RT-AC Series - EOL- Honest oppinions

[taurelio]

Hello everybody

First and foremost many thanks to Merlin for the years of support to the community.

I own an RT-AC66U B1 for almost 3 years and its replacing the ISP router that dates from 2018 (Thomson Brand with no 5Ghz and last firmware update i belive dates 2020 or 2022).

To put in perspective an Asus average router in my country (Portugal) its expensive, costing almost 30% or more of the mininum wage.

As you can imagine don't have the money - finnancial capabillity- to replace my RT-AC66U B1 that as reach EOL, its not easy when you have, morgage, cars, kids, etc, and some of you i believe can relate to what i am writing

So i would like to have honest, constructive opinions is how dangereous means EOL for a super basic home network

As stated above i just have a basic home network with samba share, no remote acess to router activated, DNSSEC, ipv6 disabled.

So the question is: as it is impossible to me to replace the router in years to came (trust me i had to save a lot of time to by this one i have), i am better with my RT-AC66U B1 even in EOL or with the crappy thomson from 2018? I ask this because ISP dont replace there devices to the clients if the router is working propaly, their firmware does not allow dns changes and internet speed ir much slower.

Should i activate the Trend Micro stuff to increase security when EOL arrives?

I am not a tech savy guy, i tried to flash freshtomato on my router (that was an adventure) but it doesn work because it needs the special profile for MEO ISP

So please share your two cents to the EOL question and please keep it constructive and helpfull

Thanks

 

[bennor]

This subforum discusses the Asus-Merlin firmware not other third party firmware like FreshTomato. Are you running Asus-Merlin firmware on the RT-AC66U B1?

You may want to see the large discussion on EOL Asus routers at the following URL which touches on using EOL routers:

News - RT-AC68U End of Life Announced by Asus

Sadly, Asus has just announced that the RT-AC68U has been discontinued and has reached end of life. :-( When a product is end-of-life, it means: It is no longer manufactured Its certification will not be renewed Its firmware, utility, website, DM, QSG and manual will not be updated...

www.snbforums.com

 

[Tech9]

As stated above i just have a basic home network with samba share, no remote acess to router activated

With no open services to Internet you're good. Just continue using your router as before with your firmware of choice - stock Asuswrt or Asuswrt-Merlin. I personally would run the latest available stock Asuswrt or Asuswrt-Merlin 386.13 version. There are some issues with the base in 386.14, see the release thread. Use AiProtection if you want to, there is nothing dangerous or too much privacy concerning about the data sharing to Trend Micro. Signature file most likely will continue with updates from Trend Micro. Keep the configuration simple and this router will work well for you.