Release Asuswrt-Merlin 386.5 is now available

[RMerlin]

Enough with the "is this firmware making my router run hotter" posts, these have been debated ad nauseam in every single release thread. Any further temperature discussions in this thread will be deleted, as being off-topic.

 

[RMerlin]

either it was an insane coincidence and my hardware failed, or something "deep" in the unit is horrendously confused.

Or it is unrelated to your router, and it is an ISP issue.

 

[Incubus32]

Or it is unrelated to your router, and it is an ISP issue.

Maybe, but it's kinda weird that this all goes away if I connect my modem directly to my PC

 

[Makaveli]

Maybe, but it's kinda weird that this all goes away if I connect my modem directly to my PC

Is it possible your ISP is doing something to the packets on their modem that isn't present on the Asus router?

Generally Packet loss is 100% from the ISP side as merlin stated.

 

[ColinTaylor]

@RMerlin Did you see this post. Is it possible to do the extra input field validation to prevent user error (assuming my understanding was correct)?

Can you confirm that the "Resolve Hostname" and "Ping Target" fields are only meant to contain a single entry. If so, perhaps they should not accept input that contains spaces. Same for the Dual WAN page.

 

[Incubus32]

Is it possible your ISP is doing something to the packets on their modem that isn't present on the Asus router?

Generally Packet loss is 100% from the ISP side as merlin stated.

Yes I agree with you, but all of these goes away if I connect my modem directly to my PC

 

[octopus]

Updated my three routers and is working just fine. Nothing to report at this moment.
Thank you RMerlin for new software.

1 days 11 hour(s) 0 minute(s) 28 seconds

 

[Rhialto]

However it seems like something ASUS needs to work with TM

Seems to me ASUS just need to remove all TM crap and their EULA.

 

[RMerlin]

@RMerlin Did you see this post. Is it possible to do the extra input field validation to prevent user error (assuming my understanding was correct)?

Maybe. There are so many input fields on the webui as a whole that I generally don't really devote time to making sure they are all doing proper input validation, as this would be a major undertaking on its own.

Same as the other user.. I'm smart enough to have plugged in directly to my modem. That's the first thing I do is to plug my desktop into my cable modem to be sure this isn't the case. I knew in my posts I would have to list every detail or I'd get replies like this. I'll be more thorough in the future.

You need to troubleshoot using tools like ping and traceroute to determine at which hop the packet losses are occurring. The reason I mention ISP issues as a possibility is because many times in the past when someone posted on these forums about packet losses, the issue ended up being an ISP, modem, or Ethernet cabling issue rather than a firmware issue. Packet routing is a very basic feature on the router, and any major issue there would impact virtually everyone if there really was an issue. You need to test for the more likely causes before looking at the least likely one.

Plugging a computer directly into a modem does not confirm the router's firmware is responsible. It can still be an Ethernet cabling issue. Or an Ethernet port issue. Or a modem issue. Or an ISP fiddling with packets TTL. Or the ISP not liking the router's MAC, which will be different from the PC's MAC (in the case of cable providers for instance, you have to power off the modem for 10-20 minutes when using a different Ethernet client on the modem's LAN port to request the DHCP lease). Or a misconfigured MTU within your network or your router. Or a VPN client you forgot you had configured on the router (yes, that actually happened at least once in the past).

Removing the router is just one test, it does not confirm there is a firmware issue with it.

 

[mmacedo]

Same as the other user.. I'm smart enough to have plugged in directly to my modem. That's the first thing I do is to plug my desktop into my cable modem to be sure this isn't the case. I knew in my posts I would have to list every detail or I'd get replies like this. I'll be more thorough in the future.

Hi Yenic, I have the same router as you running on 386.5 without any issues. BTW, if there's anyone on this forum I would follow advice regarding networking without thinking twice it is from RMerlin.

 

[Damit1]

Because I saw this mentioned earlier I do like to ask- JFFS partition- why does it need to be formatted for?
Should I format it from time to time?
Any more knowledge about this JFFS partition formatting?

 

[laracroftonline]

Everything works fine so far! my ac5300 and ac68 are happy.

 

[ColinTaylor]

Because I saw this mentioned earlier I do like to ask- JFFS partition- why does it need to be formatted for?
Should I format it from time to time?
Any more knowledge about this JFFS partition formatting?

Just like any other filesystem you would only want to format it if it becomes corrupted or you want to erase it's contents.

