BIG UPDATE FW Version 3.0.0.4.220

[RMerlin]

Nice, is there a command similar to this for the port forward table?

Port forwards are saved in vts_rulelist. QoS rules are in qos_rulelist.

You can get the whole list of settings by running:

nvram show

To save it to a file, assuming you have a USB disk mounted as sda1:

nvram show > /mnt/sda1/settings.txt

You can selectively restore many settings by using the same method (as long the format hasn't changed between firmware versions, of course).

 

[RocketJSquirrel]

nvram show > /mnt/sda1/settings.txt

How about this:

nvram show | sort | sendmail -f me@mydomain.net -S smtp.myisp.net:# -auMyUserName '-apMyPassword' me@mydomain.net

 

[SoCalReviews]

I ran into one of my first major issues with one of my two N66Us and at this point in time it appears to have been a settings issue or firmware bug. I was running the official Asus .178 (32k) firmware on one of my N66U routers for use with my newly purchased Trendnet TEW-680MB Dual band 450 Mbps media bridge which is the first 5Ghz capable device I have had the opportunity to use. I have the bridge set to a/n only with the 20/40 band connected the N66's 5Ghz radio. It ran flawlessly for two days connected solidly to the Trendnet media bridge with Tx and Rx of around 200-250 Mbps (according to the signal meter in the media bridge firmware). The distance from the N66U to the media bridge is more than 60 ft (about 20 meters) and two rooms away through two plaster walls. I was able to perfectly do PS3 gaming and HD media streaming for two days with zero problems.

Then sometime yesterday I noticed the radio on the N66U wasn't working at all. The media bridge seemed to be working well but it wasn't recognizing any 5Ghz signal from the N66U. At first I thought the problem was the bridge so I power cycled it but the problem wasn't the bridge. It appears that the N66U 5Ghz radio simply shut down by itself. The 5Ghz LED was also off or unlit. Everything else on the N66U was working including the 2.4Ghz radio. The settings showed the 5Ghz radio was supposed to be enabled so I disabled and re-enabled it and then rebooted the router and the 5Ghz radio still wasn't working.

I had cleared the NVRAM before and after re-flashing with the .178 firmware last week so there shouldn't have been a conflict with previous settings. Even though clearing it may have worked I didn't bother trying to clear the NVRAM this time. After reading about the reset options in this thread relating to the new official .220 firmware I opted for using the 15 second hard reset button....The router with .178 official Asus firmware came up....I input my basic settings and the 5Ghz radio finally came up working again. I then took the opportunity to flash to the new official Asus .220 (64k) firmware...I did a hard button reset again after flashing...I input my settings once again and the router and 5Ghz radio has been working well for the last day.

The Trendnet media bridge is still connected to the N66U via the 5Ghz band as of this post. I will leave things as they are for the next week and see if the N66U with the .220 firmware continues working as it should. I am hoping the problem I had with the 5Ghz radio was just a strange settings conflict or a bug in the official Asus .178 firmware and that the 5Ghz radio continues to work as it should with the official Asus .220 firmware.

 

[RogerSC]

Interesting, the "Network Map" shows all the clients, but for the first time the "DHCP Leases" log doesn't, always has for previous firmware versions. Refresh doesn't help. Only 3 out out of my 8 DHCP clients are shown in the DHCP Leases log.

So it goes.

 

[RMerlin]

How about this:

Assuming Asus compiles Busybox with the sendmail applet - I never checked if they did.

 

[RMerlin]

Interesting, the "Network Map" shows all the clients, but for the first time the "DHCP Leases" log doesn't, always has for previous firmware versions. Refresh doesn't help. Only 3 out out of my 8 DHCP clients are shown in the DHCP Leases log.

So it goes.

Possibly because your devices haven't renewed their leases yet.

 

[RogerSC]

Possibly because your devices haven't renewed their leases yet.

Seems reasonable.

 

[RocketJSquirrel]

Assuming Asus compiles Busybox with the sendmail applet - I never checked if they did.

Yes, they did and it works.

