386.10 on AC86U losing all 2.4Ghz devices (seemed to be fixed in 386.9.0)

[heysoundude]

I remember when fridges were used to keep things cool. Now they attack your network! Lol!

Why do we need "smart" appliances?
Let me pre-heat my oven or shut it off remotely, sure, or run the dishwasher if I forgot to before I left the house...but they really shouldn't have the ability tp "phone home" afaic.
smh.

 

[Tech9]

Why do we need "smart" appliances?

Because people got less smart lately...

 

[Viktor Jaep]

Because people got less smart lately...

I deeply resemble that remark...

 

[Tech9]

I don't care about appliances, but new cars are extremely stupid tablet stands on wheels. Something I could do in seconds without even looking on previous models now requires going through menus on a ridiculous and definitely non-distracting touch screen. Why engineers and designers, why?

 

[ducky124]

Why do we need "smart" appliances?
Let me pre-heat my oven or shut it off remotely, sure, or run the dishwasher if I forgot to before I left the house...but they really shouldn't have the ability tp "phone home" afaic.
smh.

Just because you have no need doesn't mean other don't. I like having the ability to monitor my appliances from my phone

 

[Tech9]

I like having the ability to monitor my appliances from my phone

Someone else monitors your appliances in the process as well and they like it too. If you like "smart" cameras and microphones - even better.

 

[heysoundude]

Just because you have no need doesn't mean other don't. I like having the ability to monitor my appliances from my phone

Is your fridge running? ;-p

Seriously though, I'm guessing you're one of those "who has nothing to hide"...until you see photo/video of yourself online that you didn't post.
Like @Tech9 was trying to say: all those devices may be gathering more data on you/your family/your home than you may be comfortable with if you're to dig deeper into it. who's in charge of the security of the repositories that stuff goes to? who do they sell the data they collect to? Now is it worth the convenience?

 

[Languor245]

Follow up,

Ended up reloading 386.10 , done multiple resets with initialize checked in the gui as well as formatted the jiffs partition. I never done wps resets.

All is well so far two days in. But what’s different now is I geared up a eero pro 6, which I figured is better wifi than this 68u.

The ac68u is setup in wireless router mode, but with only 2.4 radio on for my iot devices (as eero had them disconnecting randomly)

And the eero is in bridge mode for all my other devices to get ax.

 

[Eric Lieb]

Spoiler: Nevermind

So I was having a similar issue, but was also noticing all kinds of failures and other things in my system log. Decided to try to revert the firmware back to stock ASUS and the router kept ignoring all of the reset and upgrade commands. I am pretty sure somehow the firmware got corrupted on my router.
I then just tried to do an emergency firmware reflash using the Asus software and it would not accept it (said the flash was completed but the router was still on the Merlinwrt firmware). So did a factory reset using the reset button on the back and when they finally completed I immediately did the emergency flash again back to stock Asus.. It worked. Then I did a firmware upgrade back to Merlinwrt from the stock Asus and a lot of my issues went away (havent seen any of the failure messages).

I should point out I only use Asus routers now as wireless APs and have a PFSense router. What is even more strange is my VLAN configuration script I was working on would fail (not allow devices to connect) when I had Flow Cache and Runner enabled, but after all this factory reset, emergency flash and then flash back to MerlinWRT my VLAN setup is working WITH Flow Cache and Runner enabled. I am really thinking something may have corrupted in my router.

The only weird messages I am getting now are like
May 5 01:10:38 kernel: ^[[0;33;41m[ERROR mcast] bcm_mcast_netlink_process_snoop_cfg,884: interface 19 could not be found^[[0m
May 5 01:10:38 kernel: ^[[0;33;41m[ERROR mcast] bcm_mcast_netlink_process_snoop_cfg,884: interface 19 could not be found^[[0m
May 5 05:05:06 kernel: proc_dostring_crashlogsave: crash log filename is /jffs/crashlog.log
May 5 05:05:06 kernel: crashFileSet: log signature invalid !
May 5 05:05:11 lldpd[1220]: cannot get ethtool link information with GLINKSETTINGS (requires 4.9+): Operation not permitted
May 5 05:05:11 lldpd[1220]: cannot get ethtool link information with GSET (requires 2.6.19+): Operation not permitted


Also weird that I have noticed this in the log
May 5 01:05:05 kernel: bcm963xx-pcie: found core [0] Rev [ 3. 4]^M
May 5 01:05:05 kernel: pci 0000:00:00.0: of_irq_parse_pci() failed with rc=-22
May 5 01:05:05 kernel: pci 0000:01:00.0: of_irq_parse_pci() failed with rc=-22
May 5 01:05:05 kernel: bcm963xx-pcie: found core [1] Rev [ 3. 4]^M
May 5 01:05:05 kernel: pci 0001:00:00.0: of_irq_parse_pci() failed with rc=-22
May 5 01:05:05 kernel: pci 0001:01:00.0: of_irq_parse_pci() failed with rc=-22
May 5 01:05:05 kernel: bcm963xx-pcie: found core [2] Rev [ 3. 4]^M
May 5 01:05:05 kernel: bcm963xx-pcie: failed to bring up core [2] link^M

Does the AC86 have a tricore processor and they just disabled one of the cores?

Nevermind.. The second a restart_wireless was triggered on the router in 386.10 the entire router locked up... trying to flash back to 386.9 but having issues now.

