AX product Wi-Fi connection limits

[CaptainSTX]

No, the configuration of the RT-AC66U is exactly the same WPA2 and AES password as I was using on the RT-AX88U.

But it probably isn't both AES-TKIP. Some older devices want/require the TKIP piece which some current routers such as my AX88Pro running Merlin doesn't provide. The newer routers that seem to still provide AES-TKIP are ISP provided routers.

 

[vit5421]

But it probably isn't both AES-TKIP. Some older devices want/require the TKIP piece which some current routers such as my AX88Pro running Merlin doesn't provide. The newer routers that seem to still provide AES-TKIP are ISP provided routers.

Did you try wpa/wpa2 personal in order to select tkip+AES encryption?

 

[CaptainSTX]

Did you try wpa/wpa2 personal in order to select tkip+AES encryption?

Yes, but when you make this choice then hit apply it reverts to AES only. To confirm that it is only AES you can use a Wi-Fi scanner app and it will show that SSID is in fact AES only. During the alpha and beta releases I reported this behavior to Merlin and suggested if not possible or desirable to actually enable TKIP that he remove the option from the pull down list.

 

[sfx2000]

Most consumer router/AP's are going to hit a hard limit on the number of clients per radio...

General rule of thumb here is 32 clients per radio, and something used for network planning.

 

[IanSav]

In my case, as I mentioned before, every device is capable of connecting to the network. The issues appear to relate to the number of devices connecting.

I am now working with ASUS to try and identify the issue.

 

[IanSav]

ASUS have stopped responding to this issue. They requested many changes to my settings to simplify the Wi-Fi complexity but nothing helped.

If anyone has more suggestions they would be welcomed.

 

[Tech9]

Your network's capabilities have to correspond to the number of client devices you plan to have. With 90-100 devices already - see post #14 and plan your next network upgrade accordingly. Just adding more Wi-Fi in form of consumer mesh pods, nodes, satellites with limited client support per radio and all sharing the same channels won't help.

 

[Ronald Schwerer]

@IanSav any updates or solutions to this issue? I've got a similar issue. About 60+ clients total, with 50 IoT on AIMesh IOT. I've even had times where I couldn't connect to the mesh SSID using my phone, even though I could easily connect to the main SSID (same 2.4 channel) immediately. I was trying to troubleshoot some dropped wireless cameras near the fringes of my property. The cameras (all TP-Link Tapo) had been working flawlessly until a long power outage last week. However I did just recently add a Tapo 4K camera that uses 5GHz band and a Tapo H500 Smart HomeBase to offload some of the video data bandwidth using a separate sub-G band (proprietary AFAIK). The camera can switch to the sub G band when the primary SSID is having problems.

I've tried utilizing my old RT-AC68U's as AiMesh nodes, but I know that isn't going to be a good permanent solution. I'm about to reconfigure a couple as APs.

As an interim solution I've been moving many of the Iot stuff to the 2.4 base SSID. They have been working much better.

Anyway, you left us hanging back in July. I'm sure your problem isn't unique.

 

[Tech9]

You may want to describe your system better, @Ronald Schwerer. About 60 clients on <something> AiMesh with few old routers as "nodes" doesn't say enough even for suggestions. Your old routers have just basic AiMesh compatibility in 2025.

 

[Ronald Schwerer]

Yes, I agree. For starters I was just trying to solicit from @IanSav an update on what he's learned or accomplished. I was reluctant to jump in with my problems because - well it gets complicated. And I don't want to hijack this thread.
I've got a few things to try when I get time. If that doesn't work-out, I'll be back. Meanwhile, nobody's gonna die if my landscape lights don't come on or the lawn sprinkler doesn't work. The important stuff that isn't on the IoT guest work fine.

 

[IanSav]

I have made very little progress with this issue. I have contacted ASUS support quite a while ago and reported the issue. They asked for information and details of my setup. They also asked me to use the ASUS GUI to submit a Feedback report with my support case number attached. I provided the information but they claimed it didn't arrive. On the third or forth attempt to send them email with configuration and screen captures they acknowledged the information and told me they have escalated my case to the engineers. This was just shy of two weeks ago. I have not received an update as yet. I will make contact with support at the end of this week for an update.

My suggestion is to contact your local ASUS support department and report the issue. Follow any requests or instructions they provide and then get your case number. You should then use the GUI to send Feedback with your case number attached. The more that people raise this issue the better our chances of getting a fix.

