Can anyone help me to check if my RT-AC86U is part of this latest ASUS debacle

[Sonicmojo]

All

Backgrounder: I am in Canada (Calgary) and my local internal LAN runs to a very solid RT-AC86U (now with Merlin 386.11. From there I go to a (Shaw Cable) supplied Technicolor XB7 modem (Bridged) and out to the Internet.

This specific setup has been so rock solid for so long that I seriously could not remember the last time I needed to tend to this units or even reboot them. But starting the first week of April 2023 - this has become a regular issue with the Internet suddenly dropping off completely without warning. This has been going on since around April 8 and occurs about every 24 to 72 hours without fail. Shaw support is NO help and had been useless on every call I made.

I put up with this for most of April by rebooting the Shaw XB7 - and never touching the ASUS (which WAS running Merlin 386.7 for this period). I finally had enough about two weeks ago and had Shaw come by and replace the XB7. And things were fine for about yes - 72 hours.

Now - flash forward to all this ASUS nonsense from this week - where the apparent "symptoms" feel the same but clearly in my case - something else is going here as this ASUS thing was NOT a thing back at the start of April. This week I flashed the 86U up to 386.11 but this problem persists.

To sum up - I am not as savvy with SSH or Telnet or log interpretation as some in here but I am willing to learn. Can anyone give me a short bulletpoint list on the best way to either eliminate (or confirm) that the AC86U is actually part of this problem? I am willing to factory reset or reconfigure or whatever needs to be done to just get this to stop - assuming all the while that Shaw (or their crappy equipment) are actually working correct.

This is making me crazy and I appreciate any help that anyone can offer.

Cheers!

Sonic.

 

[ColinTaylor]

To answer the question in your title, "is part of this latest ASUS debacle" the answer is "No". Your problems predate the Asus signature issue and 386.11 was not effected by it.

 

[Sonicmojo]

To answer the question in your title, "is part of this latest ASUS debacle" the answer is "No". Your problems predate the Asus signature issue and 386.11 was not effected by it.

Colin

Fair enough - but is there anything else I can try to at least be confident that my AC86U is running normally and is not contributing to any other mysterious or unknown issue in this case. I am simply blown away that this setup could be so solid for literally months and months and suddenly turn to crap for no apparent reason. Unless it's infrastructure or the line to the street etc.

The weird timing of this too makes me curious - I can never seem to get past 72 hours of connectivity without a failure - almost like something is timing down etc. I mean if the Shaw gear was not working right - I would expect to to see it not work instantly - not cruise along normally for a few days and then go dark again.

Sonic.

 

[ColinTaylor]

Check the CPU and Wi-Fi temperatures shown in the GUI. The RT-AC86U is known to have had overheating problems which often leads to hardware failure.

 

[bennor]

Your issues predate the Asus issue from a few days ago by over a month. It has been well explained by RMerlin elsewhere that the Asus-Merlin firmware was generally not affected by the Asus router bug from last week.

One basic troubleshooting step when having issues is to perform a hard factory reset and reconfigure manually (don't import a saved router CFG file).

 

[heysoundude]

I'm exceedingly confident in saying your issue has absolutely nothing to do with the router hardware or the firmware running it.
You may be barking up the wrong tree: Shaw can't help since they've been acquired by Rogers, is my guess.
They're merging systems/technologies, and there are bound to be issues with end users I'm sure.

My go-to solution of late when running up against issues like this is to email the parent company and register a complaint.
The last time I did (This is with a different kind of company - a few weeks ago), the local big cheese called me personally (they have people to deal with issues and people like me) because their new boss lit a rather large fire under their buttocks from the other side of the world, and the solution started progressing much more expeditiously. Remember, it's all about corporate branding and reputation. Call that into question from a publicly visible forum and watch how quickly the fat cat corporates move to cover their butts and healthy incomes. they have seen how "Me Too" works.

 

[Tech9]

I'm exceedingly confident in saying your issue has absolutely nothing to do with the router

I wouldn't be that confident knowing the number of failed RT-AC86U routers around. I would replace this router with something else.

 

[Sonicmojo]

I wouldn't be that confident knowing the number of failed RT-AC86U routers around. I would replace this router with something else.

While I see some great tips here (like temps etc) - I would challenge the fact that there are a ton of working AC86Us out there - so I am not so quick to dump it.

