[*] Regarding the new HW acceleration modes: there are now three modes from what I could understand (note that I'm not 100% sure, but pretty close):
1) No CTF (no HW acceleration at all)
2) Level 1 CTF (which is the same as previous FW versions)
3) Level 2 CTF (which is CTF + FA)
FA = Flow Accelerator. It's a
Broadcom technology that's supposed to improve network throughput. As usual, there is zero technical details as to how they achieve this, what are the side effects, etc...
Now, the weird part: like other users reported, setting CTF to Level 2 does not seem to work for me either. After it's rebooted it's back on Level 1. I tried querying the wireless driver to see what FA level is supported by the hardware, and it reports... 0. So, either a) not all router models/revisions support it, b) Asus hasn't fully enabled it yet in the driver, or c) the routine that reads the supported FA revision is broken.
If any of you is able to set it to Level 2 and have it stick there after a reboot, please let me know. I'll send you a tool so you can try querying the router for me to see if it returns a different FA revision.
[
Due to both the Wifi and USB changes, a factory default reset is indeed strongly recommended when flashing this FW. (I even did one myself, which I rarely do).