Speed diff for OpenVPN on RT-AC68U and RT-AC86U?

[BosseSwede]

The new router's firmware as it has just been unpacked is:
Firmware Version: 3.0.0.4.384_81992

The new router is not yet attached to the Internet so I cannot fix the firmware on that.

The existing home LAN RT-AC86U router firmware is:
Firmware Version: 3.0.0.4.384_32799
Edit: Note that the remote RT-AC68U is using the same f/w version!

On the home router (same model) I have tested many times by clicking on the firmware version itself to get to the "Firmware Update" page where I click "Check".
But it always fails to connect for some reason, so I thought it had the latest firmware already:
After I have clicked "Check" and waited then it shows this:

So it says that it is not connected to the Internet while at the same time I am using it to connect to this forum posting this message....
How can the router be forced to update its firmware?

Why are you running such old firmware?

Update the firmware, fully reset the router and then minimally and manually configure it.

Then it will be worth the small excursion to put it into play. If the remote location has similarly fast (or faster) ISP speeds as your home location does.

See above! The active home router cannot find a new firmware when I use the Check button....
Not much I can do about that then...

And the remote site is supposed to have the same 250/250 Mbit/s speed, but in fact only download shows this while the upload varies in major ways over time, here is a graph showing the hourly reported Down-/Upload speeds since Feb 28:

I have opened a ticket with the ISP regarding the speed problem, but they will do nothing until I supply measurements done with the PC directly connected to the fiber box so no other equipment is involved.
This is a problem because I cannot do that until I travel to the site and when I do this I need to have fixed the new router as well so I can exchange it while on site...

 

[BosseSwede]

I have found the new firmware for these routers on ASUS webpages:

RT-AC68U Version 3.0.0.4.386.46065

RT-AC86U Version 3.0.0.4.386.46092

If I upgrade manually now then the two connected routers will have different f/w, will that work out OK?
And can it be done remotely? (The two LAN:s are connected by VPN)
Since I am 100 km away I do not like to have a bricked system on the remote site...

EDIT:
I downloaded the f/w from ASUS and ran the upgrade (after checking MD5) on the newly bought RT-AC86U destined for the remote site but now sitting here.
The update itself went smoothly, I believe, but at the end the following was displayed:

This seems to mean that I have to operate on the hardware itself, or????
I can reconnect by WiFi and log in to the router, without having rebooted it through power cycling or similar and it now shows this at the top of the page:

To me that really implies it has been successfully upgraded. Why is there a need for a physical reboot?
Or is that on screen message bogus?

 

[RMerlin]

Why is there a need for a physical reboot?
Or is that on screen message bogus?

That message appears automatically if following the wait time your browser is unable to automatically redirect to the login page.

 

[L&LD]

You do not need to be connected to the internet (i.e. WAN does not need to be connected) to update the firmware (as a matter of fact, I suggest you don't when setting up a new router), perform a factory reset, and then properly set up the router (at least to basic levels).

If you depend on this OpenVPN connection to the remote site, don't update the firmware remotely. Besides, you should be doing a full reset and a minimal and manual configuration afterward anyways, going from 384.xx to 386.xx (and doing so without using a saved backup config file to configure the router once updated to the latest firmware).

Fully Reset / Best Practice Setup / More


(BTW, I always set up a new router wirelessly too (even when flashing the firmware), it is one of my tests of the RF hardware, and yes, for Asus routers, it is safe).

 

[BosseSwede]

(BTW, I always set up a new router wirelessly too (even when flashing the firmware), it is one of my tests of the RF hardware, and yes, for Asus routers, it is safe).

So in my case I started up the new RT-AC86U router without any Ethernet cable attached and connected via WiFi.
Then I modified the SSID to what I want to use and this disconnected my PC from the router so I had to connect again by WiFi.
Next I modified the base Ethernet network to get away from the 192.168.1.x default network. Again I lost connection and had to reconnect.

At this point is where the discussion above is valid.

Now I downloaded the most current f/w from ASUS and used the firmware update function to upload the firmware file (I had checked MD5 first of course) to the new router.
The router automatically went into the firmware update process and at the end it showed the message in the screenshot above about restarting the router.
But I did not do this, I just reconnected the WiFi, which had disconnected during the update.
And this seems to have worked fine without any manual restart.

NEXT
Managing the home LAN I use another RT-AC86U router with old f/w (older than what the newly bought router was delivered with).
I have full access to this router so I guess I can update its f/w too safely?
A difference to the new router is that this is fully configured with a lot of DHCP reservations, Port forwards, Custom routes etc (the home system is a server type system).
It is not using the VPN server function though, the remote router connects to my home Linux server OpenVPN service via port forwarding.
So what can go wrong if I update f/w to the latest starting at the level shown above?

Remote LAN
If I am able to update the home router too, then is the time for the remote LAN where I have an older RT-AC68U router:
I have downloaded its latest f/w too and I have access to the remote site via the OpenVPN connection using the remote router's VPN Client.
The versions of f/w for the two router types is not the same, the release date differs by a few weeks and the "build" number is different.

Since it connects by VPN I can access its admin page and in theory I can now upload its new f/w file...
What will happen then is that the VPN is disconnected while it is doing its update. So I lose connection altogether with that LAN until the router starts up again after the f/w update...
Note:
All units on the remote LAN are connected by wired Ethernet, so no WiFi in use except when I visit there and my phone connects by WiFi.

If the router fails to start up including the VPN client, then I will definitely have to travel to the site (100 km) so I MUST avoid the update if this might cause a lockup problem.

But if it just silently reboots itself afterwards, then I assume it will reconnect the VPN and I am back in business.
Even if the VPN connection for some reason fails but the router itself starts up then I have a backdoor since there is an OpenVPN service on a RaspberryPi over there which I can connect to provided the router at least works as a router with DHCP and port forward in this situation.

What do you advice me to do?
- Nothing now
- Update f/w on the home LAN router only
- Update f/w on the remote LAN router only
- Update both

 

[BosseSwede]

Have anyone else here seen a fiber service vary this much?
I have now logged the speed on my remote LAN using a RaspberryPi4, which I have access to remotely.
I now have enough data to see a pattern where the upload speed increases during daytime only to drop a lot nightly.
Notice that the remote fiber connection is subscribing to the same 250/250 service I have at home where the home speed is rock solid at above 250 for both up- and downloads.
Not so at the remote site.
Even more mysterious is this considering that the remote site is a vacation home area and this time of year there are probably very few people even using the fiber connection.

Here is the current state of my log covering more than a week of hourly measurements. See the speed increase between 11 and 18 every day...

 

[BosseSwede]

FINALLY SUCCESS!
After months of nagging the ISP about the poor upload speed and 3 days ago traveling to the remote place to perform yet another speedtest on the fiber box with everything else disconnected, they got their act together.

Today the service was down to single digit upload speeds and then was interrupted for a few hours. Now returned at 260 Mbps speed!

This is on the raw fiber using a Raspberry Pi4 device against Ookla speedtest CLI logging every half hour.

While visiting I also exchanged the older ASUS RT-AC68U for a new RT-AC86U using the same OpenVPN channel connecting the remote LAN to my home LAN.

And now I have timed a video file transfer from the remote LAN via OpenVPN to my home LAN server.
The 135,842,020 Mb video took 5,187s to transfer!
That corresponds to a speed of 209.5 Mbps, going through the VPN encryption too!
So RT-AC86U is way faster than RT-AC68U!