Voxel Custom firmware build for Orbi RBK50/RBK53 (RBR50, RBS50) v. 9.2.5.1.19SF-HW

[Voxel]

I just updated from 9.2.5.1.17 to 9.2.5.1.19, and my throughput on both wifi and physically cabled into the router has dropped dramatically -- say ~250Mpbs with a cable on my 1Gbps connection. This happened in the past on earlier Voxel firmwares and I fixed it by flashing stock (though not until trying to restore to factory in the Voxel firmware and soft-bricking, so my flash-to-stock was via TFTP), restoring to factory settings, flashing Voxel's firmware, and setting everything up again manually. Since then I routinely get 1Gbps cabled to the router and high speeds on wifi as well, until flashing this update.

Any suggestions? If no I'll try flashing to stock again and going through the same song and dance but it's annoying and I'd like to avoid it.

Well. It is strange of course and should not be so. I upgrade from my version to my version w/o any intermediate flashing and no speed degradation. No ideas yet what could be the reason...

Voxel.

 

[Skippy Bosco]

I would love to hear from someone who has experience with both, but everyone seems to agree its a hit or miss.

This has overall comparison:

https://www.slant.co/ai/netgear-orbi-rbk852-vs-asus-zenwifi-ax-xt8

This has spec and performance comparison:

https://www.cnet.com/reviews/asus-zenwifi-ax-review/

There is no Voxel firmware to save me from that purchase.

Actually there is:

https://www.asuswrt-merlin.net/

 

[beanfootage]

Well. It is strange of course and should not be so. I upgrade from my version to my version w/o any intermediate flashing and no speed degradation. No ideas yet what could be the reason...

Voxel.

Yeah, I thought it was weird, too. I manually flashed 2.5.1.16 and the issue persisted until a factory reset. Then I re-paired the satellites (two RBS50, one RBS50Y), flashed 9.2.5.1.19 to the RB[RS]50 devices, manually reconfigured everything, and it's all working fine again. Unfortunately this takes hours and is very tedious.

The most obvious symptoms are
1. Wireless speed degradation from satellites across backhaul (verified by wired connection to satellites and throughput tests)
2. Wireless speed degradation from wifi clients to either router or satellites (verified by several devices, checking BSSID to ensure communication on 5G on node I'm trying to test)
3. Wired speed degradation at router to internet (verified by speed tests wired to router and then wired directly to cable modem)

Speed degradations knock top speeds down to ~250Mbps-~280Mbps, even wired. Daisy-chained satellite drops to ~150Mbps-~180Mbps. After stock flash, factory reset, re-flash to Voxel, speeds are back to ~500Mbps wireless to router, 1Gbps wired to router, and ~250Mbps furthest daisy-chained satellite.

It's the weirdest thing, and it happened with previous incremental Voxel updates, too. If I ever get the courage to perform another incremental update, is there anything I should log, check, or try to shed some more light on this?

 

[digital10]

This has overall comparison:

https://www.slant.co/ai/netgear-orbi-rbk852-vs-asus-zenwifi-ax-xt8

This has spec and performance comparison:

https://www.cnet.com/reviews/asus-zenwifi-ax-review/



Actually there is:

https://www.asuswrt-merlin.net/

Does Merlin improve on the performance of the stock firmware like Voxel or just unlocks options like SSH and spectrum splitting?

Asus seem to have 1 firmware for all their routers which is a different approach from Netgear that seems to have custom firmware to each product line.

 

[Skippy Bosco]

Does Merlin improve on the performance of the stock firmware like Voxel or just unlocks options like SSH and spectrum splitting?

Looking at their changelog, it would suggest they have updated libraries, tools and configuration optimizations similar to Voxel:

https://www.asuswrt-merlin.net/features

System:

• Various bugfixes
• Performance optimizations to some CPU-bound components like OpenVPN
• Some components were updated to their latest versions, for improved stability and security
• User scripts that run on specific events such as firewall restart
• Cron jobs for scheduled tasks
• Customizable config files for router services
• Third party software through Entware, with an easy setup script
• SNMP support
• Nano text editor (for more user-friendly script editing)
• NTP daemon, which can synchronize your client devices
• TLS 1.3 support for some services (OpenSSL 1.1.1)

Disk sharing:

• Optionally use shorter share names (folder name only)
• Disk spindown after user-configurable inactivity timeout
• NFS exporting of USB drives
• Allow or disable WAN access to the FTP server
• Updated Samba version (3.6), with SMB2.0 support
• TLS support for the FTP server

Networking:

