aimesh worth it?

[userlee5267]

Hello all

Just bought a asus ac86u all working well. I've never had issues with not getting signal anywhere in the house it's not large.

But speeds were shocking from sky's fttp 500mb package. Was only getting 150mb to 300mb tops with the sky sr203 router.

Thought I would try a third party router and was pleasantly surprised to get 425mb.

Now i have seen a asus ax56u I would like for a good price. As I want to try the WiFi 6 out on my Xbox series x and ps5.

I would buy the asus ax86u but it's a bit pricey at the minute.

Would I benefit from using the asus ax56u as my main and the asus ac86u as a node?

Or is it not worth using nodes without dead spots?

Cheers lee

 

[bbunge]

No, The AX56U is not as good as the AC86U. Compare the specs for yourself. Second choice is RT-AX86S has most of the features of the RT-AX86U. RT-AX68U or RT-AX82U for other choices.

 

[alba666]

IMHO, stick with what you’ve got. I have an AX92 and the AC radio tops out at about the 425 you are seeing. But I have Gigabit service, so I can get up to 800 on the AX radio. If you’re looking into upgrading your internet service beyond 500, then an AX unit might make sense.

 

[Tech9]

Just bought a asus ac86u all working well.

This router has a history of hardware failures, still unresolved software issue and will never receive 388 base firmware. Return it and get AX86S instead.

 

[bbunge]

This router has a history of hardware failures, still unresolved software issue and will never receive 388 base firmware. Return it and get AX86S instead.

Guess it is not working too well.....

 

[bbunge]

I wanted to add that if you decide to keep the AC86U a good device to use as an AiMesh node is the RT-AC66U_B1 which is on sale now for $60.00 at a lot of places. Good solid hardware and it looks like it will be supported for a while yet. It is a bit slow booting up but it has good WIFI coverage.

 

[Tech9]

Guess it is not working too well.....

If you have Traffic Analyzer or Web History enabled on this router you'll find them frozen in about a month uptime. Sometimes the same happens to Client List. The issue is perhaps somewhere around this still unresolved software bug:

Stuck commands

Has anyone else observed any "stuck" commands on their router since upgrading to 386.x? Below is a frequent occurrence of the wl command getting stuck being spawned by conn_diag (this process was created at 4:10 AM). But I've also seen it happen with some nvram get commands (I once had Skynet...

www.snbforums.com

Reliability issues history means more than usual % hardware failures, not every AC86U. Some folks got lucky, others not so much. This router was excellent for its time (and if working), but not recommended as new purchase in 2023. It's a 5-years old model in unofficial End-of-Life state.

 

[userlee5267]

Cheers all. Is a node useful for me. I don't have dead spots anywhere?

 

[Tech9]

If your main router provides enough Wi-Fi coverage you don't need a node, obviously.