Asus Zen XT8 (3.0.0.4) 5ghz gone bad

[defmc]

Hi,

Im having issues with 5g connection between my new Macbook M1 Pro, and my relatively new Zen XT8 router (not mesh). It used to be great — I could sit anywhere in my apartment (and ie. play cloud gaming on 4k) without issues. My ISP gives me 1000/1000mbs, and I used to get approximately 800mbs up and down on average, measuring on speedtest.net over 5g (sitting about 5 feet away from the router in the same room).

Lately im hardly pushing 500mbs on speedtest over 5ghz (measuring over ethernet is fine, so its not my ISP), and cloud gaming gives me horrible performance. Im actually getting more stuttering on 5g than 2g, and Im wondering if this started happening after upgrading the firmware.

So my questions are:

1 Could the latest firmware have given me worse performance over 5g? And if so, how can I downgrade or confirm this?
2 If its not the firmware, what else could it be? Why am I only getting half the speed over 5ghz that I used to get a couple of weeks ago — even though im sitting right next to my router/same location?
3 When looking at the tx rate while ie. cloud gaming, it starts to fluctuate alot after a while. Is this an indicator that something is wrong?

I know that interference is a thing, but just makes no sense to me that this would suddenly become a problem — having lived here a year without experiencing this until the last two weeks. Also to reiterate: Moving almost on top of my router when doing these tests does not change anything. I could sit in another room just fine. But now speed is bad and connection quality is horrible compared to just a couple of weeks ago (as ie. experienced when cloud gaming; showing constant stuttering and getting bad connection-notifications. It used to run flawlessly).

Any hints/tips much appreciated.

 

[defmc]

Heres a screenshot of my Macbook wifi-details when connected to the XT8:

There is no indication for me that there is anything wrong here. Screenshot is taken with little to no network traffic. As soon as I start doing something that uses a lot of bandwidth, the txrate drops — sometimes below 50. Is that normal?

 

[L&LD]

Can you test with any other laptop instead of Apple?

Are there any settings you can adjust in the MB's wireless config?

Is everything up to date on all the equipment you're using to test with? Does a reboot of all interconnected equipment help?

Testing 'almost on top of the router' isn't recommended. Use your devices at least 10' (about 3M) from the router for best throughput and stability.

In a wireless environment, the only constant is, change. Whether we realize it or not. New neighbors, new commercial projects (temporary or permanent), or non-WiFi sources of interference (including government sources) all constantly affect our networks in seemingly inexplicable ways.

Are you using DFS channels? Have you tried different control channel(s)?

If flashing the previous firmware fixes your issues, I would be more inclined to then test flashing the latest firmware again and doing a full reset (rather than staying on outdated firmware).

HTH.

 

[RogerSC]

My inclination would be to get off the DFS channels...set the 5GHz. channel width to 80MHz., and choose channels in the lower 5GHz. and upper 5GHz. and avoid those in between. So actually select control channels and channel bandwidths, rather than having 160MHz. enabled and using "auto" to allow the router to select these settings.

I've had problems using DFS around here, you might be having similar problems. I did look up the situation in Norway, and it looks similar to ours here. Asus has a write-up for Norway about understanding and dealing with DFS channels that I ran into:

[Wireless Router] What is DFS (Dynamic Frequency Selection) and how does it work on ASUS router? | Offisiell kundestøtte | ASUS Norge