RT-AC87U Shuts down random times - Mostly at night

[Huntk420]

So I just bought a brand new RT-AC87U and have this strange issue. Firstly, I am using the most updated ASUS firmware (3.0.0.4.378_6117) for it and I use the LED button to turn the lights off. Almost all settings are default and both signals are being broadcast.

Normally in the middle of the night 1-5AM the router just completely stops working / wired and wireless. I will have noticed one of the LED had turned back on and it blinks every 5 seconds. I've noticed it has always been port 2 on the router that flashes and nothing is plugged into port 2. Today it has strangely stopped working in the middle of it being used by everyone.

I have contacted ASUS support and they were sadly the most unhelpful support I've experienced in a while. They just want me to mail it in and I do not have a replacement router anymore, so I am trying to avoid that at all costs.

I've attached the log since November 1st but you will notice a massive gap in it. The router has never been off more than maybe an hour or so when I was asleep. Another weird thing that will be noticed is somehow Dec 31 is in the middle of Nov logs.

SO.. my questions are, has anyone had this problem before? Could it be bad firmware installation or perhaps a bad hardware part which will require me to send it back to ASUS. I have read amazing things about Merlin firmware, could it possibly fix this issue? Does it void my warranty?

Any suggestions much appreciated.

 

[alarsen77]

Unfortunately the AC-87U is not the most reliable router. I had one and gave it a few weeks tried merlins firmware I just couldn't get it to be stable at all. I was still within my return policy at Best Buy so I exchanged it for the AC-3100 and so far that has been working well. I'd suggest if you can taking it back and picking up an AC-3100 from Best Buy. So far it has been a much better experience for me.


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[alarsen77]

Also 3.0.0.4.378.9313 is the most recent firmware available from asus


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[Huntk420]

Oh so I guess the built in firmware check is looking at a bad location/repository. Says I have the most recent version of the firmware. (Not surprised that's wrong though)

I almost bought an AC-3200 but felt it was a little overkill for my needs. I really don't want to return this AC-87U but if you say it is extremely unstable. It really saddens me that I should return it.

 

[Huntk420]

Should I truly give up on this router and try another?

 

[alarsen77]

I am not an expert, but there are many on these forums that will state the AC-87U was a giant failure. You can see if anyone else has any more suggestions but I honestly didn't haven't any luck. I couldn't find an AC-3200 in stores anywhere so I got the AC-3100


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[Huntk420]

Alrighty, thanks for the heads up. If no one has any ideas on the instability of this router, then I will move on since it sounds like you've had a way better experience with the AC-3100.

 

[alarsen77]

With my AC-87U the 5GHz band would be very unreliable. My iPhone and my gfs phone would disconnect and then take a minute or so to reconnect. Sometimes the 5GHz band would shut down completely and the router needed to be rebooted.

I've only had the AC-3100 for a day now but I've had no disconnects and the speeds have been even better than my AC-87U.


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[Huntk420]

Interesting... I do feel the 5GHz band may have been the culprit this whole time. Cause I have noticed when I woke up after the router shut down, my phone can still see the 2.4GHz band but cannot connect to it. Yet it's still being broadcast.

 

[alarsen77]

Yeah the AC-87U is using a quantenna 5GHz chip one of the first of the wave 2 AV chips and it has had many issues. The AC-3100 is using a Broadcom chip now and is even faster than the quantenna chip.


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[Huntk420]

Well the good news is, I moved over to the latest release of Merlin's firmware. So far I'm going on the 4th day and the router hasn't randomly shut off. If I go a couple more days I definitely need to donate for saving me the hassle of shipping to ASUS Repair.

 

[wfhmaster]

Mine crashes similarly. This last time I made it some 20 days before it went dead and needed to be unplugged to recover. I've had the same issue since I've owned it, using any firmware rev. I'm just using very basic settings, no thing special, 5G is disabled even.

 

[Huntk420]

Mine was exactly consistent though, literally every single night at 2-5 AM PST for 2 weeks straight. At the moment I am on the 4th day and after tonight will be 5. If I only have to restart this router every 20 days, I'd be in heaven. But every day was getting old fast...

 

[wfhmaster]

Mine was exactly consistent though, literally every single night at 2-5 AM PST for 2 weeks straight. At the moment I am on the 4th day and after tonight will be 5. If I only have to restart this router every 20 days, I'd be in heaven. But every day was getting old fast...

Yes, mine did that for a while too. My theory was that after about 20-some days it would crash once, then it would crash every day after that, which I had experienced. However, after updating the latest firmware I've only had one crash so far, but I have no doubt it will come back to daily. My solution was to set a reboot nightly, which worked most of the time. I can't wait to see if the 88U is clear of this issue, I will move to it immediately then! Totally annoying!

 

[octopus]

What happend after 20-21 days is : Forced refresh interval (in days) DDNS updates. I don't say thats is problem but its updates evrey 20-21-days.

 

[Optimize]

I found this thread through Google, I am experiencing the same issues.

* Routine nightly interruptions between 1-3am for the past 4 days, the router will refuse to load content on connected devices and disconnects the 5GHz band.
* While the 5GHz band goes down completely during these restarts, the 2.4GHz band usually remains visible
* Logs have entries from Dec 31st, in the midst of entries from December 13 and 14

I usually log in to the router from my phone and reboot it, but tonight I was unable to access the router, even from the 2.4GHz band. I received this error when trying to connect to the router tonight :

>Settings have been updated. Web page will now refresh.
>Changes have been made to the IP address or port number. You will now be disconnected from RT-AC87U.
>To access the settings of RT-AC87U, reconnect to the wireless network and use the updated IP address and port number.

I had not made any changes to the router, nor had I seen this error before. Ended up restarting the router manually by pulling the plug.

I have updated my firmware (Version3.0.0.4.378.9383).

Hope I'm not breaking any rules by bumping this thread.

 

[wfhmaster]

Sounds similar to the issues the rest of us are having. I'm surprised ASUS has not fixed this major issue yet.