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AC88U - 2.4G Network Not Working

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Well everyone..I do believe I have finally identified my issue once and for all.. so here it is..Arnd 6AM or so.woke up. Wired up old router again in office. With nothing else plugged in.Internet was great on the 2.4ghz network. Plugged in my ethernet cable from my hub across the room. Worked great for a few minutes then noticed it dropping off. Now Ill fall on the sword now. The way I had everything sitting by the hub was not optimal.

I had my Hub sitting about 6 inches from my computer case.

Hub plugged in, Internet got sketchy on 2.4 almost immediately. Hub unplugged, internet came back and was stable with no issue.Plugged it back in, terrible. Thinking it was the cable, i changed it. Didn't fix it.

I think moved the hub to about 2 feet away from my computer case. plugged it back in. No internet issues so far.

So what I think was happening.

With Hub sitting that close to computer case, it was causing interference of some sort down the ethernet cable. Which was being passed into the router, and only affecting 2.4ghz network. My wired connection was fine and 5g was fine.

Again, Im no electrical engineer or even remotely close to it. My experience is wiring up a few sockets, plugging in a volt meter to check things etc etc. But I am aware that interference can be generated from other electrical sources and passed down a line, basically creating a giant antennae.

What do you guys think. Am I close enough for government work?

All I can say is, with hub moved away from the computer case, everything is working as it should..
 
Great detective work there Steve!

PC's radiate a lot of RF interference within about a foot radius. So it sounds like some of it is being induced into the hub/cable and travelling back to the router. Wow.

USB 3 interfaces are a known source of interference on 2.4GHz, CPU's and GPU's can also create interference either directly or on harmonic frequencies. Hopefully a small bit of rearranging will sort out the problem.

P.S. A "hub", really? I didn't think they made those anymore.:eek:
 
Great detective work there Steve!

PC's radiate a lot of RF interference within about a foot radius. So it sounds like some of it is being induced into the hub/cable and travelling back to the router. Wow.

USB 3 interfaces are a known source of interference on 2.4GHz, CPU's and GPU's can also create interference either directly or on harmonic frequencies. Hopefully a small bit of rearranging will sort out the problem.

P.S. A "hub", really? I didn't think they made those anymore.:eek:


My apologies,its actually a gigabit switch,not hub.LOL

So Ive gone and done some more trouble shooting.I connected directly to my desktop then to the router. I actually now believe it is the desktop causing the issue. Latest round of troubleshooting..

Power chord plugged into the desktop, desktop shut down, plugged ethernet cable into desktop , 2.4g wifi internet gone.

Unplugged power chord from desktop, plugged in ethernet cable to desktop, 2.4g wifi is fine with internet access.

So the troubleshooting continues...
 
Power chord plugged into the desktop, desktop shut down, plugged ethernet cable into desktop , 2.4g wifi internet gone.

Unplugged power chord from desktop, plugged in ethernet cable to desktop, 2.4g wifi is fine with internet access.
Ground loop? Check both the PC and the router end.

Edit: I think you said you had a UPS? Try removing that and seeing if it makes a difference.
 
Ground loop? Check both the PC and the router end.

Edit: I think you said you had a UPS? Try removing that and seeing if it makes a difference.

Sorry dont mean for this to turn into a PC thread. but may be useful for other people trying to figure out interference issues with their wifi

Yeah the UPS is actually powering the network equipment, IE, the modem and router. The PC's are about 7 - 8 feet away. and not plugged into the UPS.

latest troubleshooting. Its narrowed to the PC.

PC plugged directly to wall outlet. Wall outlet putting out 117.
With everything plugged into computer, computer hooked to router directly and computer powered up, internet on 2.4g dropped out in about 2 - 3 minutes.

So, I have moved to the next level of troubleshooting. I have unplugged every device from computer. Including monitor.
Plugged directly into router, computer still powered up, i have so far been connected to internet on 2.4g via laptop for 6 minutes, with no issues. i will slowly start plugging items back into their ports on the computer, until I lose internet again.

More to come.
 
Okay, so here it is. After toying with this for the last few days. I have found the culprit. At least what appears to be the culprit as of now.

As I stated above. I disconnected everything from the computer. Started plugging it all back in in the following order, waiting several minutes between devices to ensure I didnt get discod from 2.4g network

1 - Monitor
2 - bluetooth device for keyboard and mouse (1 usb slot away from ethernet port)
3 - Printer right next to ethernet port. At this point I lost my connection after 3 minutes on 2.4g network. Unplugged it, and within moments 2.4g had internet again.
4 - Moved bluetooth adapter next to ethernet port - Internet is fine
5 - Connected Webcam next to bluetooth Adapter - internet is fine
6 - plugged computer speakers in - Internet is fine
7 - Connected computer to switch, switch to Router - internet is fine
8 - Hooked printer usb back up to a usb port, this time the furthest 1 from ethernet jack - Internet is fine.

