RT-AC66U Poor Wifi range. 5GHz is 15 dBm lower

[markworsnop]

I am replacing an older WiFi box hoping to get something wonderful out of this new Asus router.

The unit is central to the downstairs of the house. Max distance is 100 feet from the unit and 2 walls.

At about 40 ft away a one wall I am maintaining -70 dBm on the 5GHz and -55 dBm on the 2.4 GHz.

First of all why is the 5 not as good as the 2.4. I would expect it to be a little low but this is crazy. If I sit with it in sight both at perfect. But if I do that I might as well plug in with a cable!

The problem is the devices (phone, laptop etc) are switching to the 2.4 Wifi because the signal is better.

Is this normal for this router? Is there anything I can change?

 

[PrivateJoker]

If you search the threads for "AC66" you'll find a ton of discussion in the last week or two re various firmwares and the 5ghz band performance.

That said, two transmitters with same power and same gain antenna, 5ghz will naturally attenuate much quicker than 2.4ghz. I use it only for shorter hops in my own setup, but everyone has different results and totally different RF environments.

 

[Igb]

As PrivateJoker said, this is normal, 5ghz band is much more penalized by obstacles than 2.4 band is. But usually, is much less crowded aswell.

But this is a common mistake, with 5ghz you do NOT get better performance (unless you switch to 5ghz AND use AC clients that can't get that speeds on the other band), most people see small improvements because of the 2.4 being absolutelly saturated in town areas.

In my home i have a pair of RT-AC66U, on a quite long distance (about 10m, with obstacles all the way) linked on the 5ghz band, and i am getting about 250-300 mbps on iperf, very happy with the results (It's hard to install cable in my case, and PLC performance was far worse), but I observed the same you are stating, my phone and other clients usually get, when far from the routers, better stability (not speed) on the 2.4ghz band, so they connect to it. But if the 5ghz band is strong enough they switch to it, they only choose the better band in every moment, It's the way it should be.

On other point, do not just check attenuation, try to measure REAL speeds. They might be lower aswell, but I bet they will be quite similar, or better.

Best Regards