I want to build an AiMesh

[drabisan]

I'm using an AC68U for nearly 5 years now. Brilliant piece! Rock solid when used purely as a router. I have only good words about this box.
In parallel I'm using a Cisco Access Point to cover the entire house. All good with this solution, as expected roaming is not perfect for reasons that can be attributed only to clients.

And I want to correct this. And for reasons Cisco AP is old, no more firmware as a couple of months ago so it's time for a change.

AiMesh sounds about right, even in current beta stage. So I want to build one.
As I need more than 4 ethernet ports on the main router, I'm planning to buy a new main router and "demote" 68U as "other router", acting only as AP with some additional ethernet ports that I will use if possible.

And the questions to you is: Asus ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 or ASUS RT-AC88U?

I don't actually need any gaming function built in GT. But the price difference is only 80Euro and it makes it a no-brainer choice. That if someone with good knowledge will help me with technical arguments - strange chipset choice, poor switching performance etc.

Again, it will be only a router with wireless. All additional services will not be enabled, I don't need SMB, FTP or advanced traffic statistics. I will have Openvpn server on it for remote administration, so I don't chase ultimate openvpn speed. Switching/routing/NAT performance is already covered by 68U so I can only but presume any newer router will be up for the job.

It's a long message for a short question: is GT-AC5300 having any major flaws?

Thanks!

 

[eJC]

It's a long message for a short question: is GT-AC5300 having any major flaws?

Thanks!

There is a great discussion in the GT-AC5300 Owners Thread. The short answer is: if you only need basic routing and WiFi and you are willing to shut off QoS, not use VPN, and don't need link aggregation, the GT-AC5300 routes and switches about as fast (if not faster) than any other consumer device on the market today.

 

[Trentors]

Nobody needs the gaming stuff they added to GT-AC5300. It is just stupid and actually makes me not want to buy it. It makes it much more difficult for them to update it with all the GUI changes and idiotic renaming of common features into gaming lingo. They are already showing us that they cannot keep the updates steady for this device unlike the RT-AC68U that does not have that stupid flashy GUI (but is also based on the new Broadcom platform).

Anyway it is the current "flagship" for tri-band routers and Asus most expensive consumer-oriented router. It only costs slightly less than RT-AC5300 and for that money you get a much fast processor and maybe even MU-MIMO that works. You also get slightly improved Wifi performance.

So it is an obvious choice if it hadn't been for the ROG brand. It is likely the culprit for this device being such a mess and I could be afraid that it always will be.

If they would just release a RT-AC5300 with updated processor and chipset everyone would be happy.

 

[drabisan]

I partially agree with you on GT-AC5300 gaming crap.
But, as a owner of a RT-AC68U for 5y now, I do remember there were pretty stupid problem in the beginning with the firmware. Some easy to reproduce crashes, at one moment they published a firmware with nat loopback not working etc.
I personally had 3 cases with Asus and here on the forum there were plenty of users complaining about basic stuff not working properly. Eventually they fixed everything. I can't speak about traffic statistics or Trend Micro crap cause I'm not using it, but it took them a while to have a basic router+wi-fi aspects working rock solid.
I can only but hope they will get to the same level with GT-AC5300. I choose it to be nothing but a router+wi-fi. Maybe a bit of VPN server for remote admin, but that has very little bw requirements and shouldn't be something router can't easily do.