So far so good, it appears that plugging the USB cable from printer into the port closest to Ethernet jack was causing my issue. AT least at this time. I will update in a few hours if everything has continued to be stable..

Stay tuned...
 
Thanks Steve,

this is like reading a good detective novel when I was a teenager, and always thinking Ah! I know who the killer is now. :)
 
Thanks Steve,

this is like reading a good detective novel when I was a teenager, and always thinking Ah! I know who the killer is now. :)


Sorry everyone for all the false starts and continued troubleshooting.

Hope this helps someone in the future. As the interference might not be as easy to identify.

I guess the lesson learned, remove everything from router, and start with a clean slate, then work your way back 1 by 1. This issue baffled me for several days. But I think I have it resolved.
 
Okay, so here it is. After toying with this for the last few days. I have found the culprit. At least what appears to be the culprit as of now.

As I stated above. I disconnected everything from the computer. Started plugging it all back in in the following order, waiting several minutes between devices to ensure I didnt get discod from 2.4g network

1 - Monitor
2 - bluetooth device for keyboard and mouse (1 usb slot away from ethernet port)
3 - Printer right next to ethernet port. At this point I lost my connection after 3 minutes on 2.4g network. Unplugged it, and within moments 2.4g had internet again.
4 - Moved bluetooth adapter next to ethernet port - Internet is fine
5 - Connected Webcam next to bluetooth Adapter - internet is fine
6 - plugged computer speakers in - Internet is fine
7 - Connected computer to switch, switch to Router - internet is fine
8 - Hooked printer usb back up to a usb port, this time the furthest 1 from ethernet jack - Internet is fine.

So far so good, it appears that plugging the USB cable from printer into the port closest to Ethernet jack was causing my issue. AT least at this time. I will update in a few hours if everything has continued to be stable..

Stay tuned...

USB 3.0 or 2.0 ?
 
USB 3.0 or 2.0 ?

Believe it or not, 2.0. I know it is 3.0 that has shown to cause issues with WIFI. However there is no doubt, I tried it a few different times, it was definitely the printer causing the problem...

As of right now, 2.4g on AC88U is running better than ever.
 
Has this resolved your heat issue as well? You mentioned both routers were running cooler in another room.

That's so interesting to me that a USB device kills one band and not the other. I wonder what's happening to cause this! If you could crack open the router and shield the USB port better would it solve this? Just thinking out loud, I'm not advocating voiding your warranty.

If your printer has an RJ-45 ethernet port on it I recommend connecting it to the router that way. I've never had much luck with ASUS' USB printer sharing.
 
Has this resolved your heat issue as well? You mentioned both routers were running cooler in another room.

That's so interesting to me that a USB device kills one band and not the other. I wonder what's happening to cause this! If you could crack open the router and shield the USB port better would it solve this? Just thinking out loud, I'm not advocating voiding your warranty.

If your printer has an RJ-45 ethernet port on it I recommend connecting it to the router that way. I've never had much luck with ASUS' USB printer sharing.


The router is running as cool as if i just turned it on. No where near the heat it was running at yesterday, it is literally cool to the touch.

No the printer doesnt have an RJ45. And by the way, the printer was plugged into my desktop usb port. Not the router. Im just happy to have a stable network now after lots of troubleshooting. The USB port that the printer was plugged into originally is right next to the ethernet port. I understand it is only USB2.0, however maybe that port has gone haywire or something and was causing some kind of interference with the ethernet port. I know Im probably reaching here, but its the only thing I can come up with to be honest.

The network has been running solid all day. Minus me doing things to the router to set it up for my home again. IE, adding thermostat , ip cameras, etc etc..

I hope this thread helps someone in the future.
 
I was excited to find this post because I have the same exact symptoms - my router's firmware updated a couple of nights ago and all has been wonky since....

The first thing that I noticed was that all wireless devices were not working, although WPS worked on devices that supported it. I tried rolling the firmware back and then back forward.

Then I noticed that my internet speed was being capped at 7MB down, I plugged directly into the modem and the speeds behind it were fine, I noticed some of the UI seemed to be swapped around with Download vs Upload like the network/bandwidth monitor (swear the download used to be on the left and the upload on the right) I switched the QoS Upload and Download values and then I got my speeds back...
http://screencast.com/t/opP1rreGzVZC

So any device that supports 5g is working fine but 2.4 will not work :(
I haven't been able to get my chromecast to work, I've spent way too much time troubleshooting it to find out that if I renamed my two networks it's just the 2.4 that's not working and the chromecast is fine I assume since if I try to connect to explicitly the 2.4 with my phone it will not work either.