• Act as a SMB Master Browser
• Act as a WINS server
• SSHD support for key-based authentication
• Allows tweaking TCP/UDP connection tracking timeouts
• CIFS client support (for mounting remote SMB share on the router)
• User-defined options for WAN DHCP requests (required by some ISPs)
• Advanced OpenVPN client and server, based on code originally written by Keith Moyer for Tomato and reused with his permission.
• Support for new OpenVPN 2.4 features like NCP and LZ4
• Netfilter ipset module, for efficient blacklist implementation
• Wireless site survey page
• DNS-based Filtering, enforcing a specific DNS server, can be applied globally or per client
• Custom DDNS (through a user script)
• TOR support, individual client access control
• Policy-based routing for OpenVPN clients (based on source or destination IPs), sometimes referred to as "selective routing", or "split tunneling")
• DNSSEC validation
• fq_codel queue discipline for QoS (ARM-based models only)
• Full cone NAT support (RT-AC86U/RT-AX88U only)
• Detailed wireless troubleshooting information (RT-AC86U/RT-AX88U only)
• Modern DDNS client (In-a-Dyn), with https support
• DNS-over-TLS support
• Redirect NTP client queries to the router's own NTP daemon

Web interface:

• Performance improvements
• Optionally save traffic stats to disk (USB or JFFS partition)
• Enhanced traffic monitoring: adding graphical charts, and traffic monitoring per client IP
• Hostname field on the DHCP reservation list and Wireless ACL list
• System info summary page
• Wifi icon reports the state of both radios
• Display the Ethernet port states
• Wireless site survey
• Advanced Wireless client list display, including automated refresh
• Redesigned layout of the various System Log sections
• Editable entries (on some pages)
• User-provided SSL certificate

Some features first debuted in Asuswrt-Merlin have since been integrated/enabled in the official firmware:

• HTTPS configuration interface
• Persistent JFFS partition
• LED control - put your router in Stealth Mode by turning off all LEDs
• Turning WPS button into a radio on/off toggle
• Clicking on the MAC address of an unidentified client will do a lookup in the OUI database.
• WakeOnLan web interface (with pre-configured targets)
• Display active/tracked network connections
• VPN Status page
• DualWAN and Repeater mode (while it was still under development by Asus)
• Basic OpenVPN (client and server) support
• Configurable IPv6 firewall
• Improved compatibility with 3TB+ and Advanced Format HDDs
• SSH access

Asus seem to have 1 firmware for all their routers which is a different approach from Netgear that seems to have custom firmware to each product line.

It appears from their downloads there is an image per model, similar to Voxel

https://sourceforge.net/projects/asuswrt-merlin/files/

They take stock ROM and update the libraries, tools and optimize configuration files.

That said, specifically for the ZenWifi AX I've not seen any feedback that there is any performance or stability issues.

 

[kalpik]

Yeah, I thought it was weird, too. I manually flashed 2.5.1.16 and the issue persisted until a factory reset. Then I re-paired the satellites (two RBS50, one RBS50Y), flashed 9.2.5.1.19 to the RB[RS]50 devices, manually reconfigured everything, and it's all working fine again. Unfortunately this takes hours and is very tedious.

The most obvious symptoms are
1. Wireless speed degradation from satellites across backhaul (verified by wired connection to satellites and throughput tests)
2. Wireless speed degradation from wifi clients to either router or satellites (verified by several devices, checking BSSID to ensure communication on 5G on node I'm trying to test)
3. Wired speed degradation at router to internet (verified by speed tests wired to router and then wired directly to cable modem)

Speed degradations knock top speeds down to ~250Mbps-~280Mbps, even wired. Daisy-chained satellite drops to ~150Mbps-~180Mbps. After stock flash, factory reset, re-flash to Voxel, speeds are back to ~500Mbps wireless to router, 1Gbps wired to router, and ~250Mbps furthest daisy-chained satellite.

It's the weirdest thing, and it happened with previous incremental Voxel updates, too. If I ever get the courage to perform another incremental update, is there anything I should log, check, or try to shed some more light on this?

I am noticing the same thing! So you had to flash to stock, factory reset, and then flash latest voxel to fix the speeds?

 

[digital10]

I am noticing the same thing! So you had to flash to stock, factory reset, and then flash latest voxel to fix the speeds?

idk if I have mentioned this already but I think this is an Orbi issue, so even if you had stock firmware you would still see this kind of behavior. Maybe stock firmware users can add in their own experience to see how true is this

 

[kalpik]

idk if I have mentioned this already but I think this is an Orbi issue, so even if you had stock firmware you would still see this kind of behavior. Maybe stock firmware users can add in their own experience to see how true is this

Hmm, I never noticed this on stock, to be honest.

 

[beanfootage]

Hmm, I never noticed this on stock, to be honest.

