Smart Band Steering

[jtp10181]

which should prevent the problem of devices on the 2.4 GHz band being unable to connect to those on the 5 GHz band

That should never be a problem even with a different SSID for each band. Separate SSIDs does not segregate the LAN unless you use a guest network with the segregation enabled.
Using the same SSID/password for both bands without the Smart Connect feature still allows the client to chose to connect to either band. Usually once they connect to one they wont change but if there is a blip in the 5Ghz the client may reconnect on the 2.4Ghz.

Personally, I use the Smart Connect for my main SSID for regular devices so they can roam and connect to which ever band gets the best service. I have a hidden SSID for IoT stuff (guest 2, not segregated)) that is 2.4Ghz only. Then recently I had a few devices which do not move often that I wanted to force to the 5Ghz so I setup Guest 2 (again not segregated) on 5Ghz so I could connect them to that SSID and keep them on 5Ghz always. All devices between the 3 SSIDs have no problem connecting to each other.

I do also have a guest SSID setup on Guest 1, segregated (for actual guests), and those devices cannot connect to the rest of the LAN as expected.

This setup works well for me.

 

[Interfreak]

I have smart connect turned off, but my SSID's are both the same. Appears to be no issue in my devices shifting between frequencies depending on how weak/strong the signal is.

 

[TheLyppardMan]

That should never be a problem even with a different SSID for each band. Separate SSIDs does not segregate the LAN unless you use a guest network with the segregation enabled.
Using the same SSID/password for both bands without the Smart Connect feature still allows the client to chose to connect to either band. Usually once they connect to one they wont change but if there is a blip in the 5Ghz the client may reconnect on the 2.4Ghz.

Personally, I use the Smart Connect for my main SSID for regular devices so they can roam and connect to which ever band gets the best service. I have a hidden SSID for IoT stuff (guest 2, not segregated)) that is 2.4Ghz only. Then recently I had a few devices which do not move often that I wanted to force to the 5Ghz so I setup Guest 2 (again not segregated) on 5Ghz so I could connect them to that SSID and keep them on 5Ghz always. All devices between the 3 SSIDs have no problem connecting to each other.

I do also have a guest SSID setup on Guest 1, segregated (for actual guests), and those devices cannot connect to the rest of the LAN as expected.

This setup works well for me.

Does the MAC Filter not work then either and keep devices from connecting to the 2.4 GHz band? If it doesn't work, why does ASUS have this feature at all? If it doesn't work, then I'll have to try the other option and change the password for the 2.4 GHz band.

 

[TheLyppardMan]

I've just changed the password on the 2.4 GHz band, so now only the devices that are only able to connect to 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi can do so. All other devices face the obstacle of a different password, plus the MAC Filter if they try to connect, so that shouldn't happen.

In actual fact, apart from devices that can only connect to the 2.4 GHz band (3 in my case), I can't see the point of allowing anything else to connect to it. It doesn't seem to have any better range that the 5 GHz and all it does is dramatically slow down transfer of data, as per my earlier post.

 

[jtp10181]

Does the MAC Filter not work then either and keep devices from connecting to the 2.4 GHz band?

That might work, I never thought to try that. Depending on the device though, if you start to get out of range on the 5Ghz it may try to hop over to the 2.4Ghz and then get denied. May cause a temporarily blip in the connection.

I've just changed the password on the 2.4 GHz band, so now only the devices that are only able to connect to 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi can do so. All other devices face the obstacle of a different password, plus the MAC Filter if they try to connect, so that shouldn't happen.

Probably not a great idea if they share the same SSID. Devices typically only have a password tied to the SSID and if they see both bands they assume they both have the same password. So if your 5Ghz devices for some reason decide they want to hop over to the 2.4Ghz it will get rejected and then not sure what they will do after that, possibly reconnect to the 5Ghz. This could cause a temporary blip in the connection.

 

[SkippyP]

I've just changed the password on the 2.4 GHz band, so now only the devices that are only able to connect to 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi can do so. All other devices face the obstacle of a different password, plus the MAC Filter if they try to connect, so that shouldn't happen.

Perhaps I missed it (apologies if I did), but why not just use two different SSIDs for 2.4 and 5? Then, for the devices that should only connect to 2.4, connect them to the 2.4 SSID (and “forget” the 5GHz network if still connected); and for the devices that should only connect to 5, connect them to the 5GHz SSID and “forget” the 2.4 SSID if still connected. Also, DISABLE Smart Connect, WiFi Agile Multiband, and Roaming Assistant. By doing that, you will essentially isolate each band and your devices will remain connected to their respective network with zero chance of jumping over to the other one. As I’ve stated before, I’ve been running my WiFi environment like this for years and everything has been rock solid.