Was able to flashback to 386.9 and could successfully issue a wireless_restart.. So looks like there is a serious issue in 386.10.

 

[doczenith1]

I'll add another data point. I also have some 2.4 GHz IoT devices that are experiencing disconnect issues. I'm using a AC86U on 386.10. I also have a AC68U at my parents house that is also on 386.10. I was doing some testing with the AC68U to see if the 2.4 GHz would provide better performance than the 5 GHz band in a distant bedroom using my Pixel 6 Pro. It would not stay connected to the 2.4 GHz radio. I did a full factory reset including "initialize all settings" and also" Format JFFS partition at next boot". I did a very minimal setup including setting a static wifi channel and bandwidth and the Pixel 6 Pro still wouldn't stay connected to the 2.4 GHz radio.

Edit to add that 2.4 GHz airtime fairness and all beam forming was also turned of on the AC68U and are also off on the AC86U.

 

[Languor245]

I'll add another data point. I also have some 2.4 GHz IoT devices that are experiencing disconnect issues. I'm using a AC86U on 386.10. I also have a AC68U at my parents house that is also on 386.10. I was doing some testing with the AC68U to see if the 2.4 GHz would provide better performance than the 5 GHz band in a distant bedroom using my Pixel 6 Pro. It would not stay connected to the 2.4 GHz radio. I did a full factory reset including "initialize all settings" and also" Format JFFS partition at next boot". I did a very minimal setup including setting a static wifi channel and bandwidth and the Pixel 6 Pro still wouldn't stay connected to the 2.4 GHz radio.

Edit to add that 2.4 GHz airtime fairness and all beam forming was also turned of on the AC68U and are also off on the AC86U.

Yes I still had the same issue after many resets. I turned off wifi on 68u and used a eero that isp provided for wifi 6.

 

[Eric Lieb]

Yes I still had the same issue after many resets. I turned off wifi on 68u and used a eero that isp provided for wifi 6.

I went all the way down to 7_2 and it still had issues. I just removed the AC86 from my network and using just my AX86S right now until my Aruba AP-325 comes and that will handle all of my 2.4ghz needs.

I even went to official AsusWRT latest for the AC86 and still saw constantly drop outs and disconnects. So either it is something in the source code from Asus, or the hardware is starting to fail?

 

[maxbraketorque]

I went all the way down to 7_2 and it still had issues. I just removed the AC86 from my network and using just my AX86S right now until my Aruba AP-325 comes and that will handle all of my 2.4ghz needs.

I even went to official AsusWRT latest for the AC86 and still saw constantly drop outs and disconnects. So either it is something in the source code from Asus, or the hardware is starting to fail?

I've never had trouble with 2.4 GHz on any of my four AC86Us. Either AC86U 2.4 GHz radio is failing on yours, or one of your 2.4 GHz devices is causing trouble. I suppose its also possible that some of 2.4 GHz radio settings need to be changed.

 

[heywire]

I haven't seen a response to whether you have set the 2.4ghz band to 20mhz, or if you are running the default Auto 20/40mhz?

 

[scrumb]

I've seen similar issues for a while now (AC68U), also with .9 version. This seemed to be limited to the Guest Network devices in my case. It did help to begin using Guest Network 2 instead of Guest Network 1 (can't recall where I saw this advice, but someplace in this forum)... dropped the frequency from at least once a week to about twice a month.

Finally "solved" it by just having the router reboot automatically once a week EARLY morning Sunday. Good enough until I upgrade at some point in the future.

 

[maxbraketorque]

I've seen similar issues for a while now (AC68U), also with .9 version. This seemed to be limited to the Guest Network devices in my case. It did help to begin using Guest Network 2 instead of Guest Network 1 (can't recall where I saw this advice, but someplace in this forum)... dropped the frequency from at least once a week to about twice a month.

Finally "solved" it by just having the router reboot automatically once a week EARLY morning Sunday. Good enough until I upgrade at some point in the future.

Interesting info. I'm about to switch over to using guest network #1 on my AC86Us so that I can create isolated APs. I'll have to keep an eye out for 2.4 GHz devices dropping off.

 

[Gravityz]

i have hasd similar problems when upgrading official build to 51529
i went back to 51255 and it seems stable again.
maybee check what merling build is using 51255 and try that version

 

[streetsrule]

same problem for me on 51629 on an 86u.
WAN drops for all devices, until reboot. LAN is fine. have submitted feedback via the feedback page.

 

[barrey]

Here's another data point, running 386.11 on a RT-AC86U. Had the same issue on 386.10, IIRC.

Losing all 2.4 devices on a fairly random basis.
PMF is disabled, Channel Bandwidth is 20/40 though.
Not sure if I want to go back to 386.9 but maybe?
Or just run all of my 2.4 devices on the FortiAP I have, which really seems rock-solid.

BIG TIP: Found that simply turning the 2.4 radio off and on again in Wireless>Professional>Enable Radio resolves the issue for me, all devices reconnect.
No need to reboot.
This is useful in my situation since the router is physically distant from me and I have remote access to it.

YMMV.
-B

 

[streetsrule]

my ac86u still has this issue on Version : 3.0.0.4.386_51255-g486ded6

should i upgrade to : 3.0.0.4.386_51915-g43629d2?