RT-AC88U

[Wiredless]

^^ yep, on my 3rd 88 now because the 5G radio sh*t the bed on the others. Insanely high failure rate.

 

[galen2]

2 days with my new AC88U, just installed merlin firmware on first boot and all its ok, 5G wifi still here.

Only one thing, my cpu temp is 89-91ºC all time, i have to worry about?

 

[AlexHK]

^^ yep, on my 3rd 88 now because the 5G radio sh*t the bed on the others. Insanely high failure rate.

I received a brand new unit last Tuesday when I initially posted (my first 88U was less than 2 days old when the 5Ghz radio died).

5 days later and this second RT-AC88U just died on me completely!!

All was working fine till around 1h ago. The only LEDs on were POWER and WAN, while WAN was neither white nor red but somehow pink (in between red and white - except if I really would unplug the WAN cable to the modem, then it would turn RED). No other LED on, wireless radio's off and not available via Ethernet. A couple of reboots later, checking modem, etc - nothing. Took out the original N66U, plugged it in, all was good.

I will of course try to reset it (but for what reason I am asking myself), and probably head to the service center again. But I am really disappointed. I am stuck with this RT-AC88U now, since there is no money back at my location. But I also won't be using it, no matter I get a 3rd new one or not...

Words fail me. I should have gone with the AC68U. My two N66U worked for years without any problems and I would have saved a bit of money :/

 

[Wiredless]

^^ Pretty infuriating isn't it?
Exactly what happened with me. 2nd one just completely up n died altogether.
3rd one has a mostly working 5G radio but it blinks of a couple times a week and comes back on hours / day later.

 

[AlexHK]

I almost convinced the guy in the shop to give me another router model instead (probably AC68U plus balance cash I'd take memory or USB drives or something else from the shop) - but it didn't work out since I already threw away the inner cardboard of the original box :/

So, only option is to get another new AC88U from the ASUS distributor tomorrow, I was at the shop after the distributors tech support closing time. Not happy about all this. All I want is a stable AC router, and this completely changed my trust in Asus routers. Honestly, I don't know which model would be close to the AC88U (performance wise) but proven stable!?

I had local tech support on the phone today (they are the ones who test/replace), and they confirmed that they see a lot of problems with AC88U. The tech mentioned the 5Ghz problems, but also both radios dying just after a while etc.

 

[SoCalReviews]

Hopefully they will fix those issues with the 88u's because my experience with the Asus brand routers has been really positive so far. All my RT-N66Us that were purchased over five years ago are still running. With the exception of a few buggy firmware releases all five of the RT-AC68P routers and the one RT-AC1900P router I use have been working almost flawlessly since I purchased them.

 

[knobbage]

I have just purchased an RT-AC88U and it worked out of the box and the next day the 5GHz wireless stopped working.
Looking at the settings it has channel 0 as the only option. The firmware updated as part of the setup process but from reading the blog I can see this is a common fault with this router
Reset to system defaults but still no joy, 2 Ghz wireless had a good signal strength but was slow.

Have emailed ASUS Tech Support with no reply.

 

[AlexHK]

I just left the ASUS distributors service center. The only other guy there also had a (surprise surprise) broken RT-AC88U.

They gave him a smaller rental and told him at some time "in July" he'll get a new RT-AC88U with a "new chipset". If that means they fix the HW problem or have some new chips I don't know. If it's fixed hardware I'd certainly be pi**ed as original AC88U owner left with the buggy HW no mather if it works.

I was in luck, because I will be move to another country early July and they don't know when the new HW will be ready, so they gave me a refund instead. This ends my AC88U woes and means I am now spending my money on something else such as the AC68U or AC87U.

 

[WiredAcorn]

I got the AC-3100 after having some major disconnecting issues with a new Linksys EA9400 AC5000 router. Before that I had a Netgear Nighthawk R7000 - which was fabulous.

After following some of the setting posted earlier (i.e. turning off universal bead forming and the like), the router performance and stability was amazing. However, every once in a while it disconnects some devices and gets very hot. I am pretty confident my Nighthawk had slowly died due to heat.

