Best method for reloading settings after wipe?

[cmkelley]

I've been out of the loop a couple years, and it's looking like time to wipe my AC86U and reload fresh, having some weird rebooting issues.

In the past, I've tried to screenshot every page and use those to go through and manually re-enter the settings, because last time I looked, re-loading the nvram settings was usually a good way to re-introduce the problem you were having in the first place.

Is there a better/easier way? There's lots of screens and some buried beneath other screens by buttons. I've usually ended up missing 1 or 2 in the past. Not complaining about the layout and interface one bit, mind you, I think things are laid out pretty well, it just makes restarting with anything other than a simple configuration painful and prone to missing something.

Thoughts? Suggestions?

 

[dave14305]

Do it the hard way and question yourself whether you need each of the custom settings you’re changing.

 

[drinkingbird]

I've been out of the loop a couple years, and it's looking like time to wipe my AC86U and reload fresh, having some weird rebooting issues.

In the past, I've tried to screenshot every page and use those to go through and manually re-enter the settings, because last time I looked, re-loading the nvram settings was usually a good way to re-introduce the problem you were having in the first place.

Is there a better/easier way? There's lots of screens and some buried beneath other screens by buttons. I've usually ended up missing 1 or 2 in the past. Not complaining about the layout and interface one bit, mind you, I think things are laid out pretty well, it just makes restarting with anything other than a simple configuration painful and prone to missing something.

Thoughts? Suggestions?

Unfortunately the way you're doing it is the best way. I find that as I'm re-entering stuff I really only need to look at a couple of the screen shots for stuff I don't fiddle with much and don't remember what I ended up setting it to etc.

If you use a video type screen capture software you can just go through the screens one by one, then pause the video as you're re-entering your settings, but I don't think that saves much time.

 

[Clark Griswald]

Do it the hard way and question yourself whether you need each of the custom settings you’re changing.

Screen shots, and what @dave14305 said.
I do a full factory reset at each RMerlin fw release, since I use the alphas/betas.

 

[Tech9]

Suggestions?

Do spring season clean up event as suggested by @dave14305.

 

[OzarkEdge]

I've been out of the loop a couple years, and it's looking like time to wipe my AC86U and reload fresh, having some weird rebooting issues.

In the past, I've tried to screenshot every page and use those to go through and manually re-enter the settings, because last time I looked, re-loading the nvram settings was usually a good way to re-introduce the problem you were having in the first place.

Is there a better/easier way? There's lots of screens and some buried beneath other screens by buttons. I've usually ended up missing 1 or 2 in the past. Not complaining about the layout and interface one bit, mind you, I think things are laid out pretty well, it just makes restarting with anything other than a simple configuration painful and prone to missing something.

Thoughts? Suggestions?

I keep it simple and always install, hard reset, and configure the firmware from scratch... saves time and trouble. I use my install notes to configure the non-default settings... these began with AC68U, then AC86U, and now as noted.

Given years with your AC86U (2018-2020ish), it may be exhibiting weirdness due to a power circuit that is known to burn out. When my two died, I suffered a few weeks of unresolvable trouble before they finally died with a half-lit LED4. If so, you will need a new router.

OE

 

[cmkelley]

I keep it simple and always install, hard reset, and configure the firmware from scratch... saves time and trouble. I use my install notes to configure the non-default settings... these began with AC68U, then AC86U, and now as noted.

Given years with your AC86U (2018-2020ish), it may be exhibiting weirdness due to a power circuit that is known to burn out. When my two died, I suffered a few weeks of unresolvable trouble before they finally died with a half-lit LED4. If so, you will need a new router.

OE

Yeah, I already had that happen, fortunately ASUS exchanged it I think for the cost of shipping. I'm hoping to hold out for a wifi 7 router (RT-BE86U?) since ASUS is starting to introduce wifi 7 routers. Crossing fingers it stays on the 388 branch to keep RMerlin's life at least a little bit easier. Seems like wifi 6 devices showed up a lot faster (or time IS really flying by) than was forecast, so I expect the same with wifi 7.

Sounds like @dave14305's method is the way to go. Maybe when the wife goes away for a week to see her relatives so I can let it be broken for a couple days if it goes pear-shaped.

 

[cmkelley]

Do it the hard way and question yourself whether you need each of the custom settings you’re changing.

Oh, sure, be all logical and all. I see how you are. ;-) Sigh. You're right though, of course.

 

[drinkingbird]

Yeah, I already had that happen, fortunately ASUS exchanged it I think for the cost of shipping. I'm hoping to hold out for a wifi 7 router (RT-BE86U?) since ASUS is starting to introduce wifi 7 routers. Crossing fingers it stays on the 388 branch to keep RMerlin's life at least a little bit easier. Seems like wifi 6 devices showed up a lot faster (or time IS really flying by) than was forecast, so I expect the same with wifi 7.

Sounds like @dave14305's method is the way to go. Maybe when the wife goes away for a week to see her relatives so I can let it be broken for a couple days if it goes pear-shaped.

The reason I screen shot is half the time I tweaked something for good reason, and it worked, but I don't remember that I did it or why later on . I do often question it and sometimes google to see why it is like that or if it is still valid (has whatever it was been fixed) and try to go to defaults if not needed anymore, but most of my tweaks are minor and long term stuff, such as having found the sweet spot for roaming assistant values etc.

I do copy and paste the mac addresses of my DHCP reservations into a text file just to make that part easier, even though there's only like 5 of them.

