Enabling cache optimazation (and 3 noob questions)

[ozzed]

Hi!

I'm new here so pardon me if I'm doing this the wrong way. I'm new to Asus routers and Merlin firmware so I figure my questions are probably easy to resolve and creating 4 separarate threads would just annoy people. My questions are as follows:

My client is Windows 10, my router is RT-AC87U, my firmware is 380.57

1) I read in the change log that some cache optimization was reverted because people were panicking due to reduced free ram. I wouldn't panic, but I don't know how to enable the optimization again. The way it was written in the change log it seemed to be aimed at people familiar with the more advanced part of the system.

2) I have set the traffic monitor to save the traffic database to USB. I checked "create new database" and I'm pretty sure I ended the path with a /, but when I rebooted the router the traffic history was gone (the leftmost tab, the one to the right still shows history). What did I do wrong?

3) I have Jumbo frames enabled, but it doesn't seem to wrork properly. I have a Netgear 102 with an mtu size set to 9000, but when I enable jumbo frames on my NIC I can't access it. I'm thinking it's probably something I did wrong in the router because if I ping the router with packet size larger than 2000 I get "request timed out" or "general failure". If I disable Jumbo Frames altogether on my NIC I get "Packet needs to be fragmented but DF set.", so it seems to work on the client side. Also, if I connect my client directly to the NAS bypassing the router it works the way I expect.

4) I get cut through forwarding enabled but not flow accelleration. I read in another forum that disabling spanning tree protocol would resolve it. I have done this but I still only get "CTF only". Are there other factors that affects the availability of flow acceleration

Sorry for the inconvenience, and thanks for taking the time to read

 

[ozzed]

I have figured out you need SSH or something to do the cache optimization. The problem now is I don't see an "nvram" folder to set the command in so how would I go about and do this? Home from work now and have tinkered around some with my other issues as well but I'm getting nowhere.

 

[joegreat]

I have figured out you need SSH or something to do the cache optimization. The problem now is I don't see an "nvram" folder to set the command in so how would I go about and do this? Home from work now and have tinkered around some with my other issues as well but I'm getting nowhere.

You need a Telnet client (either the Windows default application, or better: download Putty);

Enable Telnet access on the router on the page Administration / System (do not change anything in SSH area);

Login to the router IP address (typically 192.168.1.1) via Telnet protocol - not SSH if you are in your internal network (SSH only needed via Internet connections).

Then the nvram commands are as follows:
nvram set drop_caches=0 <enter> - to set the right option.
nvram commit <enter> - to permanently store the value.

After reboot of the router check with:
nvram get drop_caches <enter>
Result: 0

 

[joegreat]

2) I have set the traffic monitor to save the traffic database to USB. I checked "create new database" and I'm pretty sure I ended the path with a /, but when I rebooted the router the traffic history was gone (the leftmost tab, the one to the right still shows history). What did I do wrong?

Select the path via the "Select button" and enable the "Radio button" (Create or reset data files), and do not forget to "press Apply" before you reboot the router!

3) I have Jumbo frames enabled, but it doesn't seem to work properly.

I recall that Jumbo frames was not working well in the past and I never saw an OK until now.
My suggestion is to not use Jumbo frames as the throughput improvement is not significant for home users.

4) I get cut through forwarding enabled but not flow accelleration. I read in another forum that disabling spanning tree protocol would resolve it. I have done this but I still only get "CTF only". Are there other factors that affects the availability of flow acceleration

Typically this means that you have enabled an option/function, which disables FA.
Do a small search in the forum and you will find hints what to look for (typically it's related to QoS and/or per IP traffic enabled).

 

[ozzed]

You need a Telnet client (either the Windows default application, or better: download Putty);

Enable Telnet access on the router on the page Administration / System (do not change anything in SSH area);

Login to the router IP address (typically 192.168.1.1) via Telnet protocol - not SSH if you are in your internal network (SSH only needed via Internet connections).

Then the nvram commands are as follows:
nvram set drop_caches=0 <enter> - to set the right option.
nvram commit <enter> - to permanently store the value.

After reboot of the router check with:
nvram get drop_caches <enter>
Result: 0

Thanks! That worked I downloaded Putty and tried at first but I didn't do the commit command so that's what was missing I now see higher RAM-usage, but won't panick over it

Select the path via the "Select button" and enable the "Radio button" (Create or reset data files), and do not forget to "press Apply" before you reboot the router!

I recall that Jumbo frames was not working well in the past and I never saw an OK until now.
My suggestion is to not use Jumbo frames as the throughput improvement is not significant for home users.

Typically this means that you have enabled an option/function, which disables FA.
Do a small search in the forum and you will find hints what to look for (typically it's related to QoS and/or per IP traffic enabled).

I have read some about it. I don't have QoS or spanning tree enabled. I did however turn on the "statistics" which I suppose are indeed "per IP" or Per Host or however you look at it. I don't want to sacrifice that. But am I missing out on a lot of performance because of it? I have 250Mbit/s down and 100Mbit/s up from my ISP and I seem to get all of that just fine, so if the purpose of FA is to increase WAN>LAN throughput I don't think it'd do much for me.

Thanks for all your help

 

[joegreat]

I have read some about it. I don't have QoS or spanning tree enabled. I did however turn on the "statistics" which I suppose are indeed "per IP" or Per Host or however you look at it. I don't want to sacrifice that. But am I missing out on a lot of performance because of it? I have 250Mbit/s down and 100Mbit/s up from my ISP and I seem to get all of that just fine, so if the purpose of FA is to increase WAN>LAN throughput I don't think it'd do much for me.

Not a problem up to approx. 500 MBit Internet connections - see more details here about CTF/FA.

 

[ozzed]

Not a problem up to approx. 500 MBit Internet connections - see more details here about CTF/FA.

Ah, I see now it says that Port forwarding is not supported, which I have enabled and configured.. But UPnP might be enough for my needs. The thing I need to always forward would be a transmission-bittorrent server that I have on my NAS, but UPnP might be able to handle that but I'm unsure of it.

Heh.. Got so excitet to try it that I forgot to post this.. Anyway after disabling port-forwarding and rebooting it still says CTF only.. I'm running out of ideas.