It's been hard to troubleshoot since there's 2 other people who are using the internet for gaming and finals right now. I wish your fix wasn't what it was,, but it sounds like I'll need to factory reset.

Does anyone know if I factory reset if loading up a backup of the settings would be bad? I guess there's only one way to find out...

Edit: oh yeah another really weird thing was that when I got back on day 1 everyone else had internet except me, there were no lights on port1 for the router, but if I plugged into a different port it was fine. I finally got a chance to reboot the router that day and it fixed port 1 at the time.
 
Last edited:
I was excited to find this post because I have the same exact symptoms - my router's firmware updated a couple of nights ago and all has been wonky since....

The first thing that I noticed was that all wireless devices were not working, although WPS worked on devices that supported it. I tried rolling the firmware back and then back forward.

Then I noticed that my internet speed was being capped at 7MB down, I plugged directly into the modem and the speeds behind it were fine, I noticed some of the UI seemed to be swapped around with Download vs Upload like the network/bandwidth monitor (swear the download used to be on the left and the upload on the right) I switched the QoS Upload and Download values and then I got my speeds back...
http://screencast.com/t/opP1rreGzVZC

So any device that supports 5g is working fine but 2.4 will not work :(
I haven't been able to get my chromecast to work, I've spent way too much time troubleshooting it to find out that if I renamed my two networks it's just the 2.4 that's not working and the chromecast is fine I assume since if I try to connect to explicitly the 2.4 with my phone it will not work either.

It's been hard to troubleshoot since there's 2 other people who are using the internet for gaming and finals right now. I wish your fix wasn't what it was,, but it sounds like I'll need to factory reset.

Does anyone know if I factory reset if loading up a backup of the settings would be bad? I guess there's only one way to find out...

Edit: oh yeah another really weird thing was that when I got back on day 1 everyone else had internet except me, there were no lights on port1 for the router, but if I plugged into a different port it was fine. I finally got a chance to reboot the router that day and it fixed port 1 at the time.


Well CTS_AE. I know its difficult to do some trouble shooting with other people needing the router. But when you have time, I would try disconnecting anything hardwired to the router and start from there, and possibly try moving the router to another room away from things. Even if you dont have internet you can see if you can at least connect to the 2.4g network. I spent several days trying to do everything that was suggested. As Ive learned, interference can manifest down the ethernet cables attached to router from a computer or USB port. I would not have thought about that initially. And it took lots of back and forth to finally pinpoint it. If you can connect to the router with nothing plugged into it, Start adding 1 device at a time, until the issue shows its ugly head again. I finally realized it was something in the room the router was in, when I moved the router to another room, plugged it in and boom, my phone and laptop both connected on 2.4g within seconds..

It is a PITA, but save your self some time before you go thru upgrading, downgrading, flashing firmwares, rebooting, hard resetting. If you go down the route I went with disconnecting everything, One other thing I did was start with a fresh firmware. Right from the start. Even left my network open for the short time to see if I could connect and hold a signal. Then little bit at a time I added security, changed the admin password. It is tedious, but could save you lots of time doing other things. And if none of it works, at least you know you did all the basic troubleshooting up front and can go down other roads.

As Ive learned, sometimes the simplest answer is the right one.

Everything I have read says, if you hard reset dont load up the old settings, as it could bring the issue back as the issue maybe in your settings or something wonky like that.

BTW, what firmware are you currently running on, so the rest of the forum knows and maybe can help you..
 
Update - 20160312

Well everyone, I am happy to say, that the router is running like a champ. It is actually faster than in the first 6 weeks of use. Which makes me think I may have had problems that I just never noticed initially and then it finally reached its breaking point.

So as of right now, router is still cool to the touch. I am placing the laptop cooling pad back under it, just for simple fact its better to run cool than warm. Even though the case is still cool to the touch,
2.4g network is rock solid so far. Something I noticed last, while walking the pup, i was a good 5 houses down from my house, which probably equates to around 300 - 400 feet, and I was still connected to my 2.4g network. I was actually shocked,so much so, i started surfing the internet to make sure it was real. sure enough, i had 2 bars on my wifi, and the speed was great. I even disconnected from my wifi and reconnected to it as if I was sitting in my office.
My 2.4g network is now running the way it should as of right now. Even wife thinks Im a hero, shhhhh dont tell her, LOL, before i said anything, she mentioned how much quicker the internet in the house was...

So thanks everyone for the comments. Hopefully issue is resolved completely, but only time will tell over the next several days and weeks to come.. But as of right now, this router is running like a 300 dollar router should.
 
Update - 20160312

Well everyone, I am happy to say, that the router is running like a champ. It is actually faster than in the first 6 weeks of use. Which makes me think I may have had problems that I just never noticed initially and then it finally reached its breaking point.

