More RT-AX58U woes

[miniterror]

I use one as Mesh node without any problems running the Merlin 386.1_2 firmware.
I do a daily reboot at 3AM.
Work from home the entire day connected to that unit and never had hickups or slowdowns or disconnects.
As you received a new unit i assume it something in your setup thats causing the instability.
Mayne something in your LAN causing a loop that makes the router crash?

 

[fishface]

So far my AX3000 has been rock solid, it took 2 attempts though, I left a review on Amazon, it's not a deep technical review or anything, but it did solve by WAN bottleneck.


This review is going to concentrate on WAN and CPU performance, there are many reviews on WiFi performance, but that was not my issues, and there seemed to be scant information on WAN/CPU performance.

Quick tip, of all the Asus features, enabling QoS is way and above all the other features with regards to the extra CPU power it will take once you enable it.

I have around 70 devices in our 2700sq ft home (I have extra APs around the house), security cameras, VMWare servers, NAS, multiple Firesticks, kids with phones, tablets, game consoles etc etc, so a busy network.

AT&T BGW210-700 in passthrough mode - PC plugged into LAN port on AC1900 - best speed I ever got was 180 - 320Mbps.

Also, when running speedtest one of the 2 cores would max out at 100%.
Disabling some of the Asus threat preventions features would increase the throughput. For example, disabling QoS would give me a 20Mbps -30Mpbs boost, if I then disable the traffic analyzer, got another 10-20Mpbs boost, and so. And ran these tests many times over different times and days, and it was very consistent.

This led to believe that my throughput was CPU limited, and time for a new router.

The first AX3000 was pretty much DOA, lights would come on, but it would do nothing, so returned.

Several months later I thought I'd try again, and this time it worked without issue, and now I'm getting 900-930Mpbs without any of the features turned on, when I enable QoS and the such it does still drop, to around 500-600 Mbps.

Also, with no features enabled, when running speed test, 2 of cores go up little, 10-15%, and the a third core goes up to 50%.

I then enabled QoS etc, and 1 core is still between 10-15%, and the other 2 cores go up to 30 -50%, so some capacity there.

The extra power in the new CPU, higher base frequency and more cores seems to have fixed my bottleneck.

I wanted to preserve all the static IPs I have and Asus made this simple, I exported the configuration from the AC1900, and then imported into the AX3000, rebooted, logged into BGW210-700 and assigned the new target MAC address for the passthrough and of it went, easy peasy.

 

[Bill D.]

My AX58U still crashes with new firmware. Have been in contact with ASUS again. Since this is the 2nd ax58u with exactly the same problemI have declined the RMA/repair offer and am waiting for ASUS to supply a recertified unit. Not really sure what a recertified unit is, however I have requested a unit that has been tested with and works with the latest ASUS firmware.
Whenever I see a new firmware release either ASUS or Merlin I give it a try. Today it was Merlin 386.2 which crashed after ~2hrs. Now back on 384 which ran without problems for 12 days before the 386.2 try.

 

[LetMePutDa]

My AX58U still crashes with new firmware. Have been in contact with ASUS again. Since this is the 2nd ax58u with exactly the same problemI have declined the RMA/repair offer and am waiting for ASUS to supply a recertified unit. Not really sure what a recertified unit is, however I have requested a unit that has been tested with and works with the latest ASUS firmware.
Whenever I see a new firmware release either ASUS or Merlin I give it a try. Today it was Merlin 386.2 which crashed after ~2hrs. Now back on 384 which ran without problems for 12 days before the 386.2 try.

That's some real bad luck! I've never had any issues with my ax58u. Currently on 386.2 and still rock solid with one ac68u node.

 

[Bill D.]

The continuing saga of the RT-AX58U crashing. On firmware 384.19 the router was stable for 55 days, no problems, no crash.
Installed(6 June) 386.2.6 ran for 45 min before router crashed, back to 384.19.

