Release Asus XT8 - 3.0.0.4.386.43181 - 2021/06/17

[ninjabob]

Updated to 43181, did not hard reset and no disconnection issues thus far - early days!

 

[RogerSC]

I've been on 43181 for several days now, and no problems. Been playing with the radio configuration, and no problems. Right now, the remote node is connected to the router node via MoCa, Smart Connect is turned off, and am using the same SSID name for the 2.4GHz. and 5GHz-2 radios. Not using the 5GHz-1 radio at the moment. Working really well, very fast and stable. Looking great.

Parenthetically, I did do a reset to defaults after flashing, and also a power cycle after a while on the new firmware.

 

[carbocation]

try setting the 5ghz backhaul to 80Mhz and the control channel to 100 so that it doesn't try to use any DFS (radar) channels.

I recently upgraded my XT8 to the 3.0.0.4.386_43181 firmware and it was working terribly until I applied these changes - now it works much better for me than any prior firmware. (I live in a crowded apartment building in a large city near an airport.)

 

[ThatGuyinNC]

I've been on 43181 for several days now, and no problems. Been playing with the radio configuration, and no problems. Right now, the remote node is connected to the router node via MoCa, Smart Connect is turned off, and am using the same SSID name for the 2.4GHz. and 5GHz-2 radios. Not using the 5GHz-1 radio at the moment. Working really well, very fast and stable. Looking great.

Parenthetically, I did do a reset to defaults after flashing, and also a power cycle after a while on the new firmware.

Hi RogerSC, I was thinking about doing the backhaul via MoCa, how is this working out for you? I have 3 nodes and router, all XT8, so I would love to open that second 5GHz-2, but was advised that the degradation on the MoCa backhaul could create some traffic issues. I'd love to hear if this is not the case and confirm my original plan would be best.

 

[karma]

I recently upgraded my XT8 to the 3.0.0.4.386_43181 firmware and it was working terribly until I applied these changes - now it works much better for me than any prior firmware. (I live in a crowded apartment building in a large city near an airport.)

cool, in the backhaul wireless tab you might also want to turn of roaming assistant (it's pointless for wireless backhaul) and OFDMA/802.11ax MU-MIMO to DL/UL OFDMA (for me it seems to make clients connected to the node more responsive)

anyways, in case anybody is interested posting screen shots of my wireless backhaul settings and the connection is rock solid

 

[RogerSC]

Hi RogerSC, I was thinking about doing the backhaul via MoCa, how is this working out for you? I have 3 nodes and router, all XT8, so I would love to open that second 5GHz-2, but was advised that the degradation on the MoCa backhaul could create some traffic issues. I'd love to hear if this is not the case and confirm my original plan would be best.

Got no idea what degradation or traffic problems that you're talking about with MoCA. I'm using goCoax MoCA 2.5 adapters, 3 of them, and they provide a fine backbone for my home network. I get basically ethernet cable speed, with just a touch of added latency (couple of ms.) because of the MoCA adapters. Using MoCA for backhaul, the ZenWiFi mesh is solid and very fast. By the way, have fiber gigabit internet here, love it. So don't worry, just do it *smile*.

 

[Luis]

I upgraded to this release…. And … not happy
router has a red permanent light
I rebooted a couple of times, switched the router and node off and on, etc… no changes.. the light is red on the router (and white on the node)…;
BUT: I *do* have internet connection! Even if the led is red supposedly indicating no internet connection

as info: running an AP config with wired Ethernet backhaul

any ideas please?

 

[Luis]

I upgraded to this release…. And … not happy
router has a red permanent light
I rebooted a couple of times, switched the router and node off and on, etc… no changes.. the light is red on the router (and white on the node)…;
BUT: I *do* have internet connection! Even if the led is red supposedly indicating no internet connection

as info: running an AP config with wired Ethernet backhaul

any ideas please?

An update
I did a reset... no change

So I did something else:
As mentioned I have the system in AP mode.
As per Asus guidelines (https://www.asus.com/support/FAQ/1044151/) I have connected the Ethernet cable coming from the switch to the LAN port of the router... (and another one tom the WAN-blue port in the node ) -> see bild
--> Scenario 3

Like this I get now the red light

BUT if I connect the cable coming from the switch to the Wan-blue port of the router (and also so in the node) then all is good!!!!

Seems the new FW changed the behaviour check?

 

[ThatGuyinNC]

Got no idea what degradation or traffic problems that you're talking about with MoCA. I'm using goCoax MoCA 2.5 adapters, 3 of them, and they provide a fine backbone for my home network. I get basically ethernet cable speed, with just a touch of added latency (couple of ms.) because of the MoCA adapters. Using MoCA for backhaul, the ZenWiFi mesh is solid and very fast. By the way, have fiber gigabit internet here, love it. So don't worry, just do it *smile*.

Much appreciated! I will let you know when it gets completed!

 

[ninjabob]

Still the same old problem. Works reliably for a few days then strangely things like Smart Switches start to operate sluggishly if at all and CCTV cameras drop off the system. A reboot puts everything back to normal again.

 

[srkbear]

Anyone have an idea why Asus keeps reposting this firmware several times? Yesterday they posted it again, with no apparent changes

 

[sgoldswo]

I finally updated to this version. It is stable at the router, but I do still see extremely short drops in connection to the nodes, which instantly restore without the lights switching. Enough to disrupt a streaming show for a few seconds, have a video call with work hang or pause or have my nest hub looking for internet. That said, on 43170 the drop outs would take a minute or two to come back. I'm in a bit of a catch 22 in that this newer firmware seems to work better with my Sonos system than 42095, but obviously I would prefer if I didn't get drop outs.

