Linksys WRT1900AC First User Reports

[sfx2000]

sfx, Re: "N600" mode in 2.4 GHz, you mean 256 QAM rates, correct?

If so, that's good advice. I've seen little/no benefit to "TurboQAM" so far. I think it causes more problems than it is worth.

Yes, TurboQAM (which I think is Broadcom's name for it) or QAM256 mode - it's not quite baked, and once disabled, the WRT1900ac was rock solid for 2.4GHz mode.

Something tells me though - we're going to see more of this, esp. on the lower end with QAM256 enabled single band Router/AP's - and the vendors will claim N600 class performance on the box

 

[Mordred]

This unit is the worst I have ever seen. I have been testing it for a few days in order to see if it performs better then my AC68U. I thought Asus was buggy, but at least wireless works now on the Asus.

But on the WRT 1900AC nothing works, sometimes wireless devices can't connect until you reboot it.
Sometimes the unit reboots if I watch youtube videos.
UPNP does not work. Webif is sometimes not reachable.

Do they have some sort of QA?

And finally no usable alternative firmware available. I'm not going to try to flash an unofficial openwrt build as users in the openwrt forum already found lots of stability issues in this pseudo openwrt build.

I'm just going to return this unit, as it is completely useless to me. For $50 I would just keep it and wait a few month, but by the time this unit is usable I manage to get 3 better units for the same price.

 

[sfx2000]

Um...ok...could u post a link to it then.

On Metageek's InSSIDer Forum

 

[RMerlin]

But on the WRT 1900AC nothing works, sometimes wireless devices can't connect until you reboot it.
Sometimes the unit reboots if I watch youtube videos.
UPNP does not work. Webif is sometimes not reachable.

Do they have some sort of QA?

One single unit doesn't necessarily mean a widespread QA issue. You could simply have a defective unit - these things happen. Might be worth exchanging it, I haven't seen any other report of actual random reboots in this thread so far.

 

[G997]

This unit is the worst I have ever seen. I have been testing it for a few days in order to see if it performs better then my AC68U. I thought Asus was buggy, but at least wireless works now on the Asus.

But on the WRT 1900AC nothing works, sometimes wireless devices can't connect until you reboot it.
Sometimes the unit reboots if I watch youtube videos.
UPNP does not work. Webif is sometimes not reachable.

Do they have some sort of QA?

And finally no usable alternative firmware available. I'm not going to try to flash an unofficial openwrt build as users in the openwrt forum already found lots of stability issues in this pseudo openwrt build.

I'm just going to return this unit, as it is completely useless to me. For $50 I would just keep it and wait a few month, but by the time this unit is usable I manage to get 3 better units for the same price.

I have the exact opposite experience between my Asus 66 and 68 routers and the WRT1900
Both ASUS were unstable and buggy(even with all the firmwares and Merlins builds), the WRT1900 has be solid...

 

[Mordred]

One single unit doesn't necessarily mean a widespread QA issue. You could simply have a defective unit - these things happen. Might be worth exchanging it, I haven't seen any other report of actual random reboots in this thread so far.

Does not look like I'm the only one, all of these issues have been reported by multiple users:

http://community.linksys.com/t5/Wireless-Routers/bd-p/Wireless_Routers

 

[sfx2000]

Does not look like I'm the only one, all of these issues have been reported by multiple users:

http://community.linksys.com/t5/Wireless-Routers/bd-p/Wireless_Routers

Took at look at the linked forum (Linksys Support) - Not seeing a common thread or common firmware - in any event, I'm not seeing stability in the short term, but everyone's home network is different - and my home network is very different.

 

[Deleted member 28741]

Does not look like I'm the only one, all of these issues have been reported by multiple users:

http://community.linksys.com/t5/Wireless-Routers/bd-p/Wireless_Routers

Looks like a major headache for some - this advice is very pertinent:

"If you have a router you like and it is doing the job for you, leave it be. New routers, especially AC, tend to be science experiments these days. Let someone else debug them."

http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/showpost.php?p=115722&postcount=7

 

[chadster766]

I'm putting my WRT1900AC test unit into field testing starting tonight with my families on-line gaming, Netflix,Youtube and xBoxes They are some serious internet users

I'm hoping to that the Linksys firmware UPnP works like its suppose to and provides Open NAT for multiple xBoxes.

Also maybe this stress testing will provide clues to the disconnect issues being posted.

I couldn't start this until today because my home Internet Connection was Strict NAT but now I've upgraded to Public Static IP

 

[sfx2000]

I'm putting my WRT1900AC test unit into field testing starting tonight with my families on-line gaming, Netflix,Youtube and xBoxes They are some serious internet users

I'm hoping to that the Linksys firmware UPnP works like its suppose to and provides Open NAT for multiple xBoxes.

good luck with uPNP -- linksys uses libupnp v1.6.17, and it's got some memory leaks that can compromise stability and security...