Installed(10 June) 3.0.0.4.386.43406-g999010d8(from Ausu.com). Router has been stable for 4 days, no changes in previous settings, no problems, no crash.

 

[Deleted member 22229]

I have used 386.2 , 386.2.4, 386.2.6, 386.3_Alpha1 No crash on any of them works fine. Hope you get it worked out.

 

[JWoo]

As in an earlier post I made, with my RT-AX58U crash problem Asus sent me a refurbished unit. The refurbished unit also crashed repeatedly just like my original unit. After providing crash logs. config information, etc., to Asus, I sent them back the refurbished router at their request. They decided to refund my purchase price for the router because a) they had no more refurb routers in inventory and b) the crash problem is systemic with the RT-AX58U. Asus send me an ACH payment just as they said they would. My conclusions are a) Asus is a very good company and b) the RT-AX58U has systemic hardware problems most probably related to the Broadcom chipset that cannot be fixed. I believe that the user's usage of the router may very likely determine if they experience crashes or not. The crashes cannot be corrected by a firmware update. Asus Techs seem very familiar with this router as it appears to have a high return rate. So if you have one and it doesn't crash consider yourself lucky. If you have one that crashes, I can tell you from experience your best move is to send it back to Asus while it is under warranty. You can play musical chairs and update the firmware all day long and that won't fix your problem.

 

[Deleted member 22229]

I believe that the user's usage of the router may very likely determine if they experience crashes or not.

Could be. I use mine as a simple router i don't use 2.4GHz it's disabled. My sister has a AX58U she has 4 people in the house 2 working from home and has had zero issues what so ever. So what ever the cause many are not having the crash issues. Guess time will tell. Thanks for sharing your story.

 

[JWoo]

In my case, I was using both 2.4Ghz and 5.0Ghz bands with 2 main networks and 2 guest networks, IPv6, DNS over TLS (Stubby) and working from home + many IoT devices + a lot of streaming. Most of the crashes appeared to occur during streaming of video. While watching streamed content or working via Zoom, you can notice the WIFI slowing down (Asus Techs call the problem with the RT-AX58U "slow WIFI") and then you will subsequently see some buffering. At that stage the router has crashed and it is going through its recovery routine. All the crashes that I was able to observe happened during streaming, and at relatively low CPU load on the router. Most of the crash logs seem to point to the Broadcom chipset/WIFI drivers. So I was actually glad when Asus decided to refund my money for the router. I have had a lot of Asus routers over the years and the RT-AX58U is easily the worst one. Really a bummer as it has a pretty power CPU, ample memory and runs pretty cool.

 

[John Fitzgerald]

In my case, I was using both 2.4Ghz and 5.0Ghz bands with 2 main networks and 2 guest networks, IPv6, DNS over TLS (Stubby) and working from home + many IoT devices + a lot of streaming. Most of the crashes appeared to occur during streaming of video. While watching streamed content or working via Zoom, you can notice the WIFI slowing down (Asus Techs call the problem with the RT-AX58U "slow WIFI") and then you will subsequently see some buffering. At that stage the router has crashed and it is going through its recovery routine. All the crashes that I was able to observe happened during streaming, and at relatively low CPU load on the router. Most of the crash logs seem to point to the Broadcom chipset/WIFI drivers. So I was actually glad when Asus decided to refund my money for the router. I have had a lot of Asus routers over the years and the RT-AX58U is easily the worst one. Really a bummer as it has a pretty power CPU, ample memory and runs pretty cool.

Your "Signature" still says AX58. What have you moved on to as a replacement?

 

[JWoo]

Good point. While Asus had the RT-AX58U units for analysis, I got a cheap Netgear WAX204 from the Netgear site for $58 (on sale for $79.99 but I also had a Netgear coupon). It runs very cool and has a Netgear modified OpenWRT as the firmware. The Netgear WAX204 is basically the same as the ASUS RT-AX56U with a Broadcom BCM6755 quadcore CPU. So I am running for the moment this Netgear WAX204 until I find my next forever router.