 

[sfalcon]

How about this:

Thanks for the tips! It's really helpful~

 

[Gingernut]

Didn't see it announced and I'm very sure RMerlin is already aware but for the rest of us the GPL source for the .220 firmware is available for download.

http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/wireless/RT-N66U_B1/GPL_RT_N66U_B1_3004220.zip

 

[DaveMishSr]

I ran into one of my first major issues with one of my two N66Us and at this point in time it appears to have been a settings issue or firmware bug. I was running the official Asus .178 (32k) firmware on one of my N66U routers for use with my newly purchased Trendnet TEW-680MB Dual band 450 Mbps media bridge which is the first 5Ghz capable device I have had the opportunity to use. I have the bridge set to a/n only with the 20/40 band connected the N66's 5Ghz radio. It ran flawlessly for two days connected solidly to the Trendnet media bridge with Tx and Rx of around 200-250 Mbps (according to the signal meter in the media bridge firmware). The distance from the N66U to the media bridge is more than 60 ft (about 20 meters) and two rooms away through two plaster walls. I was able to perfectly do PS3 gaming and HD media streaming for two days with zero problems.

Then sometime yesterday I noticed the radio on the N66U wasn't working at all. The media bridge seemed to be working well but it wasn't recognizing any 5Ghz signal from the N66U. At first I thought the problem was the bridge so I power cycled it but the problem wasn't the bridge. It appears that the N66U 5Ghz radio simply shut down by itself. The 5Ghz LED was also off or unlit. Everything else on the N66U was working including the 2.4Ghz radio. The settings showed the 5Ghz radio was supposed to be enabled so I disabled and re-enabled it and then rebooted the router and the 5Ghz radio still wasn't working.

I had cleared the NVRAM before and after re-flashing with the .178 firmware last week so there shouldn't have been a conflict with previous settings. Even though clearing it may have worked I didn't bother trying to clear the NVRAM this time. After reading about the reset options in this thread relating to the new official .220 firmware I opted for using the 15 second hard reset button....The router with .178 official Asus firmware came up....I input my basic settings and the 5Ghz radio finally came up working again. I then took the opportunity to flash to the new official Asus .220 (64k) firmware...I did a hard button reset again after flashing...I input my settings once again and the router and 5Ghz radio has been working well for the last day.

The Trendnet media bridge is still connected to the N66U via the 5Ghz band as of this post. I will leave things as they are for the next week and see if the N66U with the .220 firmware continues working as it should. I am hoping the problem I had with the 5Ghz radio was just a strange settings conflict or a bug in the official Asus .178 firmware and that the 5Ghz radio continues to work as it should with the official Asus .220 firmware.

When I tried using my TEW-680MB media bridges on a/n only I noticed performance issues right away and the units would not connect to the 5GHz band from my RT-N66U. I set it back to a/b/g/n and all was well. I know that performance should increase with the a/n only setting but it was worse for me. Try going back to a/b/g/n and see what happens. I can connect to either band from the router and expereince no buffering with Vudu.com even if I stream their HDX format which, according to their support, needs a connection speed of at least 4.5mbps. I bet you will also see your performance increase with the a/b/g/n setting. Good luck.

 

[SoCalReviews]

DaveMishSr, Thanks for the advice. When set up the TEW-680MB media bridge right next to the N66U I was experimenting with using a/b/g/n and other settings. At first a/n didn't seem to work at all while a/b/g/n did work. As you pointed out it seemed like the bridge couldn't or wouldn't connect properly to the N66U with the a/n setting. I moved the TEW-680MB to it's distant location in my house as I described before and when I tried remotely switching the bridge settings to a/n the second time it worked. It seemed to get a little better signal with a/n and the connection seemed to be solid.

I also had set the TEW-680MB bandwidth to 20/40 from what it was set to before at 20 in the Asus .178 firmware. I fixed the N66U to channel 48 and then later changed it to fixed 151 and it worked great for two days before the router's 5Ghz radio shut off by itself. When I flashed with new .220 firmware I left the N66U 5Ghz radio settings on default with auto channel select. The two have been connected for the last two days without problems with the media bridge set at a/n.

I will probably experiment again with using a/b/g/n and see if that improves or changes the throughput but the bridge is already showing a varying throughput of between 165 to 300 Mbps for Tx and Rx (currently 165 Tx and 214 Rx with 91% link quality...as mentioned before...the bridge is 20 meters and two rooms distance away from the N66U) and averaging over 200 Mbps for both which is partial wired Gigabit speeds. I can already stream HD video easily to my PS3 and its much more than I need for my 12/1 or 100/5 internet connections. The good news here is that the official Asus .220 firmware is working well so far and the router's 5Ghz radio hasn't bugged out as it did before when I was running the stock Asus .178 firmware.