49152/tcp open     upnp        Portable SDK for UPnP devices 1.6.17
(Linux 3.2.40; UPnP 1.0)

changelist here for current libupnp - http://pupnp.sourceforge.net/ChangeLog

old Linksys uPNP implementation basically sucked - was better to just disable and statically port forward.

best...

sfx

 

[chadster766]

Is that the upnp version listed in the WRT1900's GPL? What would you suggest as a better alternative?

The older xBox 360 with external wireless adapter has only ever showed moderate Nat.

The newer xBox 360 is open Nat on the WRT1900.

FYI the newer xBox is moderate Nat on an EA6900 with same connection.

 

[RMerlin]

Is that the upnp version listed in the WRT1900's GPL? What would you suggest as a better alternative?

The older xBox 360 with external wireless adapter has only ever showed moderate Nat.

The newer xBox 360 is open Nat on the WRT1900.

FYI the newer xBox is moderate Nat on an EA6900 with same connection.

Updating to a more up-to-date version might be the easiest way to improve things there, but personally I really like Miniupnpd, as used by Asus/Tomato (and probably a few others). It's very actively developed, and I've seen very few security issues showing up in recent years.

 

[chadster766]

I would like to say that my WRT1900AC with the newest Linksys firmware has been working great

My kids are not complaining about issues with web browsing, Netflix and on-line gaming.

Myself I'm enjoying a stable remote access connection though my Public IP, Port Forwarding and RDP

Port Forwarding just worked for me without issue.

My Cisco Webcam forwarded port 80 to itself automatically through UPnP allowing easy remote view.

 

[RogerSC]

Been enjoying using the WRT1900AC here, too. The IPv6 works well. Since there's an IPv6 firewall, feel okay about turning it on even though I can't telnet into the router and enter some ip6tables commands...

One new glitch, if you reboot with the Guest network on, you lose IPv6. However, if you turn the Guest network off, and reboot again, IPv6 comes back, and then you can re-enable the Guest network, and it's all good *smile*.

Doing great, stable and fast. Same caveats as before, missing functionality, over-simplified web interface, etc., but the core functionality of routing and wireless continues to be stable and work well.

 

[chadster766]

Been enjoying using the WRT1900AC here, too. The IPv6 works well. Since there's an IPv6 firewall, feel okay about turning it on even though I can't telnet into the router and enter some ip6tables commands...

One new glitch, if you reboot with the Guest network on, you lose IPv6. However, if you turn the Guest network off, and reboot again, IPv6 comes back, and then you can re-enable the Guest network, and it's all good *smile*.

Doing great, stable and fast. Same caveats as before, missing functionality, over-simplified web interface, etc., but the core functionality of routing and wireless continues to be stable and work well.

Thanks for the confirmation. I'm seeing reports of this exact issue in the Linksys forums as well.

I will bring this to the engineering team's attention tomorrow

 

[sm00thpapa]

25 devices connected and all work great but for one Gears of War 3 Edition Xbox 360 upstairs. Restricted NAT and wireless connection goes in and out. 24 out of 25 devices working great guess I can't complain.

 

[thiggins]

25 devices connected and all work great but for one Gears of War 3 Edition Xbox 360 upstairs. Restricted NAT and wireless connection goes in and out. 24 out of 25 devices working great guess I can't complain.

So would you replace your current router with it?

 

[sfx2000]

Updating to a more up-to-date version might be the easiest way to improve things there, but personally I really like Miniupnpd, as used by Asus/Tomato (and probably a few others). It's very actively developed, and I've seen very few security issues showing up in recent years.

@rmerliin - miniipnpd also supports NAT-PMP as well as uPNP, which is pretty handy

(NAT-PMP is part of the Bonjour/Rendevous/Avahi network stacks - Apple centric perhaps, but we're seeing other applications leverage Avahi as well)

 

[TonyH]

Quick Jperf results betweeon WRT & R7000

Hi.
Had a chance to run a pass of Jperf to compare between WRT & R7000.
Used an older desk top PC as a server, Q9620, 2GHz, 8 GB , eSATA 2
HDD, Realtek Gbe NIC; ASUS ROG lap top as a client, 2nd Gen i7, 2GHz, 16GB, SSD. Intel 7260AC WiFi card.

Set up; run time 60 secs. b/w count in MB. TCP window size 512KB.

Router sitting side by side in our loft. First test in the loft, second test
2 level down in main floor family room where our HT system is located.

First test result WRT/R7000 -N mode -AC mode
409/446 1993/2067
Second test 380/499 1150/946

When I tried 4 parallel stream test, the improvement is minimal less than 5%

 

[thiggins]

Tony, what are "N mode" and "AC" mode? 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz?