RT-AC68U in media bridge mode disables 2.4 GHz radio

[bROTHER]

Hi,

I just thought that the beauty of having two radios was to bridge with one and use the other to serve clientes in the new covered area. Seems that ASUS thinks otherway...

Why in my second AC68U as MB (Media Bridge) the link is done with 802.11.ac at 5 GHz and then it disables 2.4 GHz?

They're both running latest rmerlin FW.

BTW, just getting 702 Mbps link between them (theorical number shown by the router's GUI) from one floor apart. Peaks at 1170 and 805 Mbps.

Regards.

 

[KGB7]

That's how media bridge works thanks to Asus.

 

[bROTHER]

Maybe this could be "fixed" in Merlin's FW's?
I would like to know what does he feels about this; maybe there's some kind of limitation or unknown reason to us for this behaviour.

To be honest, Asus support warned me of this functioning before purchasing this second unit, but they also told me that MB can be only done with two identical routers, which turned out not to be true as I already checked.
Asus support always on they're own disappinting style...

Regards.

 

[KGB7]

Use Repeater Mode.

 

[bROTHER]

Yep, but repeater wastes half bw. I don't need two radios for that
Nonetheless, I already had in mind testing both settings.
Right now I achieved an stable 866.5 Mbps link.

Regards

 

[KGB7]

Wastes bandwidth on what?

 

[roldogg]

DD-WRT will allow you to set it up that way.

Sent from my SM-T800 using Tapatalk

 

[roldogg]

Any repeater wastes half your bandwidth because it's connected to the primary router through its wireless connection instead of being hard wired in.

Sent from my SM-T800 using Tapatalk

 

[DaveMishSr]

Any repeater wastes half your bandwidth because it's connected to the primary router through its wireless connection instead of being hard wired in.

Sent from my SM-T800 using Tapatalk

That is true with WDS. However, unless you use other APs to extend the wireless signal then set the router to hybrid (at Wireless/WDS) and you can use AC media bridges without the throughput being cut in half for each additional router in your network topology. If you place the bridge and router properly you should be able to provide Internet and LAN access where you need it via wired Ethernet.

Have you looked at the products over at Amped Wireless? They have repeaters that do not simply rebroadcast the AP/Router's SSID, but rather they connect to the router's SSID(s) and then broadcast a signal(s) with a unique SSID. That way you do not suffer from the 50% loss in throughput as is the case with WDS. I will warn you though, their top of the line products are pricey but do work marvelously (or at least they did for me).

 

[bROTHER]

Have you looked at the products over at Amped Wireless? They have repeaters that do not simply rebroadcast the AP/Router's SSID, but rather they connect to the router's SSID(s) and then broadcast a signal(s) with a unique SSID. That way you do not suffer from the 50% loss in throughput as is the case with WDS. I will warn you though, their top of the line products are pricey but do work marvelously (or at least they did for me).

Interesting feature... nonetheless it would be a "non sequitur" purchasing a repeater after spending so much money in two AC68U units, which were "top of the top" for the mass market until recently.

Also, spent so much time and effort configuring these Merlin FW's that the idea of switching to another "FW provider" feels discouraging at least.

BTW, I found something odd with this MB implementation; while I was securing the link via MAC filtering I discovered that is mandatory not only to authorise ethernet MAC's connected to the bridge unit in the 5GHz wifi filtering section of the router unit, but also the 2.4 GHz interface of the bridge itself.

It seems that the 2.4 GHz interface has some role in the link in MB mode, although then it's disabled as shown in the log. Maybe this interface is not available because is actively linking with the router in the handshake time window?
And if not, why not? I mean, link simultaneously with two radios and if no 2.4GHz clients are to be served by the router unit, then use all its BW to enhance the link and use that glorious QAM encoding at last!

I gues there is some room for improvement here, isn't it?

Regards.

 

[nagle3092]

You might want to look into repeater mode, I found bridge mode to be broken on the AC68U with the last couple firmware updates (cant find one that its NOT broken in actually). I have my media server on the bridge end and regularly move movie rips across my wireless network to it. In bridge mode it will sometimes hit 80 mbps at the peak of the transfer but it will regularly drop connectivity a couple times during a move. Even remoting into the media server proves difficult, as the connection will drop randomly multiple times throughout the connection. Steam in home streaming was impossible.

Since changing it to repeater though all those issues have stopped. The max transfer speed is lower at around 50-60mbps (depends if anything else is going through that connection) but its pretty solid and doesn't deviate far from it. Remoting issues are gone, as well as steam in home streaming works great.

BTW the 68 would show a link rate of 1300mbps to the parent ap (87) in each mode. Also repeater will give you access to the 2.4ghz band if you want, just don't connect anything to the 5ghz ssid you have to create and you should be fine.

TLDR: Stay away from bridge mode until Asus fixes it, its badly broken (on 68 anyways). Or use repeater mode or just flash dd-wrt on it and call it good.

Edit: I've attached some snips, the first 2 are in bridge mode, the red lines represent parts during the transfer that the system on the other side of the bridge would become unresponsive (rdp windowed showing the transfer and local browser window showing 68 cpu usage). The second shows the transfer in repeater mode, note there are 3 dips but the system remained responsive the entire time during the dips in speed. It did

I dont remember having there issues when I was using a 56U as a bridge but I gave that to my parents when I got the 87 and moved the 68 to bridge duties. It would be nice to get even half of the true bandwidth for the rated link rate though.

Edit 2: I decided to try out dd-wrt on the 68u set up as a client bridge, a little better than the 68u as a repeater, way better than the Asus version of a "media bridge". This test was done right after setting it up. No tweaks really. Though anything that can maintain a solid connection while transferring a file is always good.

Adding another image of dd-wrt after some tweaks.

FYI the file I was transferring in all of these results was a 8.59GB movie.

 

[ualdrivr]

That is true with WDS. However, unless you use other APs to extend the wireless signal then set the router to hybrid (at Wireless/WDS) and you can use AC media bridges without the throughput being cut in half for each additional router in your network topology. If you place the bridge and router properly you should be able to provide Internet and LAN access where you need it via wired Ethernet.

Have you looked at the products over at Amped Wireless? They have repeaters that do not simply rebroadcast the AP/Router's SSID, but rather they connect to the router's SSID(s) and then broadcast a signal(s) with a unique SSID. That way you do not suffer from the 50% loss in throughput as is the case with WDS. I will warn you though, their top of the line products are pricey but do work marvelously (or at least they did for me).

Interested in the Amped Wireless product.. $172 at Newegg. That separate SSID though, how does it work with the clients. It sounds like a whole separate network piggybacking on the original Network? Is that a correct assessment? You have to sign all your clients to it, like it's another Network and how does the client know which Network to be on? Is it a seamless process?
Thanks.

 

[bROTHER]

80 mbps

Hi, thank you for your input and your snips.
¿You mean Mbps or MBps?

I'm also wireless bridging to move HD content from one PC to another, that's why the interest on getting maximun speed, to avoid endless transfer times. Copying 40 GB iso's through air is some business...

In my case, on MB mode (not tested repeater yet) connection is completely stable (linked at 866.5 Mbps) and get about real averages of 86 - 165 Mbps (11 - 21 MBps) depending on the direction of the transfer. I measured this with Lan Speed Test.

Hope to find some time to test repeater mode and see how much speed decreases.

Regards.

 

[nagle3092]

Hi, thank you for your input and your snips.
¿You mean Mbps or MBps?

I'm also wireless bridging to move HD content from one PC to another, that's why the interest on getting maximun speed, to avoid endless transfer times. Copying 40 GB iso's through air is some business...

In my case, on MB mode (not tested repeater yet) connection is completely stable (linked at 866.5 Mbps) and get about real averages of 86 - 165 Mbps (11 - 21 MBps) depending on the direction of the transfer. I measured this with Lan Speed Test.

Hope to find some time to test repeater mode and see how much speed decreases.

Regards.

Sorry about that. 80MBps (reported by windows during the transfer) , that would be a rare occurrence though when it would hit that. It would NEVER sustain that speed. I have found media bridge to just be unreliable on the 68, never had any issues on the 56 that I noticed. Maybe I wasn't paying as much attention to it though.

What results does the os give you when you are transferring a file?

Repeater mode is incredibly more stable than media bridge mode though for me. I have tried a bunch of different firmwares, those results are from Merlins latest release. I sent a pm to Gary Key about this issue, no response yet but maybe it will get fixed eventually. Still, for now I think the best bet would be to either go repeater, or dd-wrt for your bridging needs.

 

[bROTHER]

What results does the os give you when you are transferring a file?

Hi,

On 1 GB dumb file, averages of 14.2 MBps when copying to remote PC, 22 MBps when copying from remote PC.

I guess this measure is afected by disk caching.
Even when I turn P2P on speed is barely the same due to my QoS settings.

Regards.

 

[bROTHER]

Hi,

Today I noticed that the Media Bridge was broadcasting a 2.4 GHz SSID. I updated to FW 376.47 a few days ago. This is new.

Couldn't connect to this SSID because it does not serves DHCP and did have not the time yet to test a static IP.

So, I went to turn it off (through its hidden menus) until I got time to investigate into this any further, and as soon as I turned off the 2.4 GHz radio on the Media Bridge the link broke down.

For the link to be up it is required the 2.4 GHz to be turned on!! I former noticed this when I needed to allow MAC address for the 2.4 GHz interface.

So,

1. Why does the 2.4 GHz radio broadcasts now?
2. How can I disable SSID broadcasting without turning off the radio? (disable it, not hide it)

Regards.

 

[Adamm]

Hi,

Today I noticed that the Media Bridge was broadcasting a 2.4 GHz SSID. I updated to FW 376.47 a few days ago. This is new.

Couldn't connect to this SSID because it does not serves DHCP and did have not the time yet to test a static IP.

So, I went to turn it off (through its hidden menus) until I got time to investigate into this any further, and as soon as I turned off the 2.4 GHz radio on the Media Bridge the link broke down.

For the link to be up it is required the 2.4 GHz to be turned on!! I former noticed this when I needed to allow MAC address for the 2.4 GHz interface.

So,

1. Why does the 2.4 GHz radio broadcasts now?
2. How can I disable SSID broadcasting without turning off the radio? (disable it, not hide it)

Regards.

Its a bug that merlin and I assume Asus are aware of.

 

[bROTHER]

Ok, thank you. I'll wait for next release to fix it.

Regards.

 

[jjulez]

Have the same issues with two RT-AC66U..media bridge..don't
want to deal with dd-wrt again i love the asus interface but they
pushing me toward dd-wrt