Asuswrt-Merlin 3.0.0.4.374.37 is out

[L&LD]

lilstone87,

I really don't understand your stance? The RT-N66U router with the -37 SDK5 build from RMerlin is the best router with regards to polish (gui), range and throughput I have ever used.

What specific 'latest' firmware are you running? Highly recommend to run at least the latest -36beta1 SDK5 version 'now' or wait for the -38 SDK5 version from RMerlin soon.

I have used the RT-AC56U (lesser range than N66U) and the RT-AC66U (huge range on 5GHz vs. the N66U) - but they are different (better) hardware than the old N66U design.

I hope you don't want the over two year old model to outgun the new ones?

http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/showthread.php?t=6446


The link above shows how great a router it 'was' and how good it still is (at least to me), taken in the proper perspective.

 

[lilstone87]

Well I don't want to throw Merlin's thread off-topic as what he does for us is great. But with the older SDK5 drivers i had stability issue's when trying to stream over wifi on 5ghz range. With the latest drivers that's not a problem, but 2.4ghz range is crap.

One thing I have notice with both versions of wireless drivers. I have a issue with having two extenders connected to the wireless 5ghz band. if I am streaming video to one extender, and using the other extender to do some online gaming. It causes online gaming to lag up a lot which is odd to me. As I don't think the video streaming is maxing out the 5ghz band, and no way to use QoS for this. As last I was aware Asus QoS doesn't work wireless wise.

 

[L&LD]

Well, I see you have a very unique setup (vs. what I need from a router).

I can see the game lagging if you're actively streaming video though - the 5GHz band does have to transmit continuously to both devices, after all.

Can you not try to connect the video or gaming machine to the 2.4GHz band and see if the lagging is resolved?


Afaik, the QoS does work with the wireless - it just does so in the upstream mode though?

 

[RMerlin]

Well I understand asus focus is on the newer routers they released. But i am feeling a little disrespect regarding the N66U from them. This unit itself still need's improvements regarding it's own wireless drivers. I currently prefer the latest drivers, but as we all know the 2.4ghz range is rather pathetic. It's now been over 2 months without any news or anything regarding them even working on a new firmware for the N66U.

As much as I like a lot of the things asus offers with the N66U, if they don't work to improve the wireless side of the N66U. I can promise you, the next router I do buy won't be from asus. Btw I am in no way trying to sound like an butt here. But all of us N66U owners, know how much of a rather piss poor job asus has did regarding improving the wireless side of the N66U over many months now, and still ongoing.

They are working on it, they just haven't released anything new yet. The latest GPL code they sent me was for the N66 and AC66, and they both have a new wireless drive dated from December 2013. HW acceleration for PPPoE users should also be fixed in it based on the recent beta that was floatting around. So it's just a matter of time until they release an update for these routers. But they are definitely working on it, I have the code in front of me right now to backup this claim.

Once I can get some time to integrate this new wireless driver I will be able to see if it improved the range on my RT-N66U. I was told that they DID work on this specific issue.

Right now, I'm still at the stage of analysing the changes before I can merge anything.

 

[RMerlin]

RT-AC68U owners, can you give this 374.37_2 test build a shot?

https://www.mediafire.com/folder/ftf9kjixr1a5f//Misc

I only integrated the updated CTF and wireless drivers in it so I could flash it on my main router and give it a more thorough test, but I thought I'd push this to Mediafire for others to try out.

 

[lilstone87]

Well the reason the extender is connected to the 5ghz band that the gaming console connect's to. Is because video streaming does go threw that extender at times. But when the online gaming lag's, it's not the same extender streaming video. It would be nice if somehow you could QoS prioritize the one extender, and gaming console over the other extender. As the online gaming is using very little data and such. But I have tried using Asus QoS, and setting both the gaming console, and the extender it connects to at higher priority, that doesn't help though.

 

[lilstone87]

So does that mean the next firmware build .38 will include new drivers for the N66U? Just wondering I know you always working hard .

 

[dragon8452]

Merlin, Anything in particular your looking for us to "break"?

RT-AC68U owners, can you give this 374.37_2 test build a shot?

https://www.mediafire.com/folder/ftf9kjixr1a5f//Misc

I only integrated the updated CTF and wireless drivers in it so I could flash it on my main router and give it a more thorough test, but I thought I'd push this to Mediafire for others to try out.

 

[RMerlin]

So does that mean the next firmware build .38 will include new drivers for the N66U? Just wondering I know you always working hard .

Too early to tell yet. Asus upgraded to a newer SDK on the N66/AC66 platform, which means quite a lot of low-level changes to merge in, including at the kernel level. I will eventually switch to it, but I don't know yet if it will be the next release (which will focus on addressing the 374.37 issues) or the one after that.

