RT-AC5300 vs RT-AC3200

[Trebuin]

Hello,
I've been a fan of Merlin and John's work on the firmware and my experience with ASUS has been relatively good. I currently have an AC66U and will be upgrading to a Triband router, with the AC5300 and 3200 as my choices from ASUS. Obviously, the 5300 is pricy. this will end up as a repeater and will likely end up as a repeater as my current one is. I'm arranging it so one 5GHz will dedicated to my primary router (apple AC airport) and the other two will be used for device connections. My alternate thought is to hardwire my AC66U to the Airport and see if I gain any acceleration between the AC66U and the new ASUS router in repeater mode. The primary router is located in my attic and has horrible signal range due to the location in the house...hence the need for a repeater. The other issue I'm trying to resolve is a slow USB port...both provide about the same USB3 speed and should work.

So I'm left looking at the difference between the AC5300 and AC3200. Do any of you have experience with both? For now, I'm just looking at the features on the website, and it does not help with repeater mode setup.

 

[RMerlin]

Hello,
I've been a fan of Merlin and John's work on the firmware and my experience with ASUS has been relatively good. I currently have an AC66U and will be upgrading to a Triband router, with the AC5300 and 3200 as my choices from ASUS. Obviously, the 5300 is pricy. this will end up as a repeater and will likely end up as a repeater as my current one is. I'm arranging it so one 5GHz will dedicated to my primary router (apple AC airport) and the other two will be used for device connections. My alternate thought is to hardwire my AC66U to the Airport and see if I gain any acceleration between the AC66U and the new ASUS router in repeater mode. The primary router is located in my attic and has horrible signal range due to the location in the house...hence the need for a repeater. The other issue I'm trying to resolve is a slow USB port...both provide about the same USB3 speed and should work.

So I'm left looking at the difference between the AC5300 and AC3200. Do any of you have experience with both? For now, I'm just looking at the features on the website, and it does not help with repeater mode setup.

AFAIK, repeater mode is not supported by either of these two models. Only router and access point modes.

 

[sfx2000]

So I'm left looking at the difference between the AC5300 and AC3200. Do any of you have experience with both? For now, I'm just looking at the features on the website, and it does not help with repeater mode setup.

Choosing between the RT-AC3200 and the RT-AC5300 - I'll offer an alternate choice - the RT-AC66U/RT-AC68U series - for most folks, the performance is exactly the same...

 

[sfx2000]

And I'll throw another choice at you...

>> Using Airport TC (5th Gen) -> 5ghz -> RT-AC66U in repeater mode

Consider picking up an Airport Extreme AC in the Apple Refurb Store - $129USD/Free Shipping, and it's going to just work fine at extending your TimeCapsule...

 

[L&LD]

I do not think that getting a current router and using it as an AP (or repeater, if possible) is the best thing to do.

The most powerful router should be used as the main router, with the older/lesser units used as AP's instead.

Also, do not consider using any current router with an USB attached drive. Not only does NAS-type use suffer, but so will your network for other duties (it takes away cpu cycles to drive the storage).

A simple NAS (even a single bay, depending on what is being stored) is the better solution. USB attached storage is simply too taxing on the router for more than one or two 'light' users of the content it may contain.

 

[Trebuin]

And I'll throw another choice at you...

>> Using Airport TC (5th Gen) -> 5ghz -> RT-AC66U in repeater mode

Consider picking up an Airport Extreme AC in the Apple Refurb Store - $129USD/Free Shipping, and it's going to just work fine at extending your TimeCapsule...

That recommendation is exactly my current setup. Slow use 2 is one problem. My 5ghz is now dedicated to be a repeater while the 2.4ghz is shared by about a dozen devices. My kids kindle HDX brings the entire network to its knees surprisingly.

 

[Trebuin]

AFAIK, repeater mode is not supported by either of these two models. Only router and access point modes.

I can't believe that. I would think it would be easy to port the code used with the rat-ac66u over to the newer routers to repeat. If that's the issue, I'll have to keep the ac66u as my repeater and tie a new router to one of the lan ports. Do you have any other recommendations?

