4th Time Resetting XT8 and ET8 combo to factory settings

[Ashitson]

I’m not sure if this is a thing or not. I apologize in advance… I’m new here. I bought my first 2 Asus ZenWifi XT8 6600 used on eBay about 3 years ago. The 2 worked ok in my 2500 sq ft home but I had some dead zones. After owning them 1 year I decided to add 1 more XT8 node. Helped for a while and was still having some connection issues. 6 months later I found a deal I couldn’t pass up on two more XT8s. At this point I have 5 XT8 nodes throughout my home. A year later I found a deal of a lifetime once again! 2 ET8s for $100, what??? Yes, $100!!! So, I reset my whole system using the ET8 as my main node connected via Ethernet to my modem. Put the second ET8 by my PS5 and ran Ethernet to it. Then strategically placed the 5 XT8s throughout my home. Stay with me here, 7 total nodes in 2500 sq ft here. Well, since I reset the whole system this last time using the ET8 as the main, I’ve ran into the problem of no internet to the main ET8 the red light tonight for the 4th time. It’s now almost 6 am and after factory resetting every node and waiting on them to add or fail, fall asleep or get frustrated, I am finished!!!! Why does this keep happening??? I did check for an update 2-3 days ago and updated all the nodes. I also, upgraded my internet Spectrum from 400 meg to the 1 gig service yesterday. I’m only getting the 1 gig speeds if it’s Ethernet straight from the modem to the computer. Over WiFi I’m still in the 400s-500s. Could this be why I lost connection once again and had to start from scratch? This time I swapped the 2 ET8s for the main. Is there a way to fix this without having to reset every node? Do I have too many nodes? Should I not be using XT8 and ET8 together? Help?

 

[RobJack]

The only reliable way to mix the ET8 and XT8 devices is via wired backhaul to ALL nodes. The wireless backhaul is incompatible due to the ET8 using WIFI 6 while the XT8 uses the 5Ghz band. Wiring all your nodes will improve your stability. And yes, as a few others have noticed, you have waaaay too much Wi-Fi in your house!

 

[bbunge]

Too much WIFI? Might there also be a reason some electronics sold used are cheap?

 

[naitkris]

1 x ET8 Router + 6 x Nodes (1 x ET8 and 5 x XT8) for a 2500 square foot area is way too much - unless you have very thick walls and poor signal at far corners but even then if one checks the page for the ASUS XT8 at https://www.asus.com/se/networking-...tem/zenwifi-wifi-systems/asus-zenwifi-ax-xt8/ it states that a pair of XT8's can cover 5500 sq.ft. (6+ rooms) while a single XT8 can cover 2750 sq.ft. (4+ rooms) - same applies for a pair of ET8's or a single ET8 (check https://www.asus.com/networking-iot...system/zenwifi-wifi-systems/asus-zenwifi-et8/).

Too many devices in the same close area and not spread apart can cause more problems than benefit. Check this video:

Unless you are using wired backhaul from the ET8 Router towards all 6 ET8/XT8 Nodes then mixing ET8's and XT8's (6GHz and 5GHz for the wireless backhaul) is not going to work very well - best to stick to same/similar devices using same WiFi standards.

 

[Ashitson]

The only reliable way to mix the ET8 and XT8 devices is via wired backhaul to ALL nodes. The wireless backhaul is incompatible due to the ET8 using WIFI 6 while the XT8 uses the 5Ghz band. Wiring all your nodes will improve your stability.i

Too much WIFI? Might there also be a reason some electronics sold used are chebap?

You may be right about being sold cheap, maybe something is wrong with it.

 

[Tech9]

Your ET8 main router has one only 5GHz radio for wireless backhaul to XT8, it's the weaker 2-stream radio and has to be shared with the clients, can't be dedicated. What you did is actually degrading the performance of the entire system. You have to check the specs first before just adding more devices. They are too many and the mix is not compatible with dedicated wireless backhaul idea behind ZenWiFi XT8/ET8 mesh sets.

 

[Ashitson]

I need WiFi in all areas of my house. There’s dead zones in the kitchen, so I put a node there, dead zones in garage so I put one there, basement, living room. The modem and main is upstairs in a bedroom in the middle. It’s not reaching those areas for whatever reason. The thick walls I’m assuming. Before this system I had a Linksys mesh system with 3 nodes. That didn’t work well either. Why would I wire the nodes together? Then I wouldn’t be able to put one in every room. When I have all 7 spaced apart it works excellent. 700-900 meg everywhere. I had a ring stick up cam on my mailbox out by the road that works perfect.

 

[Ashitson]

I have cameras everywhere as well. PCs being used for gaming, PS5

 

[Ashitson]

Ok, so I was still having issues, so I took the ET8s out of the equation. Now I only have the 5 XTs running… why is that one piggy backing off a node instead of the main?

 

[RobJack]

Ok, so I was still having issues, so I took the ET8s out of the equation. Now I only have the 5 XTs running… why is that one piggy backing off a node instead of the main?

Because it sees a stronger signal from that node. To work around this, you can "force" that node to connect to the primary by rebooting the node it is currently connected to. While that node is rebooting, your wayward node will seek another backhaul connection and should connect to the primary. Once it does, go into the wireless log on your primary and look at the RSSI levels and connection rate of all your nodes. The node that previously was daisy chained will probably show lower connection rates and an RSSI above -70. Despite this, the clients connected to that node will probably still experience better performance than they would with an extra router hop to get to the Internet.