Keeping the Asus RT-N66U cool

[socaljazzdude]

Hi all,

Thanks to the information and comments on this site, I decided yesterday to order the Asus RT-N66U to replace my primary router, the EA4500. Based on everything that I have read here on SNB as well as on Amazon, this model of router appears to be the best choice for my network needs.

However one main concern that I have with this router is heat. I've noticed that while the N66U is a great router, one of the criticisms that I have read about it (and other Asus routers) is that it has the tendency to get hot.

I live in Southern California and I have central air in my home. During the summer and spring, the average temperature of my home is typically 70-75 degrees when the AC is on and 78-80 degrees when the AC is off.

I'd like to protect this router as much as possible and would welcome all and any advice that you might recommend regarding keeping my brand new N66U cool.

I have been thinking of getting some sort of laptop cooling pad to rest the N66U on. Is this a good or bad idea? Will placing this router on a laptop cooling pad help keep this router cool or is there a better way to go about this?

Thanks to anyone who responds!!

 

[CooCooCaChoo]

I thought bout that as well but settled on a small room fan to blow air across all my hardware (rt-n66r, Motorola sb6121 cable modem, VoIP adapter and UPS.)

Everything is nice and cool.

 

[mstombs]

I opted for wall mounting with antennae to one side. This allows natural airflow across the big heatsink

 

[HawkInOz]

FWIW, I'm using a Targus Chill Mat for Netbooks AWE39US1 (Black), which works pretty well to keep the temp a few degrees cooler than it was without it. I've got it plugged directly into the USB port on the router.

 

[PrivateJoker]

On another thread I showed a pic of the small Vornado Zippi fan I use by my router/s (have used the same fan for several different routers over the years). They are $20 and blow 120+ CFM on slow (silent) speed mode, which is considerably more than most 5"ish muffin fans will blow.

Having a foot or more of free air space in at least 3-4 directions is generally a good thing to do too. Sometimes, if the device doesn't have a great heat sink, I will add extra rubber feet (from Amazon or Home Depot, etc) on the bottom of it and elevate the device another 1/4-3/8" instead of basically resting in full contact on something solid that might reflect heat back at it. I don't feel the need to do that with this router though.

The N66's self reported radio temps have never exceeded 50deg C by much in my setup.

 

[RogerSC]

A laptop cooling pad should work for having the router be horizontal.

Another idea is whether you're using the plastic "stand" that comes with the router to have your router sitting mostly vertical, or whether you have the router sitting flat. If you use the stand, and have it standing up just off the vertical, it does run considerably cooler. That's how I have my rt-n66u set up, and while it does feel warm, it is fine.

If you're using RMerlin's firmware, a good idea for stability and the extra features, you can go to "Administration" and then to "Performance Tuning" in the web admin GUI, and you can see a graph of the temperatures of the two radios. You can also see the radio temperatures under "Tools". Mine tends to run about 53/54 degrees C, which is lower than some because I just use it for routing and wireless, but a lot of people seem to see temperatures at or below about 55 degrees C. Higher than that, up to about 60 degrees C is fine. But it doesn't hurt to look at that to put your mind at rest some.

 

[GoNz0]

it is designed to run at this temp, as it is not cycling on a regular basis it is not cooling down and expanding when warming up again so long term stability is going to be ok.

 

[Amnesiac]

12" Fan

I had a 12" mobo fan taped to the back of the unit - drawing air away from the large metal plate under the plastic "vents" at the back.
I wired up a connector so it was powered by one of the USB ports (which I don't use) so was at 5v not 12v but that was enough to cool it down to operating temperature this summer where it was living in my attic acting as an AP.

It also was enough to stand the unit up without needing the stand, and I was going to make a bracket to latch it into the stand mounting holes properly without needing tape, but I replaced my ISP router (a Sky Hub) with it when I found that device way too limiting. So now it lives in a nice cool room downstairs.

A.

 

[PrivateJoker]

it is designed to run at this temp,

So were Xboxes.

it is not cooling down and expanding when warming up again so long term stability is going to be ok.

It's not a fissure in a slab of concrete


If you think routers don't have cooling issues, open a newer one up and look at the heat sink/s in it. A lot of people that run things like VPN, or take advantage of more and more of the CPU intensive features will run higher CPU & radio temps.

Every person's use case and physical positioning is different. One guy might have an overall low intensity use and a router positioned with lots of free flowing air, another person might try to hide his in a cabinet or shelf with terrible airflow and be running VPN on it.