 

[System Error Message]

I'll throw in more choices for fun, mikrotik APs, ubiquiti APs, engenius, cisco related brands,...
The difference between the 2 is that one is MU-MIMO and the other isnt. Both are good when you have many clients using it at the same time. If you have MU-MIMO clients you will benefit from the AC-5300.

Regarding repeater mode, its usually a poor idea but i have mentioned in many threads how to do it properly. The problem with both routers is that you dont know which antenna goes to which radio or they could all be shared. For a proper repeater set up you need directional antennas and multiple APs.
For example [wifi router]--ethernet---[wifi router/AP with directional] ))))))[wifi router/AP with directional]---ethernet---[wifi router/AP]. This is the proper way of doing a repeater set up, but regardless of how many times i mention it, few actually follow.

So if you are trying a repeater set up, consider 2 AC68Us or AC88Us just for bridging and another 2 as wifi APs. If you just buy a wifi router and add it as a repeater you are going to be disappointed with the performance and the fact that repeaters could be operating on the same channel might make things worse.

 

[Trebuin]

I'll throw in more choices for fun, mikrotik APs, ubiquiti APs, engenius, cisco related brands,...
The difference between the 2 is that one is MU-MIMO and the other isnt. Both are good when you have many clients using it at the same time. If you have MU-MIMO clients you will benefit from the AC-5300.

Regarding repeater mode, its usually a poor idea but i have mentioned in many threads how to do it properly. The problem with both routers is that you dont know which antenna goes to which radio or they could all be shared. For a proper repeater set up you need directional antennas and multiple APs.
For example [wifi router]--ethernet---[wifi router/AP with directional] ))))))[wifi router/AP with directional]---ethernet---[wifi router/AP]. This is the proper way of doing a repeater set up, but regardless of how many times i mention it, few actually follow.

So if you are trying a repeater set up, consider 2 AC68Us or AC88Us just for bridging and another 2 as wifi APs. If you just buy a wifi router and add it as a repeater you are going to be disappointed with the performance and the fact that repeaters could be operating on the same channel might make things worse.

I agree that the best way to network this would be to have the routers tied together via a LAN cable, but unfortunately, my house physically can't support it until I hire someone to do some wall work...and my landlord is against that. My current config gives me about 585mbps across wifi which is decent for what it should do (I can only measure 150 via speednet). I honestly think the issue I have is the 2.4ghz is shared across too many devices. I've physically connected everything I could to built in ports and that helps, but is just not enough.

I think part of the problem is also a lack of QOS via the apple router. I can't go backwards because I use the lan connection for that external which serves as my media server. I won't use a computer due to the $90 hike in my electric bill and have had horrible experiences with every name brand NAS on the market. USB has served me well, but 2.0 is slow.

I would love to go New AC router LAN to Airport and Wifi to old router...but that puts my media server across the wifi, and may induce buffering issues with HD videos. I'm thinking Airport wifi to old AC router and connect the new router to the old router via LAN. That may cause some issues trying to get the server back across wifi to back up via crashplan over the net. I may in the end have to try and see what configuration works the best.

 

[System Error Message]

I agree that the best way to network this would be to have the routers tied together via a LAN cable, but unfortunately, my house physically can't support it until I hire someone to do some wall work...and my landlord is against that. My current config gives me about 585mbps across wifi which is decent for what it should do (I can only measure 150 via speednet). I honestly think the issue I have is the 2.4ghz is shared across too many devices. I've physically connected everything I could to built in ports and that helps, but is just not enough.

I think part of the problem is also a lack of QOS via the apple router. I can't go backwards because I use the lan connection for that external which serves as my media server. I won't use a computer due to the $90 hike in my electric bill and have had horrible experiences with every name brand NAS on the market. USB has served me well, but 2.0 is slow.