 

[Damit1]

Just like any other filesystem you would only want to format it if it becomes corrupted or you want to erase it's contents.

So I understand, if everything works as expected, no need to format anything.

If it ain't broke, do not fix it.
Thank you

 

[SwampKracker]

BTW that doesn't prove anything, as I never claimed my issue is specific to all 66U_B1s. It's a false premise to assume that I'm blaming the firmware or router.
What I've suggested is that my hardware either went bad by coincidence going from 386.4->386.5, or there's something that needs a cleansing my router's memory. I noted when I did a factory reset after going back to 386.3_2, my Wake On Lan settings were still there. So something isn't quite right. I appreciate all advice, as one guy suggested reflashing- that has been helpful.

I get the point RMerlin was making- it was a general statement against being narrowminded on the solution. And it's a point well taken by me. As when you go through each one, ethernet cable? Same cable, working fine direct to the modem. Makes sense that wouldn't be it. Ethernet port? Does the same speed/latency issues on wifi. For my changes, I do nothing custom- no scripts, other than standard changes, all I do is enable secure DNS. Disabling it changes nothing in regards to my router. What does make sense for me to do is the trace route, I'm willing to bet it's lagging around 192.168.1.1.. but I'll go for it and report back.

Many years ago, I had very similar issues with an Asus router. It was resolved by flashing an entirely different firmware (Tomato) and then going back to Asuswrt. That required the Restoration Tool (though I don't think it existed at that time, and I had to use something else). And things were no longer wonky.

I'm open to any and all suggestions, I'll do them. I've flashed from 386.3_2->386.4->386.5->386.3_2->386.5. Each of those steps with a factory reset and reconfig by hand. I'd stand on my head at this point to fix this.

One thing I want to try is the Asus Restoration Tool after work. I'm hoping that essentially does bit by bit deletion of the memory space, and then does a verification after install for the firmware of my choice. Whatever it does to restore borked routers can't hurt the state mine may be in. And I'll do some packet tracing.

I had a slowly dying router drive me nuts for months. The only indication I had of a problem was dropped packets, occasionally. Other than having a known working spare for comparison, which is how I finally figured out the problem, subtle hardware problems can be annoying.

 

[ColinTaylor]

I noted when I did a factory reset after going back to 386.3_2, my Wake On Lan settings were still there. So something isn't quite right.

This was also the case with the other user that appeared to be having issues, @Incubus32. He said he was doing factory resets after flashing each firmware but on further questioning it obviously wasn't actually happening. That effectively negated all of his testing. Maybe if the factory resets had worked things would have been resolved by now.

 

[jata]

Competed a clean/new/WPS method update to 386.5 generally all good yesterday. This morning the internet was down and had to reboot my router to get it up. Modem was on and working fine. Is it possible this is the glitch where the NRAM for the site that the router pings/checks need to be updated.

I read about it in a beta but can't find the info. Any help appreciated

 

[jata]

another issue I have is that i can't switch back to stock on my AX3000 (Aimesh node) from 386.5. Any stock f/w fails to install. I can install any merlin f/w on it. I am definitely using the correct model image (RT-AX3000)

 

[rlucho]

Updated both of my AX11000 from 386.3_2 to 386.5 without problems, BUT i checking things and connecting dots i saw that i lost my dual wan connection since 386.3_2, i knew it wasn't working but i though it was because of a factory reset on the secundary ISP router, now that i updated i went to config the whole thing again, and it doesnt work, my sencondary ISP/connection doens't work, so looking for some answer i went to a TG group of ASUS and a very nice guy was using Dual Wan config too but in Failover (i have it set to load Balancer), he though his setup was working but doing some test with me he realized that it's not working, his secondary connection doesn't work just like mine, so i wanted to ask if someone here is using Dual Wan setup (2 ISP by PPPoE), im using Vodafone and Movistar from spain, and had it working for almost a year, i have the speed test history were i can see my speeds were 1500mbps so 600bm from main connection and 1GB from secondary. So i know it was working perfectly fine, at some point the asus software (NOT MERLIN) did something and now doesn't work, maybe someone with more knowledge can check this and maybe merlin can get Asus to check that. Thanks in advance!

 

[RMerlin]

That's kind of where I'm at. I think it's failing.. but I want to try everything I can first. I wouldn't be desperate if the AXE16000 was on the market already. Q1, has to be imminent.

Check with traceroute and ping to determine at which hop packets are getting lost.