Some of us that have had a dozen or two dozen or more routers in our lives might just err on the side of cautiously over-cooling because we've seen routers of ours die prematurely.

People from both the enterprise side and also the gaming side of PCs/IT are used to the need for better cooling (I'm sure there are people here that have worked for places that had server rooms that were 55deg F) and I think it's a mix of personal preference, tolerance for failure, physical environment, and what/how your AP is used for.

 

[savagehenry]

In sorta the same light of keeping cool/extending the life, I use the wireless scheduler (which I first thought was useless) to turn off my radios from 1am to 6am. Or if I'm up late and no one else is using the internet I simply turn mine off before going to bed. The rest of the family knows to turn it on in the morning if needed.

 

[socaljazzdude]

Thanks!

Thanks to everyone who responded! I will certainly take all the comments here into consideration. If any of you have time, I would also welcome your suggestions regarding my question about using this router with a Ethernet switch.

http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/showthread.php?t=13121

 

[SoCalReviews]

I opted for wall mounting with antennae to one side. This allows natural airflow across the big heatsink

I also wall mounted my RT-N66Us sideways. Besides excellent heat ventilation this also is aesthetically and functionally better for plugging in the cables from the side as opposed to the top. I didn't notice any signal degradation or loss of range with the antennas pointing to the side but they can still be adjusted back to a vertical position if that is preferred.

 

[msb]

Thermal Concerns

I'm sure that ASUS engineers took heat dissipation into consideration when they designed the device. You shouldn't need any extra fans, cooling pads, ice cubes, etc. if you run it in the average environment that people live in. Now if you have it mounted in your attic and have black roofing shingles, poor attic ventilation and are in the middle of a Las Vegas summer, you might need additional cooling.

 

[sm00thpapa]

2 years running with no extra cooling and still running like a champ. You're worrying about something you shouldn't be. Just plug it in set it up and enjoy the best N900 router on the market.

 

[PrivateJoker]

There is enough variability in how/where people physically setup their routers, as well as large CPU utilization differences between people who might run w/ a VPN constantly enabled, or using file sharing or media serving capabilities of the router that other people will never come near to -- so I don't think there is a universal recommendation on this like "you should/shouldn't."

I'm not trying to play both sides of the argument, but it is completely not outside the realm of reason that the demographic that makes uses of a networking forum online to have a large overlap with those who put their consumer router to use doing pretty continuous duty high CPU utilization stuff that you might not be doing (just look around the threads here).

Microsoft also has a lot of great engineers but fixing overheated Xbox 360s (in warranty) cost them over a billion dollars. Even great engineers and designers make mistakes or have inadequate QC from time to time. Is it a perfect analogy? No. Is "I'm sure they have great engineers" or "mine has worked great for 24 months" good empirical data? Not to me.

Consumer wifi routers are notorious for quicker than average heat related failure. Do most people, most of the time need to take precautions against such failure? No. Is this forum representative of most people doing average things? Absolutely not, this tends to be a user base that is slightly obsessed with great performance, great signal strength, maximizing their use of both RF & hardwired conduits to send data, and a group that does a lot of enterprise and/or traditionally multi-deviced functions out of a single router.

I would be the last person to tell someone on here that s/he doesn't need take up their router cooling/airflow a notch, how on earth would I know what stresses its under or what its physical environment is like?

 

[sm00thpapa]

N66U has been out now for 2 years has anyone on this forum reported it over heated and it totally died? Not that I have heard of.

 

[RMerlin]

The router will automatically throttle performance if the temperature reaches 80C. I assume that means that people running their routers at the current 60-65C are safe since this is well within the value allowed by Asus/Broadcom.

 

[sm00thpapa]

The router will automatically throttle performance if the temperature reaches 80C. I assume that means that people running their routers at the current 60-65C are safe since this is well within the value allowed by Asus/Broadcom.

Can you make this a sticky so people can stop asking this question. We get this question once a day.

 

[bird333]

N66U has been out now for 2 years has anyone on this forum reported it over heated and it totally died? Not that I have heard of.

I don't know if it was heat related or not but I had one die after about 11 months of use. I know I feel a little uncomfortable with the heat I feel touching the ports on the back.

 

[Super Bee]

I was thinking of placing a ThermaPAK HeatShift cooler pad underneath the router.