GT-AX11000 issues

[ViKo]

Hi all, I am new to this forum so I appologize if I needed to post this as a reply to a previous post...

I am having issues with my router.

I have an ASUS Rapture GT-AX11000 router and AiMesh with an AX92U as node to extend my network. I purchased the AX92U because on some spots at home I would lose WiFi connection or get super slow WiFi speeds and get my devices disconnected at some point from time to time so with AiMesh AX92U this has been solved. It is connected through wireless backhaul because this is a rented house so I do not want to setup a whole wired network and have to remove everything if I move to a different home...

I also have a synology DS918+ NAS for backups and as media server, the thing is that while playing a movie or something I will constantly lose connection (a message that the device lost its connection to the network would appear on the tv with Plex client) I thought it would be an issue with the NAS but it is connected through ethernet directly to the AX11000. The TV i usually watch movies is connected next to the AiMesh node and has constant connection without issues (at least almost always).

Another thing is that from time to time, the AX92U mesh node will sometimes lose connection to the AX11000 and will see in the app that it's connected through 2.4Ghz band instead of the 5Ghz_2 band.

I am running the latest firmware (I usually go ahead and install the latest FW whenever it is published by the provider, in this case Asus) but I am starting to feel this is not a great practice...

Also, when watching photos from the NAS, on the same TV, I will constantly get an "Incompatible format" message when trying to display a picture but after some seconds, the picture will be displayed correctly (I guess that would also be a glimpse on my WiFi network or on the ethernet connection to the NAS)

Any thoughts from someone here? It would be really appreciated. I think I explained the whole scenario but I would be glad to provide with further details in case someone misses something in order to be able to try and catch the issue I am having... thanks a lot in advance!

 

[Gouldin]

2 things usually cause this:

1: 5ghz-2 is a dfs channel, so ocasionally it will be forced to stop broadcasting on it until the radar/weather scan in the area clears up. Not much can be done about that. It recovers back onto 5ghz automatically after 10 minutes if all is clear on those channels.

2: Usually, the node has been placed too far away from the main router to get a decent 5ghz signal. I've found aiming between 40db-55db as the best way for aimesh to maintain a connection on the 5ghz band.

I have the same setup as yourself (Though I have 2 RT-ax92u's meshed onto my AX11000) , and after messing around for a bit, those are my observations.

 

[ViKo]

Hi Goulding, thanks a lot for you reply. Ok, basically I just need to wait until my mesh node gets refreshed and it may connect again through the 5Gz_2 band... I regularly would just reboot the node and then it will connect to the 5Ghz band and everything will seem to work ok...

Do you have any devices connected through ethernet which appear to be losing or dropping connection (as my Synology NAS) in this case? That's what most bothers me right now... THANKS!!

 

[Gouldin]

My setup is:

GT-AX11000 - Qnap connected via Ethernet port 1&2 setup with LACP load balancing, PS4 Pro, HD HomeRunTV Tuner, Philips Hue Bridge

RT-AX92U Node 1 - Sony TV, PS4 Pro, Shield TV Pro, Sony Blu-Ray all connected to the nodes lan ports.

RT-AX92U Node 2 - Sony TV, Shield TV Pro, Nintendo Switch, Playstation TV all connected to ethernet on the nodes.

All 3 routers have wifi clients connected at all times too. (around 50 or so devices usually connected at minimum most of the time)


Other than the nodes occasionally switching to 2.4ghz due to dfs interefence, they return to the 5ghz link pretty quickly afterwards. I'd guess it does this once every 3 weeks or so for me. (Usually on a saturday afternoon)
Only thing that the 2.4ghz link does is prevent me streaming from my nas in 4k, but handles everything else perfectly fine during this time.

 

[ViKo]

Thanks Gouldin, my Synology NAS is also connected via Ethernet port 1&2 Bond with LACP load balancing... and on the RT-AX92U Node, my PS4 is also connected through Ethernet (since PS4 is not 5Ghz WiFi band enabled...)