 

[TheLyppardMan]

Perhaps I missed it (apologies if I did), but why not just use two different SSIDs for 2.4 and 5? Then, for the devices that should only connect to 2.4, connect them to the 2.4 SSID (and “forget” the 5GHz network if still connected); and for the devices that should only connect to 5, connect them to the 5GHz SSID and “forget” the 2.4 SSID if still connected. Also, DISABLE Smart Connect, WiFi Agile Multiband, and Roaming Assistant. By doing that, you will essentially isolate each band and your devices will remain connected to their respective network with zero chance of jumping over to the other one. As I’ve stated before, I’ve been running my WiFi environment like this for years and everything has been rock solid.

If I have different SSID's then I get intermittent problems with devices on the 2.4 GHz band trying to talk to those on the 5 GHz band. This particularly affects my Canon Powershot camera if I want to print something or if I want to transfer images from the camera to my NAS. Having SSID's with the same name seems to have eliminated this problem.

 

[TheLyppardMan]

I tried an experiment this morning. I turned off the MAC filter, that I'd set up to only allow the three devices that cannot connect to the 5 GHz band to connect to the 2.4 GHz band instead. That resulted in my wall-mounted Android tablet (used to monitor the live feed from my external camera) dropping off the Wi-Fi altogether (it's a very sensitive device in that respect). So I have a theory that it was trying to connect to the 2.4 GHz band and when it couldn't do that (because the SSID's passwords are different), it just remained unconnected. I have since re-enabled the MAC filter for the 2.4 GHz band and it seems to be working OK again now. The MAC filter for the 5 GHz band is set to "reject", to bar anything that I don't want connecting to my main networks (it currently only has one device specified, which has to use the Guest Network created for IoT devices).

 

[jtp10181]

Probably not a great idea if they share the same SSID. Devices typically only have a password tied to the SSID and if they see both bands they assume they both have the same password. So if your 5Ghz devices for some reason decide they want to hop over to the 2.4Ghz it will get rejected and then not sure what they will do

You found out what they will do, give up and go offline.

IMO you are making this more complicated than it needs to be, and adding in extra failure points. This could be done easily with separate SSID's, without needing mac filtering. It will not cause the devices to be segregated unless you turn that setting on. But whatever makes you happy I guess.

 

[Volt]

I would like to add my two cents to the discussion based on my experience using both Broadcom and MediaTek routers. If you reset the settings, the routers have very different settings by default. For example, Broadcom routers (using the RT-AX82U as an example) have WiFi Agile Multiband disabled and a "Network Tools - Smart Connect Rule" tab, while MediaTek routers (using the RT-AX59U as an example) have WiFi Agile Multiband enabled by default for both bands and no "Network Tools - Smart Connect Rule" tab at all.

It seems that the traditional Smart Connect is a more outdated solution for band steering than the later WiFi Agile Multiband, which should also be supported by clients, although, apparently, there are enough such clients (for example, the old Galaxy S10 already supported this technology).

As a result, it turns out that band steering can be enabled by the following combinations of parameters:

• Disabling WiFi Agile Multiband, enabling Smart Connect (on Broadcom and MediaTek) and configuring Smart Connect rules (on Broadcom).
• Disabling both Smart Connect and WiFi Agile Multiband (on both Broadcom and MediaTek), and creating two identical SSIDs.
• Enabling WiFi Agile Multiband and disabling Smart Connect, and creating two identical SSIDs.
• Enabling both WiFi Agile Multiband and Smart Connect. Since there is no "Network Tools - Smart Connect Rule" tab on RT-AX59U, it may seem that this is equivalent to enabling WiFi Agile Multiband and simply using two identical SSIDs, but the WiFi analyzer shows more supported 802.11 standards for RT-AX59U in the second case, that is, Smart Connect still has some additional effect on RT-AX59U.

In short, when setting up band steering, I advise you to try all these combinations of settings. For example, from my own experience, I can say that on RT-AX59U, enabling WiFi Agile Multiband and Smart Connect gives a very good result, all phones and laptops choose the optimal frequency quite well, the only problem is S21FE, which often gets stuck on 2.4 GHz and does not want to switch to 5 GHz, although at the same time S22 works perfectly.

 

[Tech9]

Even though I don't recommend Smart Connect, I appreciate the time people spend in testing different scenarios and reporting the results.