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Asus rt-ax86u 2.5g lan port

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Silentsoul

Occasional Visitor
Just had a quick question in reference the the Asus rt-ax86u. Received the router today from amazon and was trying to test if I should use the 2.5g port or Lan 1 "gaming port" for my main pc. I have a Asus Z490-e motherboard so I can take advantage of the 2.5g port but I do not really do any file transferring over the network or anything like that. With mostly playing games on this pc should I continue using the 2.5g port of use the "gaming port"? For reference we have 3 Gaming pcs (other two are wireless), a few consoles and about 10 other wireless devices that are sporadically on the network (tv's, phones, ect).

Am i correct that the "Gaming port" is basically just predefined QOS for that specific Lan port?

Some insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
 
Easy enough to test this in your specific environment.

Let us know what you discover.
 
I would assign the 2.5g port on the Asus router for use as a LAN port for your Asus Z490-e motherboard (use CAT 6 or better Ethernet cable... I prefer shielded CAT 7 or 8). I would use the gaming LAN port 1 for your most used/most important gaming console or other device requiring low latency (yes that gaming port is supposedly predefined for a low latency QoS device). I would leave all the other general QoS settings turned off which I believe is the router default setting.
 
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Tbh, a single 2.5 gbps port is useless. If you connect it with a PC having 2.5 gbps Intel or Aquantia (Marvell) card, what are you gonna transfer between router and pc? Nothing will go above 1 gbps. If you connect that port to a 2.5/5/10 gbps switch for transferring files from NAS over Wifi6 to mobile devices, you still need to buy a 2.5 gbps capable switch which would still need 3 ports to connect your NAS, PC and RT-AX86U. Switches with more than two 2.5 gbps ports cost $400 and above.
So basically you turn yourself into a joke if you are buying these overpriced routers just for 2.5 gbps ports.

PS: 2.5 and 1 gbps ports work exactly the same for gaming.I was getting exact same pings on the RT-AX86U I tried. “Gaming port” is just fancy marketing term to lure gullible first timers. Router needs to have atleast 3 above1 gbps ports to be future proof (1 WAN and 2 LAN)

RT-AX89X comes close with one 10gbps SFP+ WAN port and one 10gbps RJ45 which can be used for either WAN or LAN.
 
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So basically you turn yourself into a joke if you are buying these overpriced routers just for 2.5 gbps ports.

Depends on your setup. Ideally, you would connect a NAS to that 2.5 Gbps port, so two 1 Gbps clients could simultaneously pull files at full speed. Some areas also o ffer Internet services that are faster than 1 Gbps. Some of them use LACP, others use a multigig Ethernet port.
 
I would assign the 2.5g port on the Asus router for use as a LAN port for your Asus Z490-e motherboard (use CAT 6 or better Ethernet cable... I prefer shielded CAT 7 or 8). I would use the gaming LAN port 1 for your most used/most important gaming console or other device requiring low latency (yes that gaming port is supposedly predefined for a low latency QoS device). I would leave all the other general QoS settings turned off which I believe is the router default setting

I would assign the 2.5g port on the Asus router for use as a LAN port for your Asus Z490-e motherboard (use CAT 6 or better Ethernet cable... I prefer shielded CAT 7 or 8). I would use the gaming LAN port 1 for your most used/most important gaming console or other device requiring low latency (yes that gaming port is supposedly predefined for a low latency QoS device). I would leave all the other general QoS settings turned off which I believe is the router default setting.
How do I define the 2.5gbps port as a low latency qos device (similar to the gaming port)? I do gaming and file transfer on the same pc.
 
Actually, there are switches with 2.5 gbps and 10 gbps for less than $400.

For example, qnap has a nice 5-port 2.5 gbps switch for $109.99 (QNAP QSW-1105-5T) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08F9ZL9LY/?tag=snbforums-20

For $299, They also have a nice 4 port 10 gbps switch (with 8 1gbps ports):https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08DKSFXNW/?tag=snbforums-20

I have the latter, and it’s a champion.
Know if it has or can get rack ears for it?
Been looking for a 10Gb managed switch to simplify my networking a tad.
Currently NAS has a 1Gbx2 (LACP) to the network and a 10Gb directly to my workstation.

Also. Anyone know why all these motherboard manufacturers all of a sudden are putting 2.5Gb on their mobos?
Why be cheep? Just go to 10Gb and be done with it. I mean, only reason I can figure is heat and power consumption. They why not do 5Gb and actually do a decent step above 1Gb.
 
How do I define the 2.5gbps port as a low latency qos device (similar to the gaming port)? I do gaming and file transfer on the same pc.
I normally would use the gaming port for gaming and assign in the router settings and use the 2.5GbE port for other applications such as file transferring like you would for a normal port. If the device attached to it also supports 2.5GbE then obviously you will have a higher speed transfer on that port. Otherwise it will support whatever your device supports.

The 2.5GbE will not be manually prioritized or be forced to having main priority unless you specifically assign it manually in the router's QoS settings. However, I prefer not to enable manual QoS settings. The AX86U router seems to already do a good job detecting and optimizing automatically for different device applications like high data throughput file transfers. Data traffic for applications such as VoiP and live online gaming should be prioritized automatically by the router for low latency.

If your PC hardware supports 2.5GbE then try using that port for the PC and see how it works. Your gaming traffic should be detected and automatically optimized and prioritized by the router for low latency gaming. Your high data throughput should be automatically detected and optimized for file transfer. You can experiment with enabling the QoS settings if you choose but again you main not get results better than what the router automatically does. If your PC hardware doesn't support 2.5GbE then you could try using the gaming port instead but you may or may not be able to detect a big difference in latency. You will just have to try it out.
 
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Know if it has or can get rack ears for it?
Been looking for a 10Gb managed switch to simplify my networking a tad.
Currently NAS has a 1Gbx2 (LACP) to the network and a 10Gb directly to my workstation.

Also. Anyone know why all these motherboard manufacturers all of a sudden are putting 2.5Gb on their mobos?
Why be cheep? Just go to 10Gb and be done with it. I mean, only reason I can figure is heat and power consumption. They why not do 5Gb and actually do a decent step above 1Gb.
2.5Gb chips are less expensive than 10Gb chips. There are very few applications that require these types of speeds. It is mostly marketing. Creators will like the faster links.

Morris
 

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