I would love to go New AC router LAN to Airport and Wifi to old router...but that puts my media server across the wifi, and may induce buffering issues with HD videos. I'm thinking Airport wifi to old AC router and connect the new router to the old router via LAN. That may cause some issues trying to get the server back across wifi to back up via crashplan over the net. I may in the end have to try and see what configuration works the best.

Did you read my post? What im saying is that to expand wifi properly as a repeater you need a dedicated bridge. i'll give you an example. In this example you will need 4 AC68Us, 2 1M ethernet cables and 6 directional antennas. So from your main AC68U connect an ethernet cable to an AC68U with directional antennas. Imagine this to be a wired client that is near to your main router so go ahead and use a few meters of cabling for this. Now place the other AC68U with directional antennas in the area you want to supply with wifi. Have the antennas point to each other. Then connect the last AC68U to the ethernet port of that AC68U with directional antennas where you want to have wifi and set up a dedicated bridge between the AC68Us that have directional antennas. Only the main AC68U runs dhcp. Not only does this give you good performance but it allows you to use wifi as an ethernet bridge too for clients with no wifi capability.

It really seems like you dont read my posts properly. Sure the ac3200 or ac5300 would mean only have 2 instead of 4 but the problem with the antenna is you dont know if they're shared and which antenna connects to which radio. Using directionals allows a strong signal bridge that will work well even with interference so it lets you use the 80mhz or 160mhz without fear of interference giving you a high bandwidth link bridge. it also lets you use channels and transmit powers that arent legal with omni as directionals have a much much higher allowed limit and if both routers used are the same, that means you can use a channel that even clients dont support to reduce interference even more.

 

[RMerlin]

I can't believe that. I would think it would be easy to port the code used with the rat-ac66u over to the newer routers to repeat. If that's the issue, I'll have to keep the ac66u as my repeater and tie a new router to one of the lan ports. Do you have any other recommendations?

It's in the firmware's source code - Repeater mode is disabled. I believe the reason was that the Broadcom SDK version didn't support it (yet).

The RT-AC68U remains the best choice for anyone looking for a router or repeater at this time.

 

[Trebuin]

It's in the firmware's source code - Repeater mode is disabled. I believe the reason was that the Broadcom SDK version didn't support it (yet).

The RT-AC68U remains the best choice for anyone looking for a router or repeater at this time.

Will The RT-AC68P version work as well?

 

[RMerlin]

Will The RT-AC68P version work as well?

Yes. It's the same feature and hardware as the RT-AC68U, but with a slightly faster CPU.

 

[Trebuin]

Yes. It's the same feature and hardware as the RT-AC68U, but with a slightly faster CPU.

I ended up going with the 3200 because I found it on sale for $199. I set it up as my primary and put the old AC66R into media bridge and hardwired all the stuff I needed to it directly. The performance is fantastic. I also moved my Airport TC and connected it to the AC66R to help extend the range and provide a secondary low priority wireless interface and retired an old Linksys router.

 

[TheManFromUncle]

Trebuin, good work. If that works well for you there is no reason to change anything. I do understand the simplifications that were offered to you here though. I somehow think they were a tad confusing for you. You solved that pretty darn good.

Personally, I run a Linksys WRT1900AC as my main router, hook my main PC, a couple of consoles and a printer through a switch and connect that through 2(1 in router and 1 for switch) Devolo Powerline connections to the router, connect my home theater through an AC68U in wireless bridge mode(6 devices) and use a Netgear wireless extender(only for my wife's Apple devices). This covers all of our wired/wireless needs. In total about 40 devices. I have nothing to complain about. My Internet speed is 500/50 of which my hometheater has a reach for 300/50. Sure... I have some plans but it all works perfectly as it is right now.

