Zen WiFi XT8 AX

[Miguel Stanic]

Wow, really regretting this purchase. Latest firmware on ALL nodes. Bought two packs of this so 4 altogether spread out in my home. The speed on this is horrible in comparison to Orbi RBK53, Nest WiFi and Orbi RBK853 AX. I tried one unit, two units, three units and all units and always the same. I even tried the RTAX88u with one to 3 of these nodes and it's just bad. I could not stay with Orbi AX becasue it was to unstable but the speeds were out of this world. Nest WiFi is stable for WiFi 5 with decent speeds and coverage but boring to operate. And, Orbi AC3000 is okay save the router is really slow and the GUI sucks on Orbi anyways along with the Web UI. I don't understand AiMesh. What's the point of it if it's just going to run so slow and does a terrible job at moving your devices to the strongest/closets node thus always keeping you on 2.4 - even when my devices are on 5.0 they seem slow. Screwed now because of Final Sale.

 

[digits n bits]

Out of curiosity how big an area are you using these in?

 

[Miguel Stanic]

About a 6000 square foot home once you include the finished basement. I have main route router node in basement - no choice. Then on the main floor, I have two at opposite ends of the house floor with 3 walls in between from study to kitchen. Then, I have the other one located upstairs in the hallway but it's all open concept so no walls from upstairs to main floor - one big open area. I am going to try running just one node for now in open area and see but I've tried (though not for long) and the speeds are bad still.

 

[L&LD]

Yes, you should start with a single router and add AP's as needed.

Have you reset the devices to factory defaults? This helps immensely when issues such as yours crop up.

 

[Miguel Stanic]

Yah, lots of firmware resets. I find AiMesh to be the worst at moving clients around. Their mesh topology is really poor at steering clients and there is a constant refreshing of devices happening when you look at the network map from the iOS app. I also find that the units only accept a specific node as the main router. In trying two other nodes the setup does not pickup internet access even though the ISP modem has been reset and bridged and the Zen nodes are all reset to factory defaults. Overall, very disappointed with this purchase. The speeds are a joke compared to Orbi AX. But, I sold the RBK853 because they just would not allow the outdoor cameras to connect and Netgear could not resolve my issue.

 

[Bandito]

Hmmm...not to discount your poor experiences with the ZenWiFi XT8 system, but my experience has been pretty good so far and I’m getting equivalent speeds to the Orbi AX RBK852.

You mention resetting you ISP modem. Does this mean that you are powering it off, waiting a bit, then powering it back on? Most of the modems will bind to the MAC address of the attached router and usually will require a power cycle to get them to pick up a device with a different MAC address. I know this is pretty basic, but just wanted to make sure that the fundamentals are being covered. Similarly, you’re doing a Factory Reset using the reset button on the bottom of the device, correct? I’m not sure how long you need to hold the button to get a full reset.

I hope that you can find some success with these units. They seem to be quite powerful and certainly have far greater flexibility than the Orbi’s do.

 

[GBear]

Over at Dong Knows there's a potential common thread of problems for those who have enabled QoS. Turning it off seems to have fixed issues for some people. (Disabling QoS via the web interface has also been an issue, but people have used Telnet or the phone app successfully.) I have had QoS disabled since Day 1, and have been puzzled at all the problems reported, so it could be worth a try.

I have had a great set-it-and-forget-it experience with my XT8, but the shortcomings that make it feel like an unfinished product are undeniable: lack of detailed documentation, missing WPA3 support, guest network only on main router, no 160MHz on the 5GHz-1 band yet, etc. I'm happy because the product does what I need, but it still doesn't reflect well on ASUS until they get the firmware, documentation and control interfaces cleaned up.

 

[samep]

WiFi Eco mode? Any thoughts on this? I've read that reducing power may actually help older type routers but does the XT8 already reduce individual streams as needed?

I ask because I thought maybe reducing power or even using this Eco setting may increase the life expectancy of this WiFi 6 router? I'd like to not have what happened with my Orbi happen again.