That said - one oddball thing that might eliminate the AC86u outright is that when this issue first happened back in April - the ONLY thing I ever did was reboot the Shaw XB7 - never gave the AC86U a second look, a restart or anything and everything came back to normal right after the reboot. And I did this exact same process at least 5 more times in April. Only recently have I started to restart both units.

This would - at least on the surface - take the ASUS out of the equation.

That said - the most frustrating part of this is that when the internet disappears - the XB7 exhibits NO visible signs of an issue. Usually when the actual connectivity (down the line) is suspect - this XB7 will flash red/orange indicating for certain that there is a problem. But these recent outages show no such thing. The light atop the XB7 is solid white - as it should be when operating normally.

Also - even stranger still - is when I call Shaw support (and supposedly) they are able to "see" my router status from their various support locations - they usually cannot see anything. Indicating something a bit more sinister between them and me - so what could be going on?

If they cannot even see their own router - to me - that can't have anything to do with the ASUS (which is on the other side of what they should be able to see).

Tech9 - if I were to consider a replacement - your suggestion?

Sonic.

 

[Tech9]

Tech9 - if I were to consider a replacement - your suggestion?

RT-AX86U, currently on sale at BestBuy for CAD250. If too much - RT-AX86S for CAD180, also on sale.

 

[Sonicmojo]

RT-AX86U, currently on sale at BestBuy for CAD250. If too much - RT-AX86S for CAD180, also on sale.

Done! Been looking at this one for a long while now anyway. And the price is nice. Appreciate the suggestion.

Cheers

Sonic.

 

[Maverickcdn]

I put up with this for most of April by rebooting the Shaw XB7 - and never touching the ASUS (which WAS running Merlin 386.7 for this period). I finally had enough about two weeks ago and had Shaw come by and replace the XB7. And things were fine for about yes - 72 hours.

I run the same setup in Calgary albeit with a XB6 and have never had issues. The Arris models were notorious with issues but the Technicolor ones have issues as well.

If you've already replaced the modem it would be worth doing a factory reset with reconfigure on the Asus. But as others mentioned without knowing your router operating temperature or looking in the router logs for WAN up/down events no one here can diagnose the router any further.

You really should be pleading with Shaw to come out and test your cable setup to rule it out by checking signal strength/line noise at your wall jack, you could have a failed line splitter or something else is inducing noise in the line. This is free with your subscription and then you can look at replacing the router should everything check out. I had them come out and replace 2 splitters last year and all new cable ends, again this is free. Do you have a TV subscription as well? Do you ever have pixelation or other issues on select channels with that service? Does the internet outage only affect wifi clients or both wifi and wired?

 

[Sonicmojo]

I run the same setup in Calgary albeit with a XB6 and have never had issues. The Arris models were notorious with issues but the Technicolor ones have issues as well.

If you've already replaced the modem it would be worth doing a factory reset with reconfigure on the Asus. But as others mentioned without knowing your router operating temperature or looking in the router logs for WAN up/down events no one here can diagnose the router any further.

You really should be pleading with Shaw to come out and test your cable setup to rule it out by checking signal strength/line noise at your wall jack, you could have a failed line splitter or something else is inducing noise in the line. This is free with your subscription and then you can look at replacing the router should everything check out. I had them come out and replace 2 splitters last year and all new cable ends, again this is free. Do you have a TV subscription as well? Do you ever have pixelation or other issues on select channels with that service? Does the internet outage only affect wifi clients or both wifi and wired?

Mav

Thanks for chiming in. For the record - I will be moving to the newer ASUS RT-AX86U shortly but I still intend to use the RT-AC86U as a mesh station for the upper level of the house so I do need to figure out what is really going on.

Now - onto Shaw for a moment. Yes, we are in the waning days of our 2 year ValuePlan. Probably will not renew due to this ongoing debacle. The tech did replace the modem two weeks ago with a brand new one - he also did the signal strength/line testing and redid the cabling/connections in my network cabinet - everything checked out from a "man on the spot" repair angle as far as I can tell.

As far as the TV signal goes - yes - it's brutal at times. I have noticed in the last few weeks that channels 102, 103 and 104 (oddly) simply do not appear at all when navigated to using my Sansung remote OR the Shaw remote. Just a black screen and no audio. Then CTV (104) will suddenly appear three minutes later when I scroll to it using the guide or a "previous channel" setting. Pixelation - sure. All the time with HD sports etc - I can actually "feel/see" the channel network stream "righting" itself and then the sharpness returns and all is well. Until the next channel change.

