Asus RT-AC66R VPN issues

[asusvpn]

Hello,

A while back I got a RT-AC66R as a gift. I didn't have much use for it so I left it in the box. I have a family member that is still running an old Buffalo 802.11G router. That old Buffalo has been in use for years with no problems running DD-WRT and at one point Tomato. I thought the RT-AC66R would be a good upgrade and not bottleneck their connection like the Buffalo currently does.

I setup up the RT-AC66R and everything was fine until setting up their work laptop. The Cisco VPN that is needed connects and everything seems to work ok until trying to access any websites. If it's an internal work site it loads ok, but trying to load Google or any other external site it doesn't work.

I've tried many different firmwares from Asus and Merlin. Made sure passthrough for VPN was enabled and even tried putting the laptop in DMZ. I've searched online and have found other people with this problem but I have not found any solutions.

Not sure if it is related but in the router's log i'm seeing:
dnsmasq-dhcp[248]: Ignoring domain mw.na.cat.com for DHCP host name

It does sound like a DNS problem so it could be related.

I also have no problem with the work laptop connected with my phone's wifi hotspot. It's definitely something wrong with this router.

Unfortunately I can't simply return this router for something better as I received it a while ago. I've spent 5+ hours on this so any help would be appreciated. I'm not sure what else to try so open to any ideas.

Thanks.

 

[bbunge]

Did you do a firmware update? Might try Merlin 380.64 as it contains a lot of fixes.

 

[asusvpn]

Did you do a firmware update? Might try Merlin 380.64 as it contains a lot of fixes.

Thanks for the reply.

Unfortunately I did try the latest Merlin release and it didn't fix the problem.

 

[doczenith1]

Not sure if it is related but in the router's log i'm seeing:
dnsmasq-dhcp[248]: Ignoring domain mw.na.cat.com for DHCP host name

I get that same message as well for my work computer that is on my network that I use to vpn into work. On my old 68U on ASUS firmware I would see the small groups of that line a few times a day but now that I'm on Asuswrt-Merlin 380.64 I'm seeing many more entries like this. I'm not sure the Merlin firmware is just displaying more info than the stock firmware thus the extra entries. I'm also seeing some other entries.

Jan 4 13:06:42 dnsmasq-dhcp[1947]: DHCPREQUEST(br0) 192.168.1.208 [mac address]
Jan 4 13:06:42 dnsmasq-dhcp[1947]: Ignoring domain home.ohm-eng.com for DHCP host name [pc name]
Jan 4 13:06:42 dnsmasq-dhcp[1947]: DHCPACK(br0) 192.168.1.208 [mac address] [pc name]
Jan 4 13:06:42 dnsmasq-dhcp[1947]: DHCPREQUEST(br0) 192.168.1.208 [mac address]
Jan 4 13:06:42 dnsmasq-dhcp[1947]: Ignoring domain home.ohm-eng.com for DHCP host name [pc name]
Jan 4 13:06:42 dnsmasq-dhcp[1947]: DHCPACK(br0) 192.168.1.208 [mac address] [pc name]

Now that I look through the log I'm seeing similar entries for my other computers and phones that are on the LAN and there are hundreds of entries. I'm positive that only my work computer would show up on the stock firmware.

That said, I've had issues with my work computer on or off the VPN.