 

[jegesq]

Trebuin:

My setup is almost the same. Two-story home, cable modem (SB6183) located in study upstairs. AC3200 router upstairs, and downstairs, two AC66U's, one running as a repeater, and the other as a media bridge, along with one other bridge (a WD AC1200 Bridge). All bridges and the repeater are connecting wirelessly to the AC3200's 2nd (channels 149-161) 5.2 ghz radio, which handles the backhaul very well. The repeater is located downstairs at the far end of our home in another bedroom used as a home office by my wife. The repeater is set to broadcast both 5ghz and 2.4ghz, and the SSID's are different than the three on the AC3200 (which gets confusing for my kids when they visit, but I prefer to see which radio and device I am connecting clients to). We've got 300/20 service from our ISP, and even with the repeater and bridges, speed and throughput remain very high (no where near the 50% drop from using a repeater that conventional wisdom says should be occurring). Maybe a 15-20% drop at the farthest reaches of the repeater's range, but anything hard-wired to either the repeater or the bridges routinely gets close to 300mbps down (I should note that devices connected to LAN ports of the AC3200 get well above our ISP reported package speed, i.e., upwards of 350mbps.

I used to run some of my downstairs media equipment (e.g., an HTPC) using Powerline, but it was too slow (admittedly, this was back in the early Powerline 1.0 days). Still, even with what I read about the reported PHY link layer and throughput of the Powerline AV2 products, I wouldn't expect to see much, if any improvement over what I see using the RT-AC66U's in Media Bridge and Repeater modes.

Interesting to see that you have hung another wireless device off the back of your RT-AC66U (in repeater mode). Isn't your AC66 Repeater also broadcasting on both the 2.4 and 5 ghz radios? If so, do you see any interference, noise or other adverse effects on clients connected to the Airport (from cross-channel contention or interference)?

BTW, you'll have to change your signature line now....

 

[Trebuin]

Thank you everyone for the feedback. I updated my sig to represent the current config. The ASUS design is really stable now over the initial setup. I also learned that the antennas on the RT-AC66R are much stronger than the RT-AC3200 on the 5GHz.

I hung my Apple TC off the AC66R an am working on some troubleshooting issue...I can't access settings except when connected to the TC (not a big deal) but I have noted that it drops the IP assigned through the RT-66U bridge. Resetting the Asus bridge fixes it, but this happens daily, but I'm working through the settings. I think this also is related with all the instability recently that drove me to replace the TC as the primary router.

I also had to hang my USB Drobo off the AC66R still because of a NTFS fault that the AC3200 is detecting that nothing else is detecting. I need to get a USB 3.0 computer (I have none as of now) and back everything up on the drobo using a 4TB drive, then rebuild it. After that, I should be able to hang it on the AC3200 and get the 3.0 speed improvements on it. The drobo didn't like the move apparently. The Speed test went from 9MB/s to about 25MB/s on transfer. Not much, but enough to do the job.

Finally, I'm seeing an issue with the SMB mounting if anyone has any simple solutions. This did not appear before, but is likely due to me hanging it off the bridge. This is posted elsewhere by others, but no solid solution id'd yet. Note that it happens once an hour:

Feb 23 17:01:32 smbd[2170]: [2016/02/23 17:01:32, 0] smbd/sesssetup.c:reply_sesssetup_and_X(1265)
Feb 23 17:01:32 smbd[2170]: reply_sesssetup_and_X: Rejecting attempt at SPNEGO session setup when it was not negoitiated.
Feb 23 18:00:40 smbd[2477]: [2016/02/23 18:00:40, 0] smbd/sesssetup.c:reply_sesssetup_and_X(1265)
Feb 23 18:00:40 smbd[2477]: reply_sesssetup_and_X: Rejecting attempt at SPNEGO session setup when it was not negoitiated.
Feb 23 19:01:36 smbd[2794]: [2016/02/23 19:01:36, 0] smbd/sesssetup.c:reply_sesssetup_and_X(1265)
Feb 23 19:01:36 smbd[2794]: reply_sesssetup_and_X: Rejecting attempt at SPNEGO session setup when it was not negoitiated.
Feb 23 20:01:01 smbd[3097]: [2016/02/23 20:01:01, 0] smbd/sesssetup.c:reply_sesssetup_and_X(1265)
Feb 23 20:01:01 smbd[3097]: reply_sesssetup_and_X: Rejecting attempt at SPNEGO session setup when it was not negoitiated.

Thanks again for all the help!