Update: The Asus 4.220 firmware is still working well. The 5Ghz radio on the N66U seems to be broadcasting a solid signal after several days always on. I am currently using a/g/n for the bridge settings and it seems to work as well as a/n. This seems to be more of a matter of preference as to whether you want the 2.4Ghz radio in the bridge activated even if you are only going to use it for 5Ghz. I like using the bridge's site survey is able to see all the radios on all frequencies that are broadcasting in the local area but if you are using only the 5Ghz band then using only the 5Ghz a/n mode for the bridge appears to work just as well. Just like the reviews of this device claimed there is a noticeable a difference in 5Ghz band signal quality based on the exact physical placement of this TEW-680MB wireless bridge. As expected adjusting and experimenting with the N66U's 5Ghz radio settings...channel choice (auto or fixed), bandwidth (20 or 40) and radio power seems to have the most overall impact on signal quality and throughput to the bridge.

 

[theonlybabyface]

Port forward issues here. Any time I try to hit an open port pointing to my WHS from outside the network my router crashes and reboots. Not pleased.

Yup, same thing happens to me when logging into my Synology NAS using my external IP from internal. Crashes and reboots the router....

 

[RMerlin]

Yup, same thing happens to me when logging into my Synology NAS using my external IP from internal. Crashes and reboots the router....

I sent an Email to one of my contacts at Asus about the GRO related crashes. Will keep everyone posted on what I get back.

In the mean time, you can switch to Asuswrt-Merlin once I release the next version based on build 220 (no ETA at the moment), as I compile it with GRO disabled, fixing those crashes.

 

[RocketJSquirrel]

I think I'm losing my grip on the acronyms used here. What are WHS and GRO?

 

[RogerSC]

I think I'm losing my grip on the acronyms used here. What are WHS and GRO?

I think "Windows Home Server" and "Generic Receive Offload".

A little discussion of GRO right here in River City *smile*:

http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/archive/index.php?t-7426.html

 

[RMerlin]

I think I'm losing my grip on the acronyms used here. What are WHS and GRO?

GRO = Generic Receive Offload. It's a technology that improves network performance. Asus's original firmware will enable that option whenever it detects that you have a USB disk plugged in and shared through SMB (as a Windows share). Unfortunately that feature is broken, and will cause your router to crash and reboot itself whenever you try to access a local device accross the LAN loopback (if you are trying to use your dynamic DNS hostname from inside your network), or through a VPN tunnel.

In Asuswrt-Merlin I disable the GRO option from the firmware, fixing this crashing issue.

I just learned that one of my contacts had left Asus last week, so it might take a little longer before I get an answer on this issue.

 

[edwardl]

GRO = Generic Receive Offload. It's a technology that improves network performance. Asus's original firmware will enable that option whenever it detects that you have a USB disk plugged in and shared through SMB (as a Windows share). Unfortunately that feature is broken, and will cause your router to crash and reboot itself whenever you try to access a local device accross the LAN loopback (if you are trying to use your dynamic DNS hostname from inside your network), or through a VPN tunnel.

In Asuswrt-Merlin I disable the GRO option from the firmware, fixing this crashing issue.

I just learned that one of my contacts had left Asus last week, so it might take a little longer before I get an answer on this issue.

So if I do not share the USB disk through Samba, will the GRO be disabled and thus the loopback issue can be avoided?

Thanks.

 

[RMerlin]

So if I do not share the USB disk through Samba, will the GRO be disabled and thus the loopback issue can be avoided?

Thanks.

That is correct.

 

[smlunatick]

I just uploaded this 220 firmware. I half lost my configs. The VPN service settings was still in it. I reset everything and found this firmware better for me so far. I have a a Fibre to local node server and a modem / router combo that will alos provide IPTV/Internet. The modem/router has two VLANs, one for Internet and the second for IPTV. The IPTV is not part of the standard Internet nor does it add to my Internet caps. The modem/router will let the Internet VLAN be automatically converted to "bridging" mode when a PPPoE request is issued from a LAN port. My N66U workls well. However, normally you can not access the internal settings of a mode/route if the WAN port if the WAN does not going the "router's" LAN network.

With thus 3.0.0.4.220, I can get both my external WAN network plus the Fibre service unit LAN network (192.168.2.1)

I'll wait and see if the wireless radio on / off problems show up.