Having connection problems at 2.4ghz on my RT-N66U - please help!

[F1nchy]

Hi all

I've had this for around six months now and had no problems with it previously, but over the last month or so I'm having constant connection problems.

I have a few devices that connect via the 5ghz connection and they seem to connect fine (my laptop, iPad) but the devices that only work on the 2.4 range are having loads of problems.

My android phone and work iPhone are both 11n and they seem to find the connection most of the time, and generally keep the connection (although the signal is not strong at all, despite the router being in the room directly above).

However, I have a Squeezebox Radio which is 11b/g only and that's constantly dropping the connection, and often unable to actually find the network when I then rescan. My girlfriend's work laptop is also 11b/g only and that's not been able to connect all day.

Strangely, my Pure Siesta alarm radio (11b/g) and Squeezebox Touch (11b/g) seem to keep a good connection most of the time.

I have tried loads of different settings over the last month but I just can't seem to get it working properly. There's only one other 2.4ghz network nearby and that's not very strong, and no other 5ghz, so that shouldn't be the problem.

I did update the firmware to 3.0.0.4.260 a while back - I can't recall if that was before or after the problems started.

Any ideas what it might be and how to resolve it?

The signal is generally not very strong either since we moved from a flat on one floor (excellent signal over a long range) to a small two bedroom house (two floors but much small and laptop and Radio in the room below on the other side, 45 degrees away from it (so around 10 feet away through the floor). How is best to position the antennae on these?

As a side issue, does anyone have a link to a detailed guide of all the settings for this router? There are a number of settings I'm not sure about (ie, how does changing TX Power affect performance/stability/power consumption, etc). The Asus manual only has the very basic info.

Thanks in advance for any help!

 

[got_milk]

The .260 firmware does have issues with devices on the 2.4GHz band. In the meantime, until Asus sorts this out, you could try Merlin's builds, as he's rolled back the wireless driver to one that doesn't have this issue. It works excellent.

I don't know of a detailed guide for the router - most of the settings should be easy to Google and get a good overview of what they do if you had anything you wanted to learn about in particular.

 

[F1nchy]

Ah, thanks for that, I'll have a look for it - I presume there's a link on here for it?

With the TX Power, I have 5ghz set to 80 and have increased 2.4 to 100. What's the maximum I can safely set the 5ghz to, and does setting it too high potentially cause damage to the router itself?

 

[got_milk]

Maximum value is 200mW for both radios, although the router does say "the real transmission power will be dynamically adjusted to meet regional regulations". I'm not sure if the router actually adjusts the value you input however - someone with better knowledge on that topic might be able to better answer that than I.

You could probably set them both to 200mW without damaging the router - it might decrease the life span of the wireless radios, but not enough for it to actually matter. I find the default power values are generally optimal, as higher values can introduce extra noise and actually decrease performance and even range.

 

[nubyOz]

Hi,
Another potential source are other 2.4 GHz devices. Baby monitor, doorbells, wireless telephones...
If any of these is near some of your devices it might interfere.
It might be your neighbours device.
You could try the devices that have issues in different locations.

Cheers

 

[F1nchy]

Can anyone point to the version of Merlin's firmware for the RT-N66U please. I can see a few different threads but I'm not sure if it's for this router. Is Asuswrt for all recent Asus routers? I don't want to brick it!

Thanks

 

[got_milk]

Here you go:

http://www.mediafire.com/asuswrt-merlin/

You'll (obviously) want the RT-N66U folder for RT-N66U builds.

 

[F1nchy]

Thanks. I've updated to that one, I'll see how it goes. Hopefully that'll be better with 11g/2.4ghz.

 

[Recumbent]

Thanks got milk! And thanks to you, F1nchy, for this thread. I updated my n66u to the latest official Asus firmware, and suddenly connectivity became flaky with 2.4Ghz devices.

Including one of my alarm.com cameras. Spent way too much time trying to figure out if the camera was dying before coming here.

Flashed to the most recent Merlin build and I'm back in business!

 

[F1nchy]

So far so good. I've had the Squeezebox Radio streaming five live all afternoon and then streaming music from my LMS this evening and it's stayed connected. I'll test again tomorrow, but this firmware certainly seems better than the one I had on there.