Dual WAN AXE16000 + XT12 Mesh to Merlin

[JuanGF]

Hello all, great forum you have here, I've learned a lot already.

I'm looking for a recommendation here, currently I have a setup where my main router is an AXE16000m running with Dual WAN (10G and 1G ports) and then two XT12 as Wifi Mesh nodes.

All of them running with the stock firmware and working fine so far.

I'm very interested in the Merlin advanced capabilities for the AXE16000, question is, would the two XT12 keep working with the AXE16000 if they still use the stock firmware? Do it need to upgrade all three to Merlin to be safe?

Is there any known limitation or known issue with Dual WAN and Merlin I should be aware of?

Thanks a lot.
Juan

 

[DJones]

Yes Merlin will function the same as stock, but with advanced features. No you don’t need to have each router with Merlin, however I would keep each router updated for security and bug related reasons. Merlin sometimes provides security fixes before Asus can or Asus provides security fixed before providing him the GPL firmware to him so he’s stuck waiting or porting the fix himself in the meantime.(usually only a couple weeks or a month if they end up having issues with the GPL firmware)

Dual wan can have draw backs I’m not the best to elaborate on what they are, but if it works in stock it will work in Merlin. You might even get more options via amtm packages in SSH.

 

[JuanGF]

Yes, I mean, the stock firmware is far from perfect (very annoying bugs, specially when managing routing that lead to a lot of unnecesary reboots) and the UI and options sometimes feels childish. Dual WAN has improved with latest firmware (3.0.0.4.388_24329-g5906523) used to be more unstable when connecting after rebooting.

Currently for the XT12 firmware it is the AXE16000 who tells me there are new versions to install in the nodes and does the process, when I upgrade to Merlin, it is going to detect it the same way?

For what I read here: https://www.snbforums.com/threads/k...n-firmware-and-stock-in-aimesh-network.88888/ there shouldn't be any special compatibility issue having the AXE16000 with Merlin and the XT12 with stock (I use ethernet backhaul), so I can try that setup first.

 

[Tech9]

Is there any known limitation or known issue with Dual WAN and Merlin I should be aware of?

The same code from Asuswrt with lots of known issues.

 

[L&LD]

RMerlin firmware gives you many more options than stock Asus though.

Asuswrt-Merlin AddOns

This forums is for discussions about AddOns for Asuswrt-Merlin, i.e. Diversion, Skynet, etc.

www.snbforums.com

Including a Dual WAN script that works (and some conveniently forget to mention).

Dual WAN Failover ***v2 Release***

WAN Failover is designed to replace the factory ASUS WAN Failover functionality, this script will monitor the WAN Interfaces using a Target IP Address and pinging these targets to determine when a failure occurs. When a failure is detected in Failover Mode, the script will switch to the...

www.snbforums.com