[Official Beta] AiMesh beta firmware for RT-AC68U/RT-AC86U/RT-AC5300/RT-AC88U

[Ronald Schwerer]

@drabsian and @DummyPLUG. Thanks for the feedback and refreshing me on the issues. So, back to my concern. Since the security hole of Guest isolation can't be fixed on APs/nodes, then Guest configuration propagation to nodes should not be implemented. As it currently works, I can live with it only working on the router. Or, alternatively, make propagation optional.

I'm just raising this issue now because it has been stated that some Guest node support is a few months away.

 

[drabisan]

Agree, it shouldn't work without vlan. It just gives users false expectations and it creates a security issue. Better no support than a bad implementation.

 

[xbladr]

So I have added my 68u as a note to my GT-AC5300 router. I can not seem to get anything to connect to it though. Do I need to enable smart connect?

 

[drabisan]

Do you see the SSID broadcast by 68U? In both 2.4 and 5GHz? Use a WiFi analyser.
Maybe 68U chooses a DFS channel and your device doesn't support?
Smart connect makes sense on GT-AC5300 not on 68U.

 

[xbladr]

Do you see the SSID broadcast by 68U? In both 2.4 and 5GHz? Use a WiFi analyser.
Maybe 68U chooses a DFS channel and your device doesn't support?
Smart connect makes sense on GT-AC5300 not on 68U.

I do not see any extra ssids. After a reboot of the router it is now connected since devices anyways. I have noted that with it on and a device connected to the node it is slower than if I just turn it off and connect to the router itself. The gui does show the ai node as full strength signal. Will play more tonight. Maybe I'll have to go up the driveway and see if I can get it further outside.

Note 8 same spot across the house gets 320 down on smart connect node powered off. Node on connected to it i get 220 down. Node is half way between router and the spot in the house.

Sent from my SM-N950U1 using Tapatalk

 

[ptwat]

So you're talking about 2.4.
How about in 5GHz? In 19612 Asus fixed a similar problem in 5GHz, where router was using 80MHz channel spacing and node was doing only 20.
Anyway, as a general rule, unless you're leaving into a remote area, where there's no other signals in 2.4GHz, you shouldn't bother with 40MHz in 2.4. It will be unreliable due to external interference in the spectrum.

The 5Ghz bands are the same in both the airouter and the ainode at 80 Mhz wide.
As far as the general rule I can see that, but it really comes down to S/N and although I have not measured that, the largest interferer is outside the band I am using.

 

[ptwat]

I noticed the same. Node is attached on 2.4, 5 and wire. From what I can see, there's almost no traffic over wireless. And file transfer speed clearly shows both router and node choose wire even with connection type set to auto.

Good to know this. My statement here was around why the ainode had a 20 Mhz band in 2.4 and the airouter had a 40 Mhz band when there is only one selection in the user interface. I assume setting that would set both the airouter and the ainode to 40 Mhz but it does not. Someone speculated that the ainode might be using the omitted 20 Mhz for backhaul. I can accept that the wired connection is used for backhaul as that makes the most sense.
This is all good discussion!

 

[ggruszynski]

On GT-AC5300 the node is still using just the 20MHz wide channel for the lower 5G-1, but 80MHz on upper 5G-2.


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[drabisan]

@ggruszynski both radios are doing 80HGz with no special settings. It needs to find good, clean channels to do that, but there's no default setting to force one radio to do only 20MHz.

 

[dude6156]

Mine was like that this morning. For grins, I tried the web interface using the node's IP expecting to just get re-routed back to the router. Instead, I was at the node's Firmware ugrade screen. Then I remembered. One of the things I tried last night was something I saw in a post - how to access that screen in order to flash different (non-AiMesh) firmware by going to 192.168.1.xx/AiMesh_Node_FirmwareUpgrade.asp After trying that link last night, I didn't do anything except close that window. I wonder if that left the node in some weird state.

Anyway, this AM I rebooted the node using ssh, and everything looks good now. So, by any chance - had you also tried going to that url?

Nope, I did not. But I rebooted the Master and the node, and everything seems to be displaying fine now (so far). My fixed client still connects to the distant Master though instead of the closer node .