 

[Quoc Huynh]

If you use Chrome, there is a very useful extension for making screenshots of webpage content, called "GoFullPage" (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/gofullpage-full-page-scre/fdpohaocaechififmbbbbbknoalclacl ). It saves me some extra time from taking those with my phone cameras. However, please remember to click "Download image" after each screenshot, or tick the checkbox "Auto-download files" in its Settings to save the file(s) to your computer.

 

[drinkingbird]

If you use Chrome, there is a very useful extension for making screenshots of webpage content, called "GoFullPage" (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/gofullpage-full-page-scre/fdpohaocaechififmbbbbbknoalclacl ). It saves me some extra time from taking those with my phone cameras. However, please remember to click "Download image" after each screenshot, or tick the checkbox "Auto-download files" in its Settings to save the file(s) to your computer.

You know you can just "print screen" and not take pictures with your phone camera (to make it easy open a word doc and paste each screen shot into it)? There are lots of decent snipping tools out there that auto save everything to a file too (actually I think chrome and windows may even have them built in now, I'm just so used to using print screen I still do that). Not saying the extension you're recommending is bad, just thought it was odd that you were using it as an alternative to snapping pictures with your phone.

 

[cmkelley]

If you use Chrome, there is a very useful extension for making screenshots of webpage content, called "GoFullPage" (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/gofullpage-full-page-scre/fdpohaocaechififmbbbbbknoalclacl ). It saves me some extra time from taking those with my phone cameras. However, please remember to click "Download image" after each screenshot, or tick the checkbox "Auto-download files" in its Settings to save the file(s) to your computer.

I actually already have GoFullPage. But thanks for the suggestion.

 

[Quoc Huynh]

You know you can just "print screen" and not take pictures with your phone camera (to make it easy open a word doc and paste each screen shot into it)? There are lots of decent snipping tools out there that auto save everything to a file too (actually I think chrome and windows may even have them built in now, I'm just so used to using print screen I still do that). Not saying the extension you're recommending is bad, just thought it was odd that you were using it as an alternative to snapping pictures with your phone.

Oh, thank you so much for pointing that out @drinkingbird! I forgot that it was my old habit before Snipping tools are launched like today, and print screen was quite frustrated to me at that time, in terms of forgetting to save the pictures sometimes, and having to take a screenshot again Do not worry, I understand you

 

[Quoc Huynh]

I actually already have GoFullPage. But thanks for the suggestion.

It's nice to hear that. You are welcome

 

[AntonK]

I use a browser extension called SingleFile. It saves the page such that the values in the fields are copy-and-pasteable. So if you're a person who needs to input a lot of IPs, MAC addresses, or other strings that are easy to make typos with, SingleFile makes a rebuild much less stressful.

 

[cmkelley]

I use a browser extension called SingleFile. It saves the page such that the values in the fields are copy-and-pasteable. So if you're a person who needs to input a lot of IPs, MAC addresses, or other strings that are easy to make typos with, SingleFile makes a rebuild much less stressful.

Fortunately, that's not me. All I really have to do is save the router SSL keys to a text file. I've only a few IPs on my network I explicitly assign, only things that I have a need to point to directly from other machines (e.g. NTP servers)

 

[Aiadi]

I frankly still feel that it is quite ridiculous not being able to just save (and then restore) the user's settings without potentially breaking the functionality although I can understand some of the rationale behind why this might happen. Not a bad way though to kill some time resetting the blooming thing after each upgrade!!

 

[Tech9]

Not sure about Asuswrt-Merlin, but I just made a backup file on Asuswrt 386_46061 and restore it on Asuswrt 388_22525 and everything was transferred correctly with working on 388 firmware RT-AX86U router. I've spend like 30min to check carefully every single setting. Some months ago I did an experiment transferring RT-AC86U to RT-AX86U settings and the result was positive again. So "the same router and the same firmware version only" statement is equally correct and incorrect. The right answer is - it depends. If one knows well what settings are present in both firmware versions and the routers are close hardware platform (like HND to HND) - it works and pretty well, at least on stock Asuswrt firmware.

 

[cmkelley]

Not sure about Asuswrt-Merlin, but I just made a backup file on Asuswrt 386_46061 and restore it on Asuswrt 388_22525 and everything was transferred correctly with working on 388 firmware RT-AX86U router. I've spend like 30min to check carefully every single setting. Some months ago I did an experiment transferring RT-AC86U to RT-AX86U settings and the result was positive again. So "the same router and the same firmware version only" statement is equally correct and incorrect. The right answer is - it depends. If one knows well what settings are present in both firmware versions and the routers are close hardware platform (like HND to HND) - it works and pretty well, at least on stock Asuswrt firmware.

So, that works fine as long as you're not having problems with your router. However, if your router is doing something weird, often (usually?) backing up, wiping, and restoring the backup will simply result in restoring the problem as well. :-/ But yeah, if you can restore from a known good backup, then it's a decent solution.

 

[Tech9]

Restore from a known good backup works between firmware versions, but not for everyone. I'm sure you know Asuswrt-Merlin well enough and can do it successfully. I've done it with some analysis what was changed between versions. Not an universal advice for everyone especially new forum members, but it's doable. In Asuswrt-Merlin half of the work for most folks (DHCP reservations, custom names, custom icons) is done by simple files transfer. If you have a clean configuration file with the basics only (WAN type, LAN IP, DHCP range, User/Pass, Wi-Fi SSID/pass, etc.) - it's transferrable with no ill effects between firmware versions on the same router model and good chance to similar different router model.

The file is .cfg and not ac86u.cfg, it's readily accepted and Asuswrt has settings conversion mechanism. So it's definitely no "the same router and the same firmware version only" by design. If something goes wrong and what's the user ability to recover is another story.