Onto the ASUS - and temps. This is one angle that is interesting. I found a screen cap of my RT-AC86U temps from June 2021 and it shows 71C for the CPU at that time. Fast forward to yesterday and the CPU is now showing 87C - same cabinet. Same location, same equipment - literally nothing has changed - but the Router CPU is up 15+ degrees. Maybe this is an issue - maybe not.

If it IS an issue - and I have monitored this for a full day now - the CPU temp is constant at 86C with little variations here and there. If that temp WAS too much - you would think it would clip the internet instantly due to heat issues - but no. It will stay constant like this for days - and then all of a sudden - no internet.

That said - when I reach for the router housing and hold it in my hand - it is barely warm. I realize that temp reading is presumably coming right from a sensor on top of or very near to the actual CPU - but still 86C should feel really hot somewhere on the router chassis if touched it with my hand. I do not feel any extreme heat anywhere.

Finally ASUS logging: You mention " WAN up/down events" - what do these look like or what should I be scouring the logs for? Is there a specific term used or does it really just say WAN Up or WAN down?

I am literally out of ideas - short of completely redoing the AC86U from scratch. Most frustrating is how this setup was about as rock solid as I have ever seen one minute and a pile of crap the next. Maybe this is as obscure (and unbelievable) as actual real (slow) hardware failure and I am just incredulous that it could actaully happen?


Sonic.

 

[heysoundude]

Onto the ASUS - and temps. This is one angle that is interesting. I found a screen cap of my RT-AC86U temps from June 2021 and it shows 71C for the CPU at that time. Fast forward to yesterday and the CPU is now showing 87C - same cabinet. Same location, same equipment - literally nothing has changed - but the Router CPU is up 15+ degrees. Maybe this is an issue - maybe not.

If it IS an issue - and I have monitored this for a full day now - the CPU temp is constant at 86C with little variations here and there. If that temp WAS too much - you would think it would clip the internet instantly due to heat issues - but no. It will stay constant like this for days - and then all of a sudden - no internet.

That said - when I reach for the router housing and hold it in my hand - it is barely warm. I realize that temp reading is presumably coming right from a sensor on top of or very near to the actual CPU - but still 86C should feel really hot somewhere on the router chassis if touched it with my hand. I do not feel any extreme heat anywhere.

when you replace the ac86 with the ax86, take a can of air to the vents at the back and the top/bottom before re-deploying it as a node in AiMesh:
The convection cooling design works well (no fans required), as long as the machine can breathe...maybe not so well in your (closed?) cabinet, if it traps the heat. my ac86 sits at about 80C, sometimes a little higher, and often lower when ambient temp is <20C, the LEDs and the 2.4GHz radios are off (last week I saw it in the low 70s with the radio/LEDs off and sitting next to a slightly open window letting cool night air in)
The mobo actually needs to be a certain temp for the clock crystals to work to spec

 

[Sonicmojo]

when you replace the ac86 with the ax86, take a can of air to the vents at the back and the top/bottom before re-deploying it as a node in AiMesh:
The convection cooling design works well (no fans required), as long as the machine can breathe...maybe not so well in your (closed?) cabinet, if it traps the heat. my ac86 sits at about 80C, sometimes a little higher, and often lower when ambient temp is <20C, the LEDs and the 2.4GHz radios are off (last week I saw it in the low 70s with the radio/LEDs off and sitting next to a slightly open window letting cool night air in)
The mobo actually needs to be a certain temp for the clock crystals to work to spec

Sounds interesting. Have not taken the air can to this device ever. And sure - I could see it being jammed with dust after a while. Will do that tonight to see what comes of it.

The cabinet itself is in the basement and is very shallow but its definitely not hot in there - I estimate ambient at maybe 20C if that. I even left the door open all day yesterday and the router temps did not make any moves down from 86C-ish.

Does turning off the LEDs help as well?

Sonic.

 

[ColinTaylor]

The mobo actually needs to be a certain temp for the clock crystals to work to spec

Sorry, this is nonsense. It's not a 1960's analogue radio transmitter.

 

[Maverickcdn]

he also did the signal strength/line testing and redid the cabling/connections in my network cabinet - everything checked out from a "man on the spot" repair angle as far as I can tell.

