
Disable hw set to ? after the upgrade (when you changed it exactly?)

It's a pity to see Asus saying NOTHING lately...Any of you got any info lately from Adam or others?

Thanks!

 

[TonyH]

Seems like E4200 (not v2) runs much better than RT-N66U, performance charts compared in this site results are better on E4200, 5GHz stream beats RT-N66U on many tests, 2.4GHz stream tests are very similar to RT-N66U...
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanwan/router-charts/bar/85-5-ghz-dn-3s
And... As far as i know Linksys does not have such bugs mentioned in this forum...

I tried WNDR4500 as well as E4200 V1 and V2 in my house.(~3000 sq. ft. 2 story house with fully developed basement: computers on every floor) Active
users in the family voted for RT-N66U. Rather than numbers in a controlled setting, real world performance is more valuable to me, IMO. We do LOT of media streaming, gaming, Bitorrent flogging the router all the time. One Linksys router I still love is an old work horse WRT54GS V2.

 

[NickMili]

For those that don't yet have the unit and are interested in the in-stock situation - Newegg just updated the release date on their product page to 2/27 (Originally listed as 2/16, then switched to 2/24, then 2/23, and now the latest update).

However, I pre-ordered from Newegg on 2/6, and they just charged and confirmed my order this morning, which usually means that the shipment will happen shortly. Hopefully this means that all retailers are beginning to receive additional shipments ...

 

[tonytoronto]

To recap, you had:
Disable hw set to ? before the upgrade
Disable hw set to ? after the upgrade (when you changed it exactly?)

It's a pity to see Asus saying NOTHING lately...Any of you got any info lately from Adam or others?

Thanks!

I changed it while on .90, just before updating the firmware to .96. After the update it stayed disabled, like in the pic i posted.. Sorry, cant remember exactly the .90 screen, i just know i disabled it before updating.
Been screwing around bit more with wireless, 80mw sweet spot for me. Still reaches quite further than my old netgear 3700v1.
If they fix the NAT thingie, allow me to name computers when assigning static IP's and add Wake-On-Lan App to the router, i'll be an happy camper
I don't use usb or dlna, no big deal for me if its busted.
asus-- got e-mail from them asking me to record steps i did to making it unstable, i shot them few e-mails detailing the steps, haven't gotten nothing back from them either since.

 

[G37x]

I changed it while on .90, just before updating the firmware to .96. After the update it stayed disabled, like in the pic i posted.. Sorry, cant remember exactly the .90 screen, i just know i disabled it before updating.
Been screwing around bit more with wireless, 80mw sweet spot for me. Still reaches quite further than my old netgear 3700v1.
If they fix the NAT thingie, allow me to name computers when assigning static IP's and add Wake-On-Lan App to the router, i'll be an happy camper
I don't use usb or dlna, no big deal for me if its busted.
asus-- got e-mail from them asking me to record steps i did to making it unstable, i shot them few e-mails detailing the steps, haven't gotten nothing back from them either since.

You know all this does NOT make any sense? I mean most of the users have the disable hw acce set to No (default) and they upgraded and never had any issues? WTH??

Have you download the fw one more time when you upgraded the second time?