So as of right now, router is still cool to the touch. I am placing the laptop cooling pad back under it, just for simple fact its better to run cool than warm. Even though the case is still cool to the touch,
2.4g network is rock solid so far. Something I noticed last, while walking the pup, i was a good 5 houses down from my house, which probably equates to around 300 - 400 feet, and I was still connected to my 2.4g network. I was actually shocked,so much so, i started surfing the internet to make sure it was real. sure enough, i had 2 bars on my wifi, and the speed was great. I even disconnected from my wifi and reconnected to it as if I was sitting in my office.
My 2.4g network is now running the way it should as of right now. Even wife thinks Im a hero, shhhhh dont tell her, LOL, before i said anything, she mentioned how much quicker the internet in the house was...

So thanks everyone for the comments. Hopefully issue is resolved completely, but only time will tell over the next several days and weeks to come.. But as of right now, this router is running like a 300 dollar router should.

I was also able to rescue my router from the dead. To think it's almost Easter..... Perhaps there is some significance there?
 
My router is actually a RT-AC68P running 3.0.0.4.380_1842

Also I can still connect to the 2.4 connection (Seems to be a good signal & bars), but there's just no internet connection/access, while if you connect to the 5g you're able to access the internet just fine.

I did notice when the 1st port on the router wasn't working that my computer's ethernet slot would stop lighting up, or at times it would be red which I didn't even know it could do :p (thought it had just amber & green)

Edit:
all the devices that support 5g are jumping over to it (which normally isn't the case) because they realize that the 2.4 doesn't have internet access: http://screencast.com/t/hjJhNut48WLF . I run the same SSID for the 2.4 and 5g connection, but I did try renaming them which helped me determine that it's just the 2.4 connection that's not working. For a while I thought it was the router having some weird client leasing issues since our ipads and phones worked while other devices like the chromecast didn't work; after factory resetting the chromecast a few times and moving it around I believe that's not the problem.

I will have to try out plugging in devices one at a time when I have time; today is going to be too busy of a day : (

Edit2:
I noticed this yesterday: http://screencast.com/t/AHehcvea
the time seems to keep defaulting back to a July 31 and then it hits the time server and gets the proper time, I did just see that the time zone was set incorrectly, so maybe that will help out /shrug
Does this happen every restart or firmware update?
 
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My router is actually a RT-AC68P running 3.0.0.4.380_1842

Also I can still connect to the 2.4 connection (Seems to be a good signal & bars), but there's just no internet connection/access, while if you connect to the 5g you're able to access the internet just fine.

I did notice when the 1st port on the router wasn't working that my computer's ethernet slot would stop lighting up, or at times it would be red which I didn't even know it could do :p (thought it had just amber & green)

Edit:
all the devices that support 5g are jumping over to it (which normally isn't the case) because they realize that the 2.4 doesn't have internet access: http://screencast.com/t/hjJhNut48WLF . I run the same SSID for the 2.4 and 5g connection, but I did try renaming them which helped me determine that it's just the 2.4 connection that's not working. For a while I thought it was the router having some weird client leasing issues since our ipads and phones worked while other devices like the chromecast didn't work; after factory resetting the chromecast a few times and moving it around I believe that's not the problem.

I will have to try out plugging in devices one at a time when I have time; today is going to be too busy of a day : (

Edit2:
I noticed this yesterday: http://screencast.com/t/AHehcvea
the time seems to keep defaulting back to a July 31 and then it hits the time server and gets the proper time, I did just see that the time zone was set incorrectly, so maybe that will help out /shrug
Does this happen every restart or firmware update?


I would definitely try the unplug everything from the router, make sure you can connect on the 2.4g to the router.
Then add in your modem and nothing else. Do whatever you need to do to get the router to recognize the internet.
Dont plug anything else in and see if you can hit the internet via the 2.4g network. I would give it a solid 15 minutes before you begin adding anything it. In between each one I would wait 10 - 15 minutes to be honest.

One thing you might want to try is to leave the security on 2.4g set to open at first. dont add in a password. Originally when I had my issues, I couldnt connect to 2.4g at all. However if I opened the security to it, I was able to connect. I had lots of odd issues to be honest. All narrowed down to the usb ports on my computer.
 
I did a factory reset and starting throwing my settings back into the router.

It seems that the 2.4 network was working until I enabled QoS
I enjoy using QoS even though I hear a lot of people say things like, "QoS is useless on consumer-grade hardware/software" Maybe we're past those times now - it seemed my $40 Netgear's QoS worked fine and I felt that QoS on this router worked fine as well - although I did need to hard limit the roomate's torrent connections. Plus your bring up the point enough too: these routers are steps above the $40 walmart routers.

Maybe when I get more time I'll try rolling back to the last firmware and playing around with QoS as well as seeing if the interface changed like I think it did..
 

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