Newbie RT-AC66U Owner: Got a lemon?

[NivagSwerdna]

Hi

Got my RT-AC66U yesterday. Connected to PlusNet DSL PPPoE easily; set the Wireless up easily... everything worked well and then after about 30 mins... PC's connection (it was wired) drops out and router has effectively freezed... nothing on any LAN port and Wireless has disappeared.

Did a hard reset... worked again... and then again after about 30 mins everything froze up.

Restarted but this time.. rather than fully restarting it came up with 3 lights lit (but not 100%)... the LAN 1+2 and the intErnet light... otherwise dead to the world.

After random pushing of WPS and Reset (I'm really not convinced the reset button is reset) I eventually managed to get it into recovery mode and flashed with the latest FW from Asus site... RT-AC66U_3.0.0.4_372.31_0

It seemed to work again... set it up...

Everything looking good and then after about 30 mins or so... freeze of death.

Getting very disillusioned with my new bit of hardware.

(FWIW my network does have a wireless client bridge to a Buffalo router running DDWRT and behind the bridge is a collection of other PCs etc... compatibility issue?)

Any suggestions? Should I just RMA it and try another one?

 

[RMerlin]

Make sure you don't have either an IP conflict with the bridge, or two DHCP servers running at the same time.

Also, test the router without any USB disk plugged in (if you had any) to ensure it's not the cause.

 

[NivagSwerdna]

I thought I would try and experiment overnight; I have turned off the Buffalo router upstairs so there is no bridging and the PCs on that segment are now isolated. (I won't be getting any mail now as my mail server is on that segment (

The Buffalo was 192.168.1.2; my old technicolor router (currently OFF) was 192.168.1.1; my new router is 192.168.1.1

DHCP was disabled on the Buffalo (and it definitely is now since it's off!)

And... I have no USB devices on the router yet.

And I'll now leave it and wait and see what happens.

 

[NivagSwerdna]

Still working

Now to turn the DDWRT Buffalo on... first with no clients...

 

[NivagSwerdna]

It seems that at least some of my issues have been solved by updating to RT-AC66U_3.0.0.4_372.31_0 and doing a complete reset however the wireless bridging does not work.

For clarity... I have the RT-AC66U (192.168.1.1) connected via PPPoE to by BT Modem and a few directly connected devices (and a couple more bridged using powerline)

And then... I have a Buffalo WHR-G300N router (192.168.1.2) running Firmware: DD-WRT v24-sp2 (03/25/13) std in Client Bridge (routed) mode to another collection of devices.

Initially all worked fine but after a few minutes the devices on the Buffalo side can no longer contact devices beyond the Buffalo. After a large amount of investigation I found the initially the Buffalo has a routing entry like...

Kernel IP routing table
Destination Gateway Genmask Flags Metric Ref Use Iface
default router.asus.com 0.0.0.0 UG 0 0 0 ath0
127.0.0.0 * 255.0.0.0 U 0 0 0 lo
169.254.0.0 * 255.255.0.0 U 0 0 0 br0
192.168.1.0 * 255.255.255.0 U 0 0 0 br0
192.168.1.1 * 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 ath0
192.168.1.3 * 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 br0
...

but after a few minutes this first line (default) disappears and subsequently devices on the buffalo side start seeing...

C:\Users\XYZZY>ping www.yahoo.com

Pinging ds-eu-fp3.wa1.b.yahoo.com [87.248.112.181] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 192.168.1.2: Destination net unreachable.
Request timed out.
Reply from 192.168.1.2: Destination net unreachable.
Reply from 192.168.1.2: Destination net unreachable.

Ping statistics for 87.248.112.181:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 3, Lost = 1 (25% loss),

I manually did a

route add default gw 192.168.1.1 netmask 0.0.0.0 dev ath0

on the Buffalo DDWRT and got the route working again but after an hour or so the Buffalo became uncontactable from the Asus RT-AC66U side

Seems like there is something very broken with the routing from the RT-AC66U to the DDWRT router in Client Bridged Mode.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance.

(PS This router/bridging configuration works flawlessly with my Technicolor router - to which I have at ,least temporarily, had to revert)

 

[NivagSwerdna]

Unfortunately I've given up on the Router and returned it via RMA.

I'm sure one day it will be a good piece of kit but currently, IMHO, the combination of hardware and firmware just isn't stable enough to find a home in my network.

I'll be watching out for any revisions of hardware or firmware to see if its worth trying again but for now I'll put my AC plans on hold.

Regards
Nivag

 

[tenchi71]

Hi

Got my RT-AC66U yesterday. Connected to PlusNet DSL PPPoE easily; set the Wireless up easily... everything worked well and then after about 30 mins... PC's connection (it was wired) drops out and router has effectively freezed... nothing on any LAN port and Wireless has disappeared.

Did a hard reset... worked again... and then again after about 30 mins everything froze up.

Restarted but this time.. rather than fully restarting it came up with 3 lights lit (but not 100%)... the LAN 1+2 and the intErnet light... otherwise dead to the world.

After random pushing of WPS and Reset (I'm really not convinced the reset button is reset) I eventually managed to get it into recovery mode and flashed with the latest FW from Asus site... RT-AC66U_3.0.0.4_372.31_0

It seemed to work again... set it up...

Everything looking good and then after about 30 mins or so... freeze of death.

Getting very disillusioned with my new bit of hardware.

(FWIW my network does have a wireless client bridge to a Buffalo router running DDWRT and behind the bridge is a collection of other PCs etc... compatibility issue?)

Any suggestions? Should I just RMA it and try another one?

I had this exact experience with my AC66U back in March/April. I posted about this as well: "Major Problems: Three Lights of Death" http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/showthread.php?t=10708
I never got it to work after MULTIPLE resets, reloading of firmware, moving to another location, etc. etc... I ended up buying a Netgear R6300 and taking the loss on the Asus (I'm deployed...).

I'm replying because I feel there is a real reliability issue with these routers. Two exact experiences usually means there are many more, and it's a problem.