N66u Speed Limit

[shawnpear]

Base your decision not only on the router capabilities, but also on the client capabilities. My N66U being used as a bridge is actually slower since I upgraded to an AC capable AP. The N66U is a 3x3 N device while my APs (UniFi UAP-AC-LR) are 2x2 AC devices. Therefore my N66U now can only link at 300Mbps instead of the previous 450Mbps when I was using a 2nd N66U as my AP.

Pretty sure your laptop WiFi is a 2x2 AC device, so your speeds will possibly be in the 300-400Mbps range assuming fairly clean airspace. This is roughly where my laptop with a 2x2 AC card hits most days when fairly close to my AP.

So.... i should be getting between 300-400mbps?
Well i was standing 2 feet from my router, and the wifi analyzer shows no other network.

 

[ColinTaylor]

So.... i should be getting between 300-400mbps?
Well i was standing 2 feet from my router, and the wifi analyzer shows no other network.

I used an N66U until recently (I upgraded to an AC68U) and also have the same wireless adapter as you. The maximum link speed you can get is 300Mbps because the 7265 only has 2 antenna connections (assuming your laptop also has two antennas). That is also assuming 40MHz channel width and short guard interval. In reality the actual throughput (i.e. speed test) will be lower.

My internet connection is about 165Mbps and I managed to get ~150Mbps through the wireless adapter. But that's with hardware acceleration turned on. As others have said, if hardware acceleration is turned off (becuase of QoS, IPTraffic, etc.) then the CPU in the N66U limits the throughput to about 120Mbps.

 

[MichaelCG]

Keep in mind that my speeds are probably less CPU restricted since I am using the N66U only as an AP. Routing duties are being handled by a pfSense box since there is no way a N66U can handle Gig Internet.

 

[shawnpear]

I used an N66U until recently (I upgraded to an AC68U) and also have the same wireless adapter as you. The maximum link speed you can get is 300Mbps because the 7265 only has 2 antenna connections (assuming your laptop also has two antennas). That is also assuming 40MHz channel width and short guard interval. In reality the actual throughput (i.e. speed test) will be lower.

My internet connection is about 165Mbps and I managed to get ~150Mbps through the wireless adapter. But that's with hardware acceleration turned on. As others have said, if hardware acceleration is turned off (becuase of QoS, IPTraffic, etc.) then the CPU in the N66U limits the throughput to about 120Mbps.

Yep, HW acceleration is on for mine. How's the AC68U fairing for you?
Wondering why you upgraded because you're already getting most of your connection speed whereas i'm still far off (wireless speeds at least)

 

[ColinTaylor]

How's the AC68U fairing for you?

Really good. No problems at all. Although my needs are fairly simple.

Wondering why you upgraded because you're already getting most of your connection speed whereas i'm still far off (wireless speeds at least)

Well, with the N66U there were always a couple of annoyances that I was working around.

(1) Randomly, a couple of times a week it would disconnect all clients from one of the radios for no reason (some others have also reported this problem with the N66U). The only way to reactivate that radio was to restart the wireless subsystem.

(2) On the 5GHz band the DFS channels were initially unavailable (Both my neighbours are using channels 36/40/44/48 ). A later firmware update did enable them but it was overly sensitive to radar detections, which meant that every few hours it would change channel (and this meant there was a 60 second period with no 5GHz availability).

Points (1) and (2) inevitably occurred while my wife was in the middle of streaming her favourite Netflix program. So I was getting grief for that.

But the tipping point for me was when I decided that I really needed to implement some QoS. If my download bandwidth started to get saturated because of downloading torrents, PlayStation updates, Steam games, etc. then once again it would impact my wife's Netflix viewing. (Are you starting to see a pattern here ). As I said previously, the N66U is incapable of doing QoS at speeds greater than about 120Mbps.

So in the end it was a combination of all of the above and a desire for a quiet life (my wife already seems to think I'm personally responsible for every internet fault anywhere on the planet ). Plus we had just started to acquire a few more phones/laptops that were AC capable.

