Unable to downgrade firmware on GT-AX6000s - I'm at my wits end.

[slackjaw99]

I've scoured the forums here, searched endlessly on Google, Bing, Duck Duck Go, Reddit and everywhere else I could think of and found no mention of the issue I'm experiencing with these two GT-AX6000s that I'm about 10 minutes away from smashing into a million shards of plastic. Please forgive me in advance if there are indeed existing threads on this that I somehow missed.

What's going on is that the wifi connection is just not stable enough on the latest 388 firmware revs whether stock or Merlin for the bulk of our 50 some odd IoT devices to stay connected. But no matter how many hard resets and flashes of any version of 386 level firmware I perform, within a day or so both routers will spontaneously reboot and the last version of 388 (April's update) that was previously on them gets auto-magically resurrected, and it's right back to the same BS. It seriously feels like I'm living in ASUS' version of Groundhog Day hell as I have great connectivity for at most about 24 hours, and then poof right back to the same version of 388 and everything starts dropping off again - over and over.

I still own and use a Linksys ACS1900 from 2015 that I flashed with OpenWRT. That router has dual firmware partitions, so you can purposely recover back to stock if you screw something up. But unless I am somehow sorely mistaken, I don't think that's the case with ASUS routers .... is it???

If anyone in the know can enlighten me on this and what, if anything, can be done to make a FW downgrade stick, you will have my serious gratitude, otherwise you'll have the opportunity to purchase 2 used GT-AX6000s for a really good price as I'll most likely bite the bullet and move on to one the enterprise grade wifi platforms while divorce proceedings with ASUS commence. TIA!

 

[slackjaw99]

...at least I got a good laugh at all the "similar threads" of people mentioning they are at "their wits end" in their titles - except none of them had the same issue beyond ASUS causing them to lose their minds in minds over something else.

 

[Tech9]

Your routers auto upgrade with Auto Firmware Upgrade in Administration, Firmware Upgrade setting set to Off?

 

[slackjaw99]

Your routers auto upgrade with Auto Firmware Upgrade in Administration, Firmware Upgrade setting set to Off?

Yup. ...and it's even "snapping back" to 388 without any connectivity whatsoever.

 

[slackjaw99]

Have you tried the current firmware GT-AX6000 version 3.0.0.4.388.23285, 2023/05/12?

Install it, hard reset it, and then configure it from scratch. Allow ample time for each process to complete before you touch anything. And confirm firmware Auto Upgrade is disabled.

Firmware Reset FAQ

Reset button/webUI Restore/node removal - clears settings in NVRAM; reboot restores fw defaults from CFE

Hard Reset via WPS button/webUI Restore+Initialize - also clears data logged in /jffs partition

OE

Didn't really see the point in trying this month's update after the wonderful experience of last month's (sarcasm). But yeah, I've been resetting badly behaving electronics since I inherited my dad's Osborne II - roughly around the same time the Woz was still chief engineer at Apple. I did every combination of WPS button, reset button and web gui method while powering on and off - even turning on after pulling the pwr cable to clear any residual wattage plus flashing every single version of 386 level FW in between. In fact it got to the point were I was doing the reset button AND the WPS button including power cycling at the same 'effin time...every conceivable, possible combination and sequence of hard reset buttons and power cycling just short of putting a .45 slug through the middle of it. I lost count on the last try, but I think it was around 8 or so hard resets of slightly different sequences of buttons and power and FW flashes and pins in voodoo dolls. Did every method in the vids to the letter plus the other 10 or so ways they don't mention. Even broke off one of the antennae in the process cuz I don't have three hands. And no, I did not re-upload any saved configs in between the resets and the Twilight Zoneish 388 reincarnations as ES mentions. In the end, I was strongly tempted to try flashing FW for a different model, but I figured they still had a tiny bit of value as switches vs. Halloween decorations since I need some extra ports for those damned Eeros and Nests I had to dig outta storage while trying not to throw up.

TBH I'm quickly losing hope that a solution to this absolutely bizzarro mystery will be found. So these two units will likely end up on the trading blocks, and I'm now open to any suggestions AFA prosumer or low end enterprise class wifi HW that allows configuration via CLI/SSH cuz ASUS is now the very last consumer company that doesn't force a cloud/phone/subscription upsell approach to getting what's supposed to be what you paid for and "own" online. ...but I digress...

I do appreciate forum vets trying to help as the list of hard reset methods could still help owners of other models. From a logic standpoint, all I can conclude is that the gt-ax6000s must have been engineered with some kind of undocumented persistent FW partition similar to well known dual partitions in Linksys WRT models back in the day for dummy proofing.

 

[Tech9]

You know things and I'm not going to suggest yet another reset attempt. The fact you opted for this hardware as APs to your OPNsense appliance was surprising to me. I'm sure you know what do you need and you'll find the right hardware. Quite a few folks around run business class APs from TP-Link (Omada), Ubiquiti (UniFi), Cisco, Zyxel, etc. as stand alone APs or as entire multi-AP Wi-Fi system with PoE. This is the right way to go. You don't really need CLI anymore - all radio settings, VLAN configurations, Guest portals, whatever configuration is now available in own or network controller GUI. The best price/performance ratio is perhaps controller run TP-Link Omada. Don't compare Omada business with Archer consumer products. They are very different products. Next comes perhaps Ubiquiti UniFi - similar performance, but less APs choice and more expensive. Cisco has lower priced Wi-Fi 6 APs now and no controller needed if you want to take a look. Wi-Fi 6E business APs - expensive and not needed in my opinion.

 

[bbunge]

Did not see a mention that you tried a flash from recovery mode?