In the meantime, here's how the wireless driver situation looks like, comparing what we're all currently using (from 374.979) versus what 374.2078 provides:

merlin@mint-dev ~/asuswrt.ac68/release/src-rt-6.x.4708 $ strings ~/asuswrt.ac68/release/src-rt-6.x/wl/sysdeps/RT-N66U/linux/wl_apsta.o | grep "6.30"
6.30.102.9 (r366174)
%s: Broadcom BCM%04x 802.11 Wireless Controller 6.30.102.9 (r366174)
merlin@mint-dev ~/asuswrt.ac68/release/src-rt-6.x.4708 $ strings ~/asuswrt.374-2078-n66/release/src-rt-6.x/wl/sysdeps/RT-N66U/linux/wl_apsta.o | grep "6.30"
6.30.163.2002 (r382208)
%s: Broadcom BCM%04x 802.11 Wireless Controller 6.30.163.2002 (r382208)

 

[RMerlin]

Merlin, Anything in particular your looking for us to "break"?

Mostly interested in the wifi range/stability of it - that was the only change I did.

 

[TeHashX]

Too early to tell yet. Asus upgraded to a newer SDK on the N66/AC66 platform, which means quite a lot of low-level changes to merge in, including at the kernel level. I will eventually switch to it

Do you mean, kernel will be updated?



Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk

 

[dragon8452]

Merlin,
Seems to be better for now (about an hour). Wife's Nexus 7 (2.4G) was dropping previously with 37_0. I didn't have issue before with my laptop using USB-AC53 adapter, although I seem to be getting 1-3 db better signal with the laptop (5G). I will update if 2.4G issue returns or other gremlins appear.

 

[RMerlin]

Do you mean, kernel will be updated?

No, just the Broadcom patches that are applied to the kernel. This newer SDK updates the nvram handling code, as well as the CTF-related patches.

 

[chercm]

RT-AC68U owners, can you give this 374.37_2 test build a shot?

https://www.mediafire.com/folder/ftf9kjixr1a5f//Misc

I only integrated the updated CTF and wireless drivers in it so I could flash it on my main router and give it a more thorough test, but I thought I'd push this to Mediafire for others to try out.

Merlin

indeed the 5ghz band did improve performance and the funny thing is that i set the channel as 80mhz on the istumbler is detected as 40mhz.

i am using the AC68u

 

[RMerlin]

Merlin

indeed the 5ghz band did improve performance and the funny thing is that i set the channel as 80mhz on the istumbler is detected as 40mhz.

i am using the AC68u

Are you able to get 802.11ac performance tho? If you do, then it could just be that the tool you are using lacks 802.11ac support (like InSSIder 3), so it can't properly report the channel width.

 

[elpibe10]

@RMerlin, is the 37_2 firmware for RT-AC56U available for trial ?

 

[Txdk]

it seems to be working just fine here but i still see a weird message i the log

WAN Connection: Detected that the WAN Connection Type was PPPoE. But the PPPoE Setting was not complete.

i am not using pppoe at all, wan is setup with a static ip as i am behind a isp router i cant control but where 1 ip has all ports open.
so my setup is

isp router
dhcp 172.0.0.1-172.0.0.255
all ports open ip 172.0.0.50

asus rt-ac66u
wan setup static
172.0.0.50
dhcp 192.168.1.1-192.168.1.255

everything works fine but i am just wondering why i thinks its using pppoe the message has been in previous firmwares

 

[ob12]

New user, first post. I joined so I could post a quick message asking about troubleshooting information. For instance, the last two days I tried using the Merlin firmware, but had issues. I wanted to post some information, but I wasn't sure what to save or post. I have an AC68 and when I updated to the latest Merlin, I had instant problems with all of my Chromecasts in the house. The application run from android phones would disconnect about every 10 minutes or so. When I put the latest Asus firmware back on the unit, this problem doesn't happen. I was using the RT-AC68U_3.0.0.4_374.37_0.zip version. Everything else seemed to work fine.

 

[Pir8pete]

@RMerlin

any time line on getting out this firmware for the RT-N66 ???

 

[bluepoint]

New user, first post. I joined so I could post a quick message asking about troubleshooting information. For instance, the last two days I tried using the Merlin firmware, but had issues. I wanted to post some information, but I wasn't sure what to save or post. I have an AC68 and when I updated to the latest Merlin, I had instant problems with all of my Chromecasts in the house. The application run from android phones would disconnect about every 10 minutes or so. When I put the latest Asus firmware back on the unit, this problem doesn't happen. I was using the RT-AC68U_3.0.0.4_374.37_0.zip version. Everything else seemed to work fine.

The firmware you are using has an old driver for your AC68U and it isn't a good one for some. If you want to test a better driver, Merlin posted it in the Misc folder but I have to warn you this firmware is a not tested extensively, however, based on some posts here it seems to improve the wireless performance.
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/ftf9kjixr1a5f//Misc