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Asus USB-AC68 Wifi adapter Region locked & Speed Limit

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Sachb

Senior Member
Hi friends, so I had bought an USB-AC68 Wifi adapter few months back cause the wifi on my old laptop was broken.

Since the day I purchased this adapter, I had these issues:

1) Speed is limited to 230 mbps, sometimes reaches the maximum of 532 mbps. Driver bugged?

2) Channels 149-165 are not seen, since my D-link is running on 149 it doesn't pick that signal up.

3) Gets really hot

People praise for Asus products, I believe they too are in the same bandwagon of having bugs.
 
3) Gets really hot

It may be defective or malfunctioning in your USB port. Try it on another port. Make sure the port is clean.

I installed one a year ago and it worked just fine. Connected right up at 866 Mbps AC.

You should have exchanged it when you first got it.

OE
 
It may be defective or malfunctioning in your USB port. Try it on another port. Make sure the port is clean.

I installed one a year ago and it worked just fine. Connected right up at 866 Mbps AC.

You should have exchanged it when you first got it.

OE

Seems to work well on my SS enable laptop port but I'll have to do more testing with Realtek's driver. I'm connected at 1.3 gbps but the speed gets capped at 230 mbps.

Is there a code to unlock upper band channels on 5 ghz i.e channel 141-165. I read a thread about the PCE AC68 with broadcom chipset which can be unlocked by editing the Driver.inf file.

Since this is a Realtek 8814au chipset, I was hoping that there would be a similar way to do it on the ASUS USB-AC68.
 
What region was the adapter purchased in?

P.S. You need to update your signature. You no longer "need help here".
 
What region was the adapter purchased in?

P.S. You need to update your signature. You no longer "need help here".
Ok, I'll edit my signature.

It was purchased in Middle East, but I'm using Dlink's Firmware where 141-165 is accesible, which was purchased in the same region. I remember I had the AC68U and I could choose channel 141-165 easily.

I don't know why would ASUS lock the upper band channels for the adapter while giving access to the channels on the router.
 
Looking at the chipset driver downloaded from Realtek it appears to use the region settings that Windows is configured for. So I'm guessing in whatever region Windows is set up for those channels are not allowed.
 
Looking at the chipset driver downloaded from Realtek it appears to use the region settings that Windows is configured for. So I'm guessing in whatever region Windows is set up for those channels are not allowed.
Any way to force it to global, or fool the driver to recognise the region as US ?

I'll try setting the region to US also.

Sent from my LM-G710 using Tapatalk
 
I don't think that "Middle East" is a Windows country. AFAIK countries like Saudi Arabia use the ETSI WiFi channels. So that would explain why you can't get channels above 140.
Yes set on UAE

Sent from my LM-G710 using Tapatalk
 
I don't think that "Middle East" is a Windows country. AFAIK countries like Saudi Arabia use the ETSI WiFi channels. So that would explain why you can't get channels above 140.
So do you think there is workaround for it? I tried the US firmware too but with same results, it won't detect upper band.




Sent from my LM-G710 using Tapatalk
 
As an experiment did you try changing the region of Windows to US (and rebooting) to see if that made a difference?
 
As an experiment did you try changing the region of Windows to US (and rebooting) to see if that made a difference?
Omg... That actually worked... I've changed the region to US & now it works, I'm connected to it.:)

You're really a genius human being.

Proof :

Asus USB-AC68 Unlocked.jpg


Dlink 5G connected.jpg
 
Well that's interesting.

Of course that might not fix your problems with slow speeds and overheating. Time will tell.
 
Seems to work well on my SS enable laptop port but I'll have to do more testing with Realtek's driver. I'm connected at 1.3 gbps but the speed gets capped at 230 mbps.

So, not getting really hot?

Connecting at 1.3 Gbps seems very good! Turns out I was thinking of the USB-AC53 Nano, so I have not used the USB-AC68 adapter. Sorry, my bad memory.

OE
 
So, not getting really hot?

Connecting at 1.3 Gbps seems very good! Turns out I was thinking of the USB-AC53 Nano, so I have not used the USB-AC68 adapter. Sorry, my bad memory.

OE
My link speed is 1.3 gbps but the actual throughput is low.
Even my laptop connected at 433 mbps get better throughput.

Seems like Asus really screwed up their Wifi adapters.

Laptop connected at 433 mbps gets around 336 mbps on speed test.

USB AC68 connected at 1.3 gbps gets only around 230 mbps.

If i re install the Asus Utility it gets back to normal.

Sent from my LM-G710 using Tapatalk
 
Last edited:
Well that's interesting.

Of course that might not fix your problems with slow speeds and overheating. Time will tell.

Now that, the workaround has been found for the Region thing, how can I solve the Speed limit (230 mbps)? This only happens the moment I restart my computer or disconnect the USB-AC68. I have to reinstall the ASUS Utility client to get the Max speeds of 530 mbps.

Perhaps, it's a manufacturing defect by Asus.
 
@K-2SO it is not a USB 2.0 limitation as he already states he gets 530Mbps normally.

@Sachb why are you uninstalling the Asus Utility client? :)
 

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