 

[Smokey613]

Let me know how much you want for the GT-AX6000…..

 

[Tech9]

Let me know how much you want for the GT-AX6000

You had one already and send it back, no?

Sorry, I was busy last month and missed some of your weekly hardware change cycles.

 

[Smokey613]

You had one already and send it back, no?

Sorry, I was busy last month and missed some of your weekly hardware change cycles.

Yes I did, but if I can get one for say half price WTHN?

 

[Tech9]

I remember Wife Acceptance Factor was involved. Did you replace your wife as well?

 

[slackjaw99]

You know things and I'm not going to suggest yet another reset attempt. The fact you opted for this hardware as APs to your OPNsense appliance was surprising to me. I'm sure you know what do you need and you'll find the right hardware. Quite a few folks around run business class APs from TP-Link (Omada), Ubiquiti (UniFi), Cisco, Zyxel, etc. as stand alone APs or as entire multi-AP Wi-Fi system with PoE. This is the right way to go. You don't really need CLI anymore - all radio settings, VLAN configurations, Guest portals, whatever configuration is now available in own or network controller GUI. The best price/performance ratio is perhaps controller run TP-Link Omada. Don't compare Omada business with Archer consumer products. They are very different products. Next comes perhaps Ubiquiti UniFi - similar performance, but less APs choice and more expensive. Cisco has lower priced Wi-Fi 6 APs now and no controller needed if you want to take a look. Wi-Fi 6E business APs - expensive and not needed in my opinion.

One of the 6000s predated the OPNsense box and was used in router mode for about 5 or 6 months. The second one I picked up a couple months before building that box for less than $200usd during one of those half day crazy Amazon flash sales. Will definitely check out the spec sheets for from your suggestions - especially the TP link as I've had good luck with both their products and support staff in the past. Probably will pass on Cisco as i still have some residual ptsd from having to program BGP on their PIX's back in the day - the only CLI I absolutely couldn't stand. I was also a hardcore Linux/Unix hack(er) in a previous career - even met Linus, himself on a couple of occasions, and ironically ASUS ssh tweaking has reinvigorated that nostalgia as a bit of a free time hobby now that I'm retired from tech. TBH this 6000 debacle and my decision just now to move on from those dual band spiders was inevitable and probably a blessing in disguise given that we just bought a place less than 2 miles from SFO and our computers/phones are all being upgraded to 6ghz capable because of the radar situation. Whatever APs we go with will only have the 2.4 and 6ghz radios enabled as there is almost no point in trying to use the 2 little slivers of 5ghz band we are allowed.

 

[slackjaw99]

Let me know how much you want for the GT-AX6000…..

will do. it may be a couple weeks before we can new hardware in place to replace them, so do feel free to DM me if you don't hear from me by early next month.

 

[Smokey613]

I remember Wife Acceptance Factor was involved. Did you replace your wife as well?

It would not be used at my home, but a neighbor wants to “upgrade” his Netgear R7000 so it could be a candidate if the price is right.

As for “replacing“ the wife…. we celebrated our 50th anniversary back in February. I would not want another one… she’s a keeper for sure.

 

[slackjaw99]

Did not see a mention that you tried a flash from recovery mode?

That was a stone I did turn over. We are all on Macs only so installed bootcamp Windows just to try flashing that way before immediately deleting it.

 

[slackjaw99]

Ok, i am not a networking person at all, but have had an issue similar on a TP-ink router. Have you tried flashing it with Merlin, factory reset then tried the Older Asus Firmware? I had to do similar on my TP-Link but it was with DD-WRT.

Yeah, same with the Linksys ACS and its infamous persistent partition I still have which is why I went crazy with the multiple alternating flashes and resets. The 6000 really is a one-off as far as ASUS' router engineering series goes, so it wouldn't surprise me if that model does have some sort of dummy proofing built in. I did have have an incident a few months ago where I was almost certain that I did something to brick one of them, and was quite surprised I was able to get it back after a couple hard resets.

 

[slackjaw99]

I remember Wife Acceptance Factor was involved. Did you replace your wife as well?

My wife seriously came close to replacing me after these last 24 hours.

 

[Tech9]

I've seen Wife 2.0 firmware update, but it was incompatible with PubNight 7.0 or something.

 

[Tech9]

Whatever APs we go with will only have the 2.4 and 6ghz radios enabled

There is a new Omada compatible monster AP with 4x 4-stream radios in AXE11000 class with 10GbE port:

Not sure what the price will be, but I expect cheaper than similar insane specs Aruba Networks or Cisco APs.

Make sure you don't exceed 2000 clients and 32 SSIDs.

It's on Amazon already, released May 01, 2023 - the price is $500. This thing needs 50W PoE power though.

 

[slackjaw99]

Despite the "Auto upgrade button" on both spiders definitely being set to "Off", I did just notice the following in the boot logs - however my first assumption is it's just the 'check' where you get that annoying, beeping icon indicating a new FW is available. But if not, then pls let me know, so I can let ASUS know they've got a significant bug to fix in the next release:

May 14 11:11:58 WATCHDOG: [FAUPGRADE][auto_firmware_check:(7736)]periodic_check AM 3:2
May 14 11:11:58 WATCHDOG: [FAUPGRADE][auto_firmware_check:(7780)]do webs_update
May 14 11:12:06 WATCHDOG: [FAUPGRADE][auto_firmware_check:(7798)]retrieve firmware information
May 14 11:12:06 WATCHDOG: [FAUPGRADE][auto_firmware_check:(7813)]fimrware update check first time
May 14 11:12:06 WATCHDOG: [FAUPGRADE][auto_firmware_check:(7844)]no need to upgrade firmware