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RT-AC68U: AP mode: 5ghz radio loses connection with router...only fix is reboot... can't get Customer service to send replacement...

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derek87

Occasional Visitor
hi all, i crammed a lot in the subject line, but it's pretty descriptive.

i bought at an AC68U in July (i have a 4 year old one faithfully operating as a router) and set it up as an access point. it has worked flawlessly until a couple of weeks ago when it started misbehaving (running latest Merlin 384.19). here are the symptoms/behaviors that have become clearer upon repeated occurrences:

  1. the 5ghz radio seems to lose connection to the main router/internet so any devices on this radio lose internet access.
  2. the 2.4ghz radio seems fine : devices remain attached to the internet
  3. wired devices attached to the AP are also fine and can see the internet
  4. turning the radio on and off doesn't fix the problem.
  5. rebooting the AP fixes the problem, but it reoccurs 24-48 hours later
  6. nothing obvious shows up in the syslog
  7. i've reset the unit to factory defaults and reset things up (nothing fancy since it's an access point) and that hasn't helped.
i contacted customer support to ask for an RMA on a 5 month old device, but so far i have been running in circles with them asking me to help them troubleshoot by sending them info and trying things out like different settings...but they seem to lose sight of the fact that nothing has changed over 5 months (or at least 3 months since i upgraded from 384.18 to 384.19) and suddenly this behavior has begun occurring.

so my questions to you guys are:

- any ideas? to me, it seems that the 5ghz radio hardware is somehow failing.
- any way to escalate things with Asus' very unhelpful customer service?

thanks!
 
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hi all, i crammed a lot in the subject line, but it's pretty descriptive.

i bought at an AC68U in July (i have a 4 year old one faithfully operating as a router) and set it up as an access point. it has worked flawlessly until a couple of weeks ago when it started misbehaving (running latest Merlin 384.19). here are the symptoms/behaviors that have become clearer upon repeated occurrences:

  1. the 5ghz radio seems to lose connection to the main router/internet so any devices on this radio lose internet access.
  2. the 2.4ghz radio seems fine : devices remain attached to the internet
  3. wired devices attached to the AP are also fine and can see the internet
  4. turning the radio on and off doesn't fix the problem.
  5. rebooting the AP fixes the problem, but it reoccurs 24-48 hours later
  6. nothing obvious shows up in the syslog
  7. i've reset the unit to factory defaults and reset things up (nothing fancy since it's an access point) and that hasn't helped.
i contacted customer support to ask for an RMA on a 5 year old device, but so far i have been running in circles with them asking me to help them troubleshoot by sending them info and trying things out like different settings...but they seem to lose sight of the fact that nothing has changed over 5 months (or at least 3 months since i upgraded from 384.18 to 384.19) and suddenly this behavior has begun occurring.

so my questions to you guys are:

- any ideas? to me, it seems that the 5ghz radio hardware is somehow failing.
- any way to escalate things with Asus' very unhelpful customer service?

thanks!

How did you get a 5-year warranty on the router?

OE
 
Reinstall the latest stock firmware. Perform a hard reset. Change the 5GHz channel from automatic to 36 and set bandwidth to 20/40/80.
 
Reinstall the latest stock firmware. Perform a hard reset. Change the 5GHz channel from automatic to 36 and set bandwidth to 20/40/80.

you guys are awesome and fast in reply. thank you...

i did perform a hard reset on Merlin 384.19 and was setting bandwidth to fixed 80 as suggested by Asus customer support (i had it previously set to 20/40/80 before contacting them) it was automatically on channel 36 the last time it died last night this morning. is there any reason to think that my firmware is bad even though it was working fine for several months? why is 36 a better channel than others?

i've had such great luck with Merlin firmware over the past 10 (?) years, and am reluctant to go back to standard Asus firmware. yet, for an access point, i probably gain no advantage with Merlin except for maybe (theoretically) more bug fixes and stability than standard Asus firmware.
 
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Channels 36 to 48 should be compatible with all devices in all countries (apart from Indonesia) and doesn't suffer from Radar of DFS issues.

You shouldn't really expect much technical support from Asus while you're using unofficial firmware.

In AP mode it shouldn't make a difference to you which firmware you use, although it's possible stock firmware has a more recent WiFi driver.

If the problem reoccurs upload the router's syslog to pastebin for us to look at.
 
Channels 36 to 48 should be compatible with all devices in all countries (apart from Indonesia) and doesn't suffer from Radar of DFS issues.

You shouldn't really expect much technical support from Asus while you're using unofficial firmware.

In AP mode it shouldn't make a difference to you which firmware you use, although it's possible stock firmware has a more recent WiFi driver.

If the problem reoccurs upload the router's syslog to pastebin for us to look at.

thanks Colin. i have fixed it to 36 and 20/40/80 as you suggested and we will see how long it lasts. the last two times, it worked fine for about 2 days and then acted up again.

after that, i'll try the asus firmware since i don't think Merlin buys me any extra settings for such a simple use for this device.

again, this thing was working just fine until a couple of weeks ago...
 
Channels 36 to 48 should be compatible with all devices in all countries (apart from Indonesia) and doesn't suffer from Radar of DFS issues.

You shouldn't really expect much technical support from Asus while you're using unofficial firmware.

In AP mode it shouldn't make a difference to you which firmware you use, although it's possible stock firmware has a more recent WiFi driver.

If the problem reoccurs upload the router's syslog to pastebin for us to look at.

so, updates (mostly good).

since last wednesday (going on 6 days), i have the AP stable running a fixed channel 36, and fixed bandwidth 80 Mhz.

ASUS tech support (via Customer service...seems like an inefficient way to communicate) finally responded saying i am not running the latest firmware and i need to do that and see if the problem persists. no acknowledge or explanation for why the older 384.19 firmware worked fine for months before this came up.

but as i said, it's running 6 days straight now. i now have a spare 68u i can plunk into its place if it acts up again, but i am asking my wife to be patient and taught her how to hard reboot the AP if it happens midday and i'm not available to help out.

maybe the access point gremlins are behind me, but we will see. (i am reluctant to move to 386 until Merlin gets updated to it (official release, not alpha)).
 
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