 

[ggruszynski]

@ggruszynski both radios are doing 80HGz with no special settings. It needs to find good, clean channels to do that, but there's no default setting to force one radio to do only 20MHz.

I have 1 GT-AC5300 as router and another as node. Router both channels show 80MHz and the node shows lower @ 20MHz and upper @ 80MHz. Have very little interference.


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[drabisan]

Ah, I see!
But look at the bright side: you have 3 radios on 80 and 1 in 20. For a beta software I would say it's damn good!
Realistically speaking now, Asus has plenty of work to do on radio management in AiMesh. Sometimes after reload you'll see node picking 20MHz, sometimes it picks the same channel as router. There's no way to manually choose the channels. Plenty of opportunities here!

But, considering it's only a beta, it's actually quite good!

 

[Flying Dutchman]

Just installed version 19612 on both my AC68U after having started with the november version.
Upgraded both Router and Node by the Admin-tool in de GUI: went smoothly.

So far it is working very, very good.
I can listen to an internet radio station without any interruption when I walk from one end to the other of my big garden, covered now by both Asus AC-68U.
That is what I want, a service to me without being disturbed by technical issues like range limitation, channel switching etc.

Asus , great job !!!!

 

[drabisan]

@Flying Dutchman highly off topic. You know you can easily bridge EPC3928AD and get rid of that DMZ mess ;-)

 

[ggruszynski]

Ah, I see!
But look at the bright side: you have 3 radios on 80 and 1 in 20. For a beta software I would say it's damn good!
Realistically speaking now, Asus has plenty of work to do on radio management in AiMesh. Sometimes after reload you'll see node picking 20MHz, sometimes it picks the same channel as router. There's no way to manually choose the channels. Plenty of opportunities here!

But, considering it's only a beta, it's actually quite good!

Agreed! Not complaining at all. This firmware is way better than what I had before...was about to sell and get Orbis or something as my house is just big enough where the 1 router just didn’t quite cover. Hopefully in the future with wired backhaul it will allow the full 80MHz.


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[xbladr]

Still having issues where speeds on the nodes wifi. it's 100mb slower than on the router wifi even though the signal is stronger. However i get 450 plus hardwired in to the node

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[bluepoint]

My fixed client still connects to the distant Master though instead of the closer node .

Have you tried to forget/delete the wireless profile from the client? Sometimes clients tend to insist on connecting to wireless stations it last connected.

 

[erkme73]

My apologies for coming late to the party. After reading all they hype on the AiMesh improvements, I purchased two RT-AC68U's (TMO units flashed to 68U). However, after upgrading to the latest firmware on the first post (Dec 15), both routers have the same LAN and WIFI MAC addresses. That, of course caused havoc on my LAN when both were on at the same time. I've managed to manually change the MAC of the one of the LANs, but the 2.4 and 5.0 are the same between both routers.

Did I miss a step perhaps? Is there a simple fix?

ETA: It turns out I inadvertently flashed the same CFE file to both routers during the conversion process from TMO to the AC68U. Fixed it. Sorry for the false alarm.

 

[dude6156]

Have you tried to forget/delete the wireless profile from the client? Sometimes clients tend to insist on connecting to wireless stations it last connected.

Yes. It is a 66U that I am using as a media bridge. I have reset it too.

 

[glugglug]

I have the following routers on my network:
AC88U (primary)
AC66U x 2 - one on ethernet to the primary router, the other attached via a MOCA 2.0 bridge
AC68U - via a MOCA 2.0 bridge

Yeah... we have an old Tudor with lots of stucco walls, even on the interior which act as Faraday cages, and aluminum studs in the parts that have been renovated. The router signals make it from the basement to the attic pretty well, but have trouble going through our walls to adjacent rooms. 3 routers had mostly good coverage with a small dead zone and an area that liked to switch between the 3 routers a lot. 4 has good coverage pretty much everywhere.

I'm assuming AiMesh solve the problem of brief disconnection when switching between access points which drops you from some games like Clash of Clans, but isn't really noticed when web browsing? Otherwise, I guess I'm missing the point of it?

Will these all work with AiMesh, including the AC66Us?
Will the ~4ms latency added by MOCA create any issues?