RT-AC56u USB speeds..help!

[uareatowel]

I have an rt-AC56u and I seem to get terrible usb speeds.
Not an advanced user (relatively lol) but ive tried stock, dd-wrt, latest merlin and latest merlin beta 3, ive tried disabling usb interference under wireless->professional, helps but still poor

-western digital passport 1TB on usb 3.0 (write: around 12-12.5MB/s, Read: 1.5-4MB/s)
-WD green drive 2Tb in nexstar enclosure on usb 2.0 formatted with ext4(switched to ext4 trying to improve performance)
(write is about the same and read is around 5MB/s)
-write speed always beats read speed... Is this typical? strange? in my mind i always thought read would be faster than write, but thats why Im asking the pros!

-on wireless for now (cat6 cable ordered and on the way to test if the problem is wireless) (wumc710, on latest linksys firmware)
-tried wireless to another laptop and it was poor, and a WDTV live occasionally buffers with 1080p streams. I usually use explorer to transfer files, ive tried other programs without a huge increase, FTP seems to be faster (havent tried again since dd-wrt), but I should be able to get decent speeds through windows share (called samba?smb? sorry new to this)

so its reasonable to assume the router is underperforming... I mean those number are wiggity whack right? It kills me when I read reviews of the unit and it praises it NAS like usb....
also, i have 60 megabit (7MB/s or so) internet where i get full line speed on the wireless most of the time, so some of my read speeds off usb are a good amount slower than my ISP, so it doesnt seem like a wireless quality problem

Any idea what I should expect out of the unit on wireless usb access? cat6 when it arrives? . Any help is appreciated.
currently on 376.44_beta3 (Merlin build), but im willing to try anything that works

thanks

 

[theveterans]

Are you using 802.11ac on your laptop? The speeds that you mentioned are typical of 802.11n. If that's the case, it should be no surprise that that's about the max you can get out of N (2 streams). Purchase Intel 7260 then try again. That should give you 45 - 55 MB/s speed.

 

[uareatowel]

I dont plan on updating the laptop, just an internet deal.Just wanted to include that N didnt outperform AC
The desktop with the WUMC710 is where i need better speeds. I see what your saying tho, still possible its just the wireless connection

 

[theveterans]

I dont plan on updating the laptop, just an internet deal.Just wanted to include that N didnt outperform AC
The desktop with the WUMC710 is where i need better speeds. I see what your saying tho, still possible its just the wireless connection

You can only conclude when you have the cat6 cable test. Still weird though to have high write speeds than read and WUMC710 should be able to at least pull off 50 MB/s max and about 40 - 45 MB/s average read speed.

Try disabling "reducing USB 3.0 interference" and see if read and write speeds improve to at least 30 MB/s

 

[uareatowel]

tried that before posting,slight performance boost. Nothing near 30MB/s

 

[theveterans]

Did you test from the line of sight and on the same room as the router?

 

[bmn1]

I have the ac56u and a usb2 HDD. I get about 25 MB/s read/write. Don't remember exact numbers but it's in the 20s.

Definitely something with your setup.

I'm using the latest stock Asus firmware.

 

[radeon7750]

I'm also using the AC56U with the latest stock asus firmware 3.0.0.4.374.5656.
I connected a WD 1TB Elements hdd to the USB 3.0 port and through LAN I usually get 27 -30 MB/s read/write, while through WIFI 150mbps N on my laptop I get 10 -11 MB/s, if I'm close to the router.

If i disable "reduce USB 3.0 interference" -using Samba share - I reach 50MB/s read speeds from the WD 1TB HDD through LAN (haven t tested write speeds yet) but this change somehow affects my 2.4 GHZ internet wifi to the point of making it almost usless, internet speedtest then shows just 5Mbps speeds and I have a real fiberlink 200Mbps connection. So it's a huge disadvantage for me .

I decided to use the default settings , even if the USB 3.0 only works in usb 2.0 mode from what I can see (27-30 MB/s).

Any other users having the same issue? I haven't tried Merlin's firmware yet. Does it sort out the USB 3.0 speeds?
And one more question, does Merlin's firmware allow us to see CPU and RAM usage on the AC56U ?

 

[uareatowel]

yupp, you get the CPU and Ram usage on the main page with merlin.
crap, not sure why i would be getting such slow speeds...
anyone heard of defective units that would cause this?

 

[uareatowel]

so when i tried a laptop on an ethernet cable (cat5 i think) i got speeds in the 20s for both read and write on both usb 3 and usb 2, should these numbers not match?? much better than before and now i can work, but still sucks that i have an "AC" router that cant output any local networking wirelessly, ill look into my wireless adaptor, other than my phone (galaxy s4) (any android apps to test local network speeds?)

 

[radeon7750]

so when i tried a laptop on an ethernet cable (cat5 i think) i got speeds in the 20s for both read and write on both usb 3 and usb 2, should these numbers not match??

disable "reduce USB 3.0 interference", reboot router and test speed again. It worked for me, but had negative wifi 2,4 ghz effects, as I've pointed out above. Give it a shot and tell me the results.

 

[radeon7750]

WOW, wi-fi speed varies like crazy throughout channels

I've tried different channels today only to discover that speed varies greatly among them . The test was done using my laptop, about 10 meters away from the router, and 2 brick walls separating me and the AC56U.

For example, this is what I got using #13


And then using #7



Not to mention that using #7 my connection went to 4 bars from 2

Speed varies like crazy when I switch from one channel to the next one. Some channels work at slow speeds even if there aren't any other routers using them in my neighborhood.

PS: using latest stock asus firmware 3.0.0.4.374.5656

 

[radeon7750]

It gets even better with 40Hz option enabled




L.E.
now I hooked up a TP LINK USB 300mbps wifi dongle to my laptop and run the test, this time 2 ft away from router.

 

[uareatowel]

tried everything said from the posts thanks all.
no solution tho, seems that whenever wirelessly accessing the router my read speeds are just terrible, really frusterating. cant seem to crack it

 

[radeon7750]

I ve just copied to my laptop from samba share a 780 MB file through wifi N (72 mbps link speed, router is set at only 20Hz )
This is what I got :