Trebuin:

My setup is almost the same. Two-story home, cable modem (SB6183) located in study upstairs. AC3200 router upstairs, and downstairs, two AC66U's, one running as a repeater, and the other as a media bridge, along with one other bridge (a WD AC1200 Bridge). All bridges and the repeater are connecting wirelessly to the AC3200's 2nd (channels 149-161) 5.2 ghz radio, which handles the backhaul very well. The repeater is located downstairs at the far end of our home in another bedroom used as a home office by my wife. The repeater is set to broadcast both 5ghz and 2.4ghz, and the SSID's are different than the three on the AC3200 (which gets confusing for my kids when they visit, but I prefer to see which radio and device I am connecting clients to). We've got 300/20 service from our ISP, and even with the repeater and bridges, speed and throughput remain very high (no where near the 50% drop from using a repeater that conventional wisdom says should be occurring). Maybe a 15-20% drop at the farthest reaches of the repeater's range, but anything hard-wired to either the repeater or the bridges routinely gets close to 300mbps down (I should note that devices connected to LAN ports of the AC3200 get well above our ISP reported package speed, i.e., upwards of 350mbps.

I used to run some of my downstairs media equipment (e.g., an HTPC) using Powerline, but it was too slow (admittedly, this was back in the early Powerline 1.0 days). Still, even with what I read about the reported PHY link layer and throughput of the Powerline AV2 products, I wouldn't expect to see much, if any improvement over what I see using the RT-AC66U's in Media Bridge and Repeater modes.

Interesting to see that you have hung another wireless device off the back of your RT-AC66U (in repeater mode). Isn't your AC66 Repeater also broadcasting on both the 2.4 and 5 ghz radios? If so, do you see any interference, noise or other adverse effects on clients connected to the Airport (from cross-channel contention or interference)?

BTW, you'll have to change your signature line now....

 

[L&LD]

I also learned that the antennas on the RT-AC66R are much stronger than the RT-AC3200 on the 5GHz.

How did you determine the RT-AC66R's antennae are 'much stronger' than the RT-AC3200's?

 

[Trebuin]

How did you determine the RT-AC66R's antennae are 'much stronger' than the RT-AC3200's?

Connected my laptop to the AC66R, checked the sig str from it...swapped the antenna (noticed the massive drop with it off, then back up with the other antenna), then checked the sig again. had to use some metal to make sure I was targeting the correct antenna. Eventually I swapped them all out and it helped the repeater config, but not the laptop connection. I can't remember the exact drop, but it was enough to say that the smaller antenna was stronger. When I swapped back, signal returned to the previous bench.

Someone back me up, but I'm guessing because the antenna are designed for certain bands better than others, they have different performance. Supplier difference could cause it too.

Edit:
I initially tested this before I put it into "mediabridge" as that does not transmit wifi to anything other than the main router. You can also swap the antenna and view the signal str using the either's wifi log. I did that as well and I'd like to say I saw about -8db difference off of -60db. Keep in mind that it is not linear so I can't tell you exactly how much difference, but it is enough to see the theoretical report off of ASUS drop from 700mbps to 5 hundred something...can't remember.

 

[L&LD]

Connected my laptop to the AC66R, checked the sig str from it...swapped the antenna (noticed the massive drop with it off, then back up with the other antenna), then checked the sig again. had to use some metal to make sure I was targeting the correct antenna. Eventually I swapped them all out and it helped the repeater config, but not the laptop connection. I can't remember the exact drop, but it was enough to say that the smaller antenna was stronger. When I swapped back, signal returned to the previous bench.

Someone back me up, but I'm guessing because the antenna are designed for certain bands better than others, they have different performance. Supplier difference could cause it too.

Thanks, but what I'm reading is better for one and worse (or at least same) for another?

The antennae are designed for a certain frequency, of course, but I think in your case, the overall interference pattern just matched your environment (for your repeater AP, at least).

Signal strength is not an indication of better throughput (the final goal), but it is interesting to think about.

I may have to try this if I have the chance too.