Getting the AC68U has been a breath of fresh air. Yes it solved my QoS issues, but also I no longer have the random radio disconnects (1) or any DFS/radar issues (2). I can't quantify it in numbers but the overall "robustness" of 5GHz connections is noticeably improved. I would have preferred to have bought a RT-AC1900 because of its faster processor but it is not available in the UK. The other alternative was the RT-AC88 but that is 3 times the price .

 

[shawnpear]

Really good. No problems at all. Although my needs are fairly simple.
Well, with the N66U there were always a couple of annoyances that I was working around.

(1) Randomly, a couple of times a week it would disconnect all clients from one of the radios for no reason (some others have also reported this problem with the N66U). The only way to reactivate that radio was to restart the wireless subsystem.

(2) On the 5GHz band the DFS channels were initially unavailable (Both my neighbours are using channels 36/40/44/48 ). A later firmware update did enable them but it was overly sensitive to radar detections, which meant that every few hours it would change channel (and this meant there was a 60 second period with no 5GHz availability).

Points (1) and (2) inevitably occurred while my wife was in the middle of streaming her favourite Netflix program. So I was getting grief for that.

But the tipping point for me was when I decided that I really needed to implement some QoS. If my download bandwidth started to get saturated because of downloading torrents, PlayStation updates, Steam games, etc. then once again it would impact my wife's Netflix viewing. (Are you starting to see a pattern here ). As I said previously, the N66U is incapable of doing QoS at speeds greater than about 120Mbps.

So in the end it was a combination of all of the above and a desire for a quiet life (my wife already seems to think I'm personally responsible for every internet fault anywhere on the planet ). Plus we had just started to acquire a few more phones/laptops that were AC capable.

Getting the AC68U has been a breath of fresh air. Yes it solved my QoS issues, but also I no longer have the random radio disconnects (1) or any DFS/radar issues (2). I can't quantify it in numbers but the overall "robustness" of 5GHz connections is noticeably improved. I would have preferred to have bought a RT-AC1900 because of its faster processor but it is not available in the UK. The other alternative was the RT-AC88 but that is 3 times the price .

Thanks for the insights, hahhaa.
my needs are simple too, honestly i just cant justify an upgrade to an AC router now.
i dont really experience lags per se.
but looking into some routers like the Archer C7 V2 (someone selling for $50) or the asus rt-ac1200g+ (brand new for about $70)

 

[joegreat]

I would have preferred to have bought a RT-AC1900 because of its faster processor but it is not available in the UK. The other alternative was the RT-AC88 but that is 3 times the price.

A bit of overclocking to your AC68U and you get the CPU speed of the AC1900: Was asked recently here and before here in detail for N66U and AC68U.

 

[ColinTaylor]

A bit of overclocking to your AC68U and you get the CPU speed of the AC1900: Was asked recently here and before here in detail for N66U and AC68U.

Yes I've read those posts and already overclock my router from 800MHz to 1GHz. That's sufficient for my current requirements, but I prefer not to run my gear out of spec if I can avoid it.

 

[MichaelCG]

(1) Randomly, a couple of times a week it would disconnect all clients from one of the radios for no reason (some others have also reported this problem with the N66U). The only way to reactivate that radio was to restart the wireless subsystem.

This is exactly why I replaced my original N66U. My 5GHz would just stop forwarding traffic on a somewhat regular basis until I cycled the radio similar to your description.

 

[shawnpear]

Not sure if you guys know about the RT-AC1200G+ by Asus and how is it compared to the AC68U.
Can get the latter for about $50 cheaper and wondering if it'll better serves my purposes, with regards to range since my apartment has a few walls between rooms.

 

[Zirescu]

Where did you pull that from? Every test thiggins has done on WAN -> LAN and reverse on Gbps routers shows they can reach close to Gbps speeds, providing you don't test the port forwarding

The test results as mentioned: https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wir...u-and-linksys-ea4500-ea4200v2-wireless-retest

 

[doczenith1]

Some info for you here: https://www.snbforums.com/threads/a-little-bit-of-pushing-my-rt-n66u.33539/