I didn't always reduce WiFi power on my Netgear Orbi RBK50 AC router. This may have shortened its usable life to 3.5 years? Or just to be expected at this age? The 2.4G output weakened to the point it was dropping connection with my Logitech Harmony hubs. I Googled Netgear Orbi and Harmony hub and found many Orbi users have this same issue and trying to resolve it; some returned their newer Orbi routers in frustration over UI not allowing separation of 2.4G and 5G SSIDs. My WiFi device needs may max at 802.11ac (WiFi 5) but seems the WiFi 5 and below support of XT8 betters my Orbi with max of 802.11ac support with weakened output. Hard to get an idea if newer or stronger or both is what improved my WiFi. Maybe both? I think I read that WiFi 5 is actually better than it's near equivalent 802.11ac.

I'm liking my ZenWifi XT8 but did lose the internet connection after 6 days. I didn't get the chance to dig deep to determine the issue but the wife was saying the modem was all green LEDs before rebooting modem and router. The internet was restored after the reboot. Hopefully this isn't ongoing. Scheduling a reboot seems an odd and unnecessary fix. It's more like a bandaid for an issue that needs resolution.

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[samep]

WiFi Eco mode? Any thoughts on this? I've read that reducing power may actually help older type routers but does the XT8 already reduce individual streams as needed?

I ask because I thought maybe reducing power or even using this Eco setting may increase the life expectancy of this WiFi 6 router? I'd like to not have what happened with my Orbi happen again.

I didn't always reduce WiFi power on my Netgear Orbi RBK50 AC router. This may have shortened its usable life to 3.5 years? Or just to be expected at this age? The 2.4G output weakened to the point it was dropping connection with my Logitech Harmony hubs. I Googled Netgear Orbi and Harmony hub and found many Orbi users have this same issue and trying to resolve it; some returned their newer Orbi routers in frustration over UI not allowing separation of 2.4G and 5G SSIDs. My WiFi device needs may max at 802.11ac (WiFi 5) but seems the WiFi 5 and below support of XT8 betters my Orbi with max of 802.11ac support with weakened output. Hard to get an idea if newer or stronger or both is what improved my WiFi. Maybe both? I think I read that WiFi 5 is actually better than it's near equivalent 802.11ac.

I'm liking my ZenWifi XT8 but did lose the internet connection after 6 days. I didn't get the chance to dig deep to determine the issue but the wife was saying the modem was all green LEDs before rebooting modem and router. The internet was restored after the reboot. Hopefully this isn't ongoing. Scheduling a reboot seems an odd and unnecessary fix. It's more like a bandaid for an issue that needs resolution.View attachment 22795

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Nothing like trying this yourself, right?

I did. No impact on performance that I've yet to notice. I have ring cameras outside. Went back to each one and pulled up live view quick enough; the health reports are virtually the same as before, right now.

Ran a speed test on my phone; I got ISP subscribed speed but Asus mobile app for Android says I'm connected to upstairs node but I'm downstairs and in same room with my downstairs node? Direct line of sight about 10 feet away. Must be an error, given the speed test result. Weird.

But I'm hoping this setting will increase the life of my router. And maybe save some power and run cooler.

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[samep]

Came across a review for the XT8 today. I found it interesting. Not many cons but one with placement of the routers being key to maximizing connection speed and coverage pertains to mesh in general. The writer got good WiFi results with the wifi backhaul.

I would just add that the Ethernet backhaul frees up the 5G-2 to reach outdoors better.

The writer brings out the advantage of having two equal routers to expand on the options to bring more versatility but not so much using wired backhaul and separating the networks. This is something I've discussed briefly in another thread in this forum. Considering using router+AP options for another day. I may wait until I upgrade the backhaul to 2.5Gbps. My network is more robust and flexible than it was with the Netgear Orbi RBK50. I'd give it an 8.5 out of 10 too.

https://www.mmorpg.com/hardware-reviews/asus-zenwifi-ax6600-xt8-wireless-router-review-2000118183

No idea who this writer is but well done.

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