 

[Bill D.]

Question - Merlin firmware - Is there anyway to determine which version of the ASUS firmware was used to build the Merlin firmware?

I have an AX58U which crashes on some versions of both ASUS and Merlin firmware. A replacement router from ASUS has the same problem. Router is flawless on Merlin 384.19 & now the latest ASUS (RT-AX58U_3.0.0.4_386_43406-g99010d8_cferom_puresqubi.w) firmware. On all other "386" firmware versions that I have tried the router crashes in less than an hour.

 

[RMerlin]

Is there anyway to determine which version of the ASUS firmware was used to build the Merlin firmware?

It's in the Changelog.

 

[serialtoon]

Good point. While Asus had the RT-AX58U units for analysis, I got a cheap Netgear WAX204 from the Netgear site for $58 (on sale for $79.99 but I also had a Netgear coupon). It runs very cool and has a Netgear modified OpenWRT as the firmware. The Netgear WAX204 is basically the same as the ASUS RT-AX56U with a Broadcom BCM6755 quadcore CPU. So I am running for the moment this Netgear WAX204 until I find my next forever router.

Hello, new guy to the SNB Forums. Ive owned my RT-AX58U since April of 2020. I have had nothing but problems similar to what you describe. Im reaching the end of my rope with this device and i plan on moving away from it as painful as it may be, im sick of having to reboot the damn thing to get it to work correctly.

Have you given any thoughts to your replacement? Im looking at going with the Alien from Ubiquiti, despite the high price, they look great and would go well with my game room/man cave aesthetic. Ive done a little research and come to the conclusion that its a good router but isnt perfect (is that even possible?).

 

[Bill D.]

I had problems with my AX58U RMA'd and replacement had the same multiple crash/instability problems. Found that the Merlin 384.19 0 firmware worked, but other versions of Merlin and ASUS firmware crashed repeatably. Since early June I have been running(~60 days) the last two ASUS firmware versions with out problems. My current firmware is ASUS 3.0.0.4.386_43588. I will be trying the Merlin firmware again when it based on the 386 series.

 

[serialtoon]

I had problems with my AX58U RMA'd and replacement had the same multiple crash/instability problems. Found that the Merlin 384.19 0 firmware worked, but other versions of Merlin and ASUS firmware crashed repeatably. Since early June I have been running(~60 days) the last two ASUS firmware versions with out problems. My current firmware is ASUS 3.0.0.4.386_43588. I will be trying the Merlin firmware again when it based on the 386 series.

Thank you for the reply Bill. Im currently on the fence with starting up an RMA to see if i can get a better device than the one i have. Although Asus' website is also incredibly frustrating to navigate to get an RMA started.

 

[Deleted member 22229]

My AX58U has been rock solid for me i have never had any issues with it at all Stock or Merlin. Running 386.3_2 on it right now works like a charm.

 

[serialtoon]

My AX58U has been rock solid for me i have never had any issues with it at all Stock or Merlin. Running 386.3_2 on it right now works like a charm.

Consider me envious then. I bought this device after always owning Asus branded RT routers over the past 15 years or so. Im willing to buy into another model since i like the feature set and im very familiar with the UI at this point. However looking at other forums, it seems that may not be the case with AX8x series devices.

 

[Bill D.]

AX58U - flackey firmware. My router which was RMA'd with the replacement being no better was working without problems on ASUS firmware 3.0.0.4.386_43588. Yesterday upgraded to ASUS 3.0.0.4.386.45674 and its back to multiple crashes. Today I reverted back to 3.00.4.386_43588.

 

[Deleted member 22229]

AX58U - flackey firmware. My router which was RMA'd with the replacement being no better was working without problems on ASUS firmware 3.0.0.4.386_43588. Yesterday upgraded to ASUS 3.0.0.4.386.45674 and its back to multiple crashes. Today I reverted back to 3.00.4.386_43588.

Been using the new firmware since release so far working ok for me.