So my question is, how do you guys cool your RT-88Us/AC-3100s? Or do your models stay cool?

 

[JemTheWire]

I got the AC-3100 after having some major disconnecting issues with a new Linksys EA9400 AC5000 router. Before that I had a Netgear Nighthawk R7000 - which was fabulous.

After following some of the setting posted earlier (i.e. turning off universal bead forming and the like), the router performance and stability was amazing. However, every once in a while it disconnects some devices and gets very hot. I am pretty confident my Nighthawk had slowly died due to heat.

So my question is, how do you guys cool your RT-88Us/AC-3100s? Or do your models stay cool?

I sit my 88U on a modified laptop cooler. The original fans were small and ran fast and noisy so I replaced them with a couple off larger fans I had spare. They are 12volt fans but I power them from a 7.5volt PSU so they are turning at slow speed. Because of there size they still move a lot of air.
Maximum temperature CPU had reached is 66C. However, that is completely dependent on the ambient temperature as I don't have AirCon.

 

[Pierino]

I have a USB powered fan blowing air on the top of mine and the CPU temp stays at 50.

 

[avtella]

Linksys switched from the 4366B1 on the EA9500 to 4366C0 and so did Netgear for the R8500 with newer "MP2" units. The R8500 had similar 5Ghz complaints of failure. I believe newer AC88Us also have the C0 chip. So that change maybe the fix, unless it's something else.

 

[ChronoBodi]

i was wondering if anyone gets this issue where the media bridge RTAC3100 just doesn't feed the signal to my PC, but this happens rarely, like every 2 weeks, i just reboot it in config page.

Also, interesting to note that my main router AC3100 is an older, 2015 era revision, no issues here.

obligatory ghetto fan pic.

 

[AlexHK]

What are the disadvantages of running a beast like the AC88U without the fan, only with stock cooling? I mean what does really happen if it gets hot? And at what temp should we start being concerned?

From memory, my AC88U (that's now gone) stayed at around 80C or 90C, which was indeed a little surprise but I live in a hot environment and have it sitting close to a window that gets a lot of sun (behind the curtain). My N66U is usually below 50C at the same spot.

 

[avtella]

90C is a bit excessive. You could have gotten a cheap laptop fan/dual fan for $10 or so, if not less.

 

[ktzlocksmith]

3.0.0.4.380_7378-g7a25649
rtn66u

this firmware.
now i cannot see my client list and have a flashing exclamation point. My WAN IP is not my external IP

any fix for the client list known?

or is there an easier way to just roll back my firmware to the version thats been working fine for 5+ years

 

[RMerlin]

3.0.0.4.380_7378-g7a25649
rtn66u

this firmware.
now i cannot see my client list and have a flashing exclamation point. My WAN IP is not my external IP

any fix for the client list known?

or is there an easier way to just roll back my firmware to the version thats been working fine for 5+ years

I wouldn't consider a firmware version with 5 years worth of known security issues "fine"... In fact, it's trivial for anyone to get root access with such old versions.

Sent from my P027 using Tapatalk

 

[ktzlocksmith]

I wouldn't consider a firmware version with 5 years worth of known security issues "fine"... In fact, it's trivial for anyone to get root access with such old versions.

Sent from my P027 using Tapatalk

Up until this version i have not had this issue.

 

[maxbraketorque]

The problem is apparently in the chip itself. A newer hardware version will be required to fix it.

Apparently, newer revisions of the RT-AC88U use the fixed chip, but no one actually tested it to confirm whether it did fix it or not.

Is there an associated HW revision number with this chipset?

 

[WiredAcorn]

Thanks guys, I had bought a cheap laptop cooler and it works wonders.

However, in the past few days (a week after I got the cooler, so it isn't interfering as it was fine for a week) my wifi speeds have come to a crawl or simply disconnect from some devices. The only way to reconnect is a hard reset. It's interesting as my iPhone and iPad would disconnect so I would try to put my password in and it wouldn't accept it.

Could this be a hardware failure? I have smart connect on and it was working fine earlier. I know my phone, tablets, Xbox all run on the 5GHz channel