I think a some people here may have experienced the issue. The number of people here would constitute a small percentage of the ASUS user community who may actually suffer the issue. I suspect that there may be many users suffering the issue but they are not technical and/or unaware of the nature of the issue. There is no solid failure. Devices just randomly drop off the network. Until we can get ASUS to acknowledge the issue there is unlikely to be much motivation for ASUS to address it. If you believe this issue affects you then please open a case with ASUS.

 

[Ronald Schwerer]

Thanks for the follow-up. I'm sorry to say that I have never had the patience to deal with bureaucratic support organizations, especially when they just have you running around doing non-productive BS. As of right now, everything is running perfectly. I'm still running everything under AiMesh. But I've moved most devices off the Guest SSID. So I'm not going to bother reporting the problems at this time.
As I mentioned I've got about 70 clients total, about 60 smart devices relegated to my Guest subnet. Of those, 10 are outside Wi-Fi cameras which are always a challenge to keep running at an acceptable level of performance. My LAN covers a large area geographically. It is on the slope of a mountain so the terrain is hilly and wooded. About 1 acre of my 1.75 acre property has cameras and landscape lighting. I also have many smart bulbs, switches, and plugs inside and out. Of course, that last category doesn't consume much bandwidth.
My LAN consists of:
RT-AX88U Pro - (lastest Merlin RT-AX88U_PRO_3006_102.5_0) main router on the main floor in the back of the house. connected to ATT fiber ONT
*RT-AX3000 - (old Merlin RT-AX58U_3004_388.4_0) node on the other end of the house in a 2nd floor window.
*RT-AC68U (ASUS 3.0.0.4.386_51665) node in the man-cave basement to support media center and an office.
*RT-AC68U (ASUS 3.0.0.4.386_51665) node in the garage.
Most of my smart IoT devices were TP-Link Kasa or Tapo. The Kasa were all at least 4 yrs old. Camera's all less than I year old. All but 1 use 2.4 GHz

* nodes all have wired backhaul. The router and all nodes were on separate UPS so they never lost power during the 10 second gap.
Note: I usually don't bother updating node's firmware unless there is a known issue. So the nodes were on firmware several years old.

I'm always finding new uses for adding IoT devices. Like you, I wondered when I might hit a ceiling threshold. But everything seemed to be running well until we had a couple two days with 4-5 hour commercial power outages in the middle of the night (12AM - 5AM). I have an automatic backup generator that handles about 80% of my total load. There's about 10 seconds delay before the backup kicks-in. Most important stuff had power except for that gap. My computers and net gear are on UPS so they were fine. But lots of the IoT stuff were either briefly or totally without power during the outages. I spent the next day going around re-booting everything that stayed off-line. About 1/3 of the IoT devices, mostly camera and outside lights/plugs/switches were problematic. Some devices would re-connect briefly, then go off-line. I even had trouble connecting to the Guest SSID with my phone. Even when fairly close to a node. I think by the end of each day, I had more stuff down than when I started. Some of the problem cameras were solar powered and ran off battery, so I knew that the power outage (or possible power spikes) didn't affect them. But they still had trouble re-connecting.

Looking at the main router's AiMesh GUI, I could see that some of the nodes were carrying more of the work-load than usual. Surprisingly, the RT-AX3000 had the fewest client connections. Many of the problem devices were on the side of the house that were served by the RT-AX3000 node. I had some spare equipment including a pre-configured RT-AC68U node, so I swapped it in place of the RT-AX3000. That seemed to help somewhat but didn't solve the problem. So It seemed that when I replaced a device with a newly configured one, it worked a little better but still had a weak signal. All the problem devices seemed to be on the Guest network, so the next day I started reconfiguring the problem devices to use the main SSID. And they were all working flawlessly.

Since the RT-AX3000 node seemed to be part of the problem, I have started testing it. I haven't concluded it was the main problem, but I feel it contributed to it. I'll continue testing. I reflashed it back to the latest ASUS firmware (RT-AX58U_3004_388.9_2). I did have some difficulty doing a manual factory reset, but it seems happy now.

So the bottom line is my entire LAN performance is better than ever. I can switch camera video sources much faster than I can remember. All devices stay connected. I'm happy. There's still a few (8) devices using the Guest SSID but I haven't noticed any problems. Some I don't even know where they are.

 

[IanSav]

I am still using the production ASUS firmware. I spoke with @RMerlin and he indicated that his firmware uses the base code in this area so the Merlin firmware won't help or change the situation.

I am still using some very old routers as access points to keep my IoT devices running. I don't have a large home so one router could have been enough. I chose 2 routers to ensure good coverage as my home uses solid brick walls. The third device was added in hope of solving the connection issues. (It made no difference.) I suspect that the mesh is only expanding range but is doing nothing to help with network capacity.