What would you think could be a way of at least tracking down the issue on regards to the network dropouts on my NAS? I downloaded Plex's log but I honestly don't know how to read it... but I am starting to think it is more of a router-related issue since when looking at the pictures, I will also get the strange error message of "Incompatible format" when trying to view a picture but then in a matter of seconds, it will display the actual picture... (Im kind of lost onto where to start looking for the source of the issue) seems odd...

 

[Gouldin]

Sounds more like a plex issue with your client that isn't picking up the correct formats fast enough.

What client are you using for plex and what model is your synology?

Does it do the same if your setup the synology's media station app and put the media station app on your client?

 

[ViKo]

Plex client is on a SAMSUNG MU9000 SmartTV.
Synology NAS DS918+

I haven't tried out the 3rd question... (Does it do the same if your setup the synology's media station app and put the media station app on your client?) *I will give it a shot and install media station app and do some testing... thanks for this recommendation, will reply with my findings sometime during the week

Thanks!

 

[Gouldin]

No probs, guess a quicker test, tried plex on your ps4? Is same result, then likely a networking issue, if not, then the samsung plex client is still a bit rubbish (I haven't had a samsung tv for a long time so don't know how good plex is on it.)

 

[ViKo]

Thanks, I'll try that... will download Plex on my PS4 and test... that will for sure be a quicker way to test... thanks!

 

[ViKo]

I think I discovered that the issue with Plex was not actually an issue with Plex... but instead it has to do with my AX92U AiMesh node losing the 5Ghz_2 band connection and switching to the 2.4Ghz band then the TV that is connected to the node loses network connection and so the media I was watching, drops.
I already did a firmware update, reset to factory defaults, hard reset and all the steps mentioned on L&LD's M&M post but unfortunately, the issue is still present. I removed the AiMesh node and now, the TV is connected to my AX11000 directly with better performance (but I do not have WiFi coverage at some points) so I just purchased some ethernet cable in order to re-setup my AX92U via ethernet backhaul... will comment my findings once setup this way but I'd expect to have a way better performance overall.

 

[ViKo]

Hi Gouldin, just as confirmation, I connected both AX11000 and AX92U via Ethernet Cat5E cable and the setup is now Ethernet backhaul. I have not experienced any disconnections and Plex seems to be working way better. So thanks a lot for pointing out how 5Ghz_2 band is ocassionally forced to stop broadcasting, that opened the window for me to checkout my AiMesh connection everytime Plex disconnected and I saw there was a switch between 5Ghz_2 band to the 2.4Ghz band or viceversa. (Causing my TV to disconnect and connect almost seemlessly but somehow affecting my Plex movie playback). Issue appears to be gone now... I would just love to be able to include the 5GHz_2 band with along with my existing Smart Connect available bands so I would not lose the 2nd 5GHz band (hopefully this will be fixed by ASUS on further framework releases since it makes to sense to reserve a 5GHz band for backhaul if ethernet is connected...) thanks again!

 

[Gouldin]

If you login to the router, you can unhide the 2nd 5ghz band so it is visible for regular too, even though it's currently being used a backup haul.

 

[ViKo]

Hi Gouldin, yes, thanks... But what I wanted was to have the same SSID than my 5GHz_1 band but that is not available for the 5GHz_2 band if I unhide it... anyways, I disabled Smart Connect, have a separate SSID for my 3 bands and will test from there...

I wanted to enable the 5GHz_2 with the same SSID because the AX92U only has WIFI 6 on the 5GHz_2 band. the first band is a regular WIFI 5 5GHz band so the whole purpose of WiFi 6 is lost if my WiFi 6 devices (iPhone 11 Pro) connects to the AiMesh node...

Guess I'll have to wait until the 5GHz_2 band is not reserved as backhaul backup for AiMesh (maybe the option of selecting manually the first 5GHz band as backhaul) or wait for a compact router alike the AX92U with WiFi 6 capabilities throughout it's 3 bands (as the AX11000 does) or something alike...