Honestly I've never even checked whether this happens on stock. And yes, to fix it I had to:

1. flash stock (to all nodes)
2. factory reset (not available in Voxel and I once soft-bricked my router trying it which I thankfully recovered with TFTP after some sweating)
3. flash Voxel (again, to all nodes)
4. manually reconfigure everything (although I didn't try recovering from a backup because I was afraid that might reintroduce the problem)

After all this everything is working great, but it's a lot to go through. I probably won't do it again until there's a very compelling reason.

 

[kalpik]

Honestly I've never even checked whether this happens on stock. And yes, to fix it I had to:

1. flash stock (to all nodes)
2. factory reset (not available in Voxel and I once soft-bricked my router trying it which I thankfully recovered with TFTP after some sweating)
3. flash Voxel (again, to all nodes)
4. manually reconfigure everything (although I didn't try recovering from a backup because I was afraid that might reintroduce the problem)

After all this everything is working great, but it's a lot to go through. I probably won't do it again until there's a very compelling reason.

I'm gonna try this, but by restoring a backup. Manual configuration is a huge headache for me

 

[digital10]

I'm gonna try this, but by restoring a backup. Manual configuration is a huge headache for me

manual configuration is a huge headache because every thing you change needs a 5 min reboot.

I dont understand why routers are like that, why not just implement all changes on the next reboot

 

[e38BimmerFN]

FYI, what others have noticed about Orbi slowing down after some days:
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Or...oot/td-p/1782582/jump-to/first-unread-message

 

[kalpik]

FYI, what others have noticed about Orbi slowing down after some days:
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Or...oot/td-p/1782582/jump-to/first-unread-message

Not the same thing. It only slowed down on firmware update, and not after 2-3 days of uptime. Also, reboot doesn't help in my case.

 

[beanfootage]

Not the same thing. It only slowed down on firmware update, and not after 2-3 days of uptime. Also, reboot doesn't help in my case.

Just curious: did you try restoring from a backup after flashing stock and re-flashing Voxel's firmware? How did it go?

 

[kalpik]

Just curious: did you try restoring from a backup after flashing stock and re-flashing Voxel's firmware? How did it go?

Not yet. Looking for a good moment to do it. You know how it is

 

[beanfootage]

Not yet. Looking for a good moment to do it. You know how it is

Yeah, nobody in my house is very happy when the internet goes down during the pandemic... Particularly for hours.

 

[kalpik]

Yeah, nobody in my house is very happy when the internet goes down during the pandemic... Particularly for hours.

Okay, I just tried resetting it, and after I switch to stock firmware and reset, and even before I start configuring anything else, I'm still only getting ~250mbps on wifi. Doesn't matter if I'm connected to satellite or router. If I do a speedtest from within orbi's web interface, I get the full 500mbps. So now I'm at a loss about what to do :/

 

[beanfootage]

Okay, I just tried resetting it, and after I switch to stock firmware and reset, and even before I start configuring anything else, I'm still only getting ~250mbps on wifi. Doesn't matter if I'm connected to satellite or router. If I do a speedtest from within orbi's web interface, I get the full 500mbps. So now I'm at a loss about what to do :/

Forgive me if this is obvious, but try physically cabling into the satellites and router and see what happens? And then ensure that over wifi you're on 5GHz (you can option-click the wifi symbol in a Mac's menu bar to see, for example) and preferably on an uncongested channel?

Next step, I would replace internet speed tests with iperf3 between local devices if possible to really nail down the bottleneck.

This whole process can be pretty frustrating. Good luck!

 

[kalpik]

Forgive me if this is obvious, but try physically cabling into the satellites and router and see what happens? And then ensure that over wifi you're on 5GHz (you can option-click the wifi symbol in a Mac's menu bar to see, for example) and preferably on an uncongested channel?

Next step, I would replace internet speed tests with iperf3 between local devices if possible to really nail down the bottleneck.

This whole process can be pretty frustrating. Good luck!

Yeah, I'm trying a few things. Let's see. For now, I restored backup on stock, and then flashed voxel. All settings are restored, so at least my home network is working again.

 

[digital10]

Okay, I just tried resetting it, and after I switch to stock firmware and reset, and even before I start configuring anything else, I'm still only getting ~250mbps on wifi. Doesn't matter if I'm connected to satellite or router. If I do a speedtest from within orbi's web interface, I get the full 500mbps. So now I'm at a loss about what to do :/

So speeds are low even on the stock firmware?
Didnt you say you have 1Gb connection? if so then the speedtest on the admin panel should give you 1Gb not 500Mbps.

Also, Wifi will output a max of 400-450Mbps in ideal conditions so an wall or distance will bring that down. Also your hardware might be out of date, i got a laptop that wont go above 75Mbps