The drops are so short, I wouldn't be surprised if you never noticed them unless you were watching video or listening to stream music at the time.
[EDIT] I also see no sign of the drops in the logs, but you can watch the drop happening if you are sat next to a number of wifi clients at the time.

 

[Raven76]

You can easily see the nodes's "disconnections" with a ping trace program as pinginfo... the disconnections are about 10-20 seconds long, and WITHOUT log-events and NO led changes...
I turned back to 42095, and all ok!

 

[Ironlake]

Hello again, with the previous firmware 43170, I was experiencing heavy drop outs and switched to 42095. But I am always open to try the new firmwares, because of security fixes etc.

The 43181 initially worked fine, but still with dropouts but still less often. After a few days it got worse. ( Did this without hard reset) 2 Days ago I did a hard reset (wps method) and now in testing phase. I tried doing a ping command run 4000 times ( approx 1 hour straight ) the results were Sent= 4000, Received=3961, Lost = 39 (calculated here in the cmd as 0% loss, but in reality closer to 1%) which is acceptable after some googling about this. The command was ping www.google.com -n 4000. This was also with a vpn service active. So now doing the ping again without this vpn service.

The results of the second ping test of 4000 is, Sent = 4000 Received=4000 Loss=0%

Sadly I never did ping tests with the firmware installed without hard reset. But the connection loss for me was enough to say it was bad. Anyways I will monitor this for the coming days. I also advise to do a hard reset with the WPS method button. And not the other button which you have to reach with a needle. I will report back with any new tests or status.

How to ping
How to hard reset router-use method 2
method 2
Router and node light color coding

Btw my noob tip is to hard reset both router and node simultaneously, I had to this probably 2 or 3 times, because node was unresponsive initially. Put the router and node very close to each other, holding hands distance. Also Flash the same firmware first on both router and node.
Use the app on your phone to configure and be patient with the optimization phase. It will take awhile, before both get white. Use the color coding to follow the process. After that place the node to your desired spot in the house by unplugging and replugging in the power outlet. Both should have a white light after awhile.(probably between 20 to 30 minutes or less)

According to wikipedia:

Acceptable packet loss​

Packet loss is closely associated with quality of service considerations. The amount of packet loss that is acceptable depends on the type of data being sent. For example, for voice over IP traffic, one commentator reckoned that "[m]issing one or two packets every now and then will not affect the quality of the conversation. Losses between 5% and 10% of the total packet stream will affect the quality significantly."[12] Another described less than 1% packet loss as "good" for streaming audio or video, and 1-2.5% as "acceptable".[13]

 

[ninjabob]

Got this working in a satisfactory manner by scheduling a reboot daily at 02:00. My old RT N66U would run for months without a reboot. Progress?

 

[karma]

i'm running in AP mode. I downgraded the firmware back to 42095 which still seems more stable and responsive to me for the wifi clients.

 

[sgoldswo]

My first attempt to install this software didn’t work out well, in that the connection to the nodes became unstable. I performed a full factory reset with the current firmware installed. It was harder to connect the nodes over aimesh, but once connected they disconnected only once within minutes of being setup, which I believe is just the nodes optimising the connection. Has been running now for the better part of 2 days without nodes dropping.

slightly odd issue I noticed which is lag on my work from home setup if I let it go to sleep and then reconnect. I have qos turned off, so not sure why that is happening. Solution is to drop then restart the connection. It could be a server issue, but it began as soon as I installed this firmware

 

[carbocation]

I recently upgraded my XT8 to the 3.0.0.4.386_43181 firmware and it was working terribly until I applied these changes - now it works much better for me than any prior firmware. (I live in a crowded apartment building in a large city near an airport.)

Other change is that in my regulatory regime (FCC), channel 100 is a radar channel, so I've now changed it to a channel in the range of 149-165.

 

[sgoldswo]

My first attempt to install this software didn’t work out well, in that the connection to the nodes became unstable. I performed a full factory reset with the current firmware installed. It was harder to connect the nodes over aimesh, but once connected they disconnected only once within minutes of being setup, which I believe is just the nodes optimising the connection. Has been running now for the better part of 2 days without nodes dropping.

slightly odd issue I noticed which is lag on my work from home setup if I let it go to sleep and then reconnect. I have qos turned off, so not sure why that is happening. Solution is to drop then restart the connection. It could be a server issue, but it began as soon as I installed this firmware

I spoke too soon - after about 2 and a half days the router began losing the nodes or connecting by 2.4ghz every few hours. A reboot would only keep things stable for 12 hours or so. As such, I've finally admitted defeat and moved back to firmware 42095, which is far more stable but problematic with Sonos speakers dropping randomly. I really hope that Asus tries again soon with improved firmware.

 

[sgoldswo]

I spoke too soon - after about 2 and a half days the router began losing the nodes or connecting by 2.4ghz every few hours. A reboot would only keep things stable for 12 hours or so. As such, I've finally admitted defeat and moved back to firmware 42095, which is far more stable but problematic with Sonos speakers dropping randomly. I really hope that Asus tries again soon with improved firmware.

Just one other issue worth noting on my abortive experiment with this firmware 43181 is that it was roughly 25% slower (270-325 mbps) in download speeds at the nodes versus firmware 42095 (400-470mbps). The wired speed at the router was unchanged (825-890).