As far as the TV signal goes - yes - it's brutal at times. I have noticed in the last few weeks that channels 102, 103 and 104 (oddly) simply do not appear at all when navigated to using my Sansung remote OR the Shaw remote. Just a black screen and no audio. Then CTV (104) will suddenly appear three minutes later when I scroll to it using the guide or a "previous channel" setting. Pixelation - sure. All the time with HD sports etc - I can actually "feel/see" the channel network stream "righting" itself and then the sharpness returns and all is well. Until the next channel change.

This is extremely likely a signal issue, did they check the source line coming in from the street, I had a great tech come out and tested right from the alley box all the way in and throughout, I had the same TV issues (without losing internet) and he resolved them.

and I have monitored this for a full day now - the CPU temp is constant at 86C with little variations here and there.

Normal for this model

Finally ASUS logging: You mention " WAN up/down events" - what do these look like or what should I be scouring the logs for?

Heres a sample of what happens when they do updates

Apr  3 02:38:03 MavMAIN kernel: eth0 (Int switch port: 3) (Logical Port: 3) Link DOWN.
Apr  3 02:38:06 MavMAIN DualWAN: skip single wan wan_led_control - WANRED off
Apr  3 02:38:11 MavMAIN WAN_Connection: WAN(0) link down.
Apr  3 02:38:34 MavMAIN kernel: eth0 (Int switch port: 3) (Logical Port: 3) Link UP 1000 mbps full duplex
Apr  3 02:38:37 MavMAIN WAN_Connection: WAN(0) link up.

I am literally out of ideas - short of completely redoing the AC86U from scratch. Most frustrating is how this setup was about as rock solid as I have ever seen one minute and a pile of crap the next.

Still curious if this is only wireless clients having issues or both wired and wireless.
It only takes 20ish minutes to reconfigure the router after a reset.
Start noting the time/date of outages to look in the Asus syslog for any hints of anything

 

[heysoundude]

Sounds interesting. Have not taken the air can to this device ever. And sure - I could see it being jammed with dust after a while. Will do that tonight to see what comes of it.

The cabinet itself is in the basement and is very shallow but its definitely not hot in there - I estimate ambient at maybe 20C if that. I even left the door open all day yesterday and the router temps did not make any moves down from 86C-ish.

Does turning off the LEDs help as well?

Sonic.

The LEDs do generate a degree or 2 of heat, but I'd think that the 2.4GHz radio emits more energy as heat. (even the 5GHz radio drops 2-3 degrees with these scheduled shutdowns, and jumps again when things come back on)
I just checked, and with the LEDs off for 4h, and the 2.4GHz radio off for about 5, next to an open window with cool 12C nighttime air coming in, my AC86 is 71-72C. That'll shoot back up in the morning to about 77-78, and then creep up to 80-81 before shutting down again tomorrow...but the system compensates both ways as it should.
And thanks to ntpMerlin, I can demonstrate clock offset&drift variations that correlate to the LED and 2.4GHz radio schedule...probably well within tolerances for accuracy/functionality, but there are published operational temperature ranges for the router. So while one member calls BS, here's some data that corresponds with LED&2.4GHz radio sched and temps (which I wish I could chart to confirm/correlate) by extension. Notice that when temps are closer to 80C, offset and drift are more stable/predictable.

Drift varies <1ppm:

Offset ~0.4ms variations

Long story short, don't obsess over the temp...just make sure the router can breathe. a good dust blow-out every so often can't hurt the airflow

 

[Sonicmojo]

Still curious if this is only wireless clients having issues or both wired and wireless. It only takes 20ish minutes to reconfigure the router after a reset.
Start noting the time/date of outages to look in the Asus syslog for any hints of anything

Mav

I will be on it like a hawk if it goes out again. So far I have been up for 2 days, 17hrs and 48 minutes....

As far as clients go - this is simply dead internet. If/when it happens again - I will do an internal ping test (to the Shaw modem ip) and in parallel - an external ping. This should tell me in the ASUS is in the mix or not - but I suspect not. And all clients (wired and wireless) exhibit nothing out of the ordinary - they simply cannot go external in any way.

Thanks for the log tips - I will swing back here if I find out anything more.

Sonic.

 

[gerardr]

I'm also going to support getting another tech visit. The timing associated with the arrival of spring, to me, is telling. Back in 1987, at a university, we had broadband cable internet (later replaced by fiber after a grant from a major computing company). The lead tech carried around an FM radio he modified so that the antenna was replaced by a short length of coax that he could plug into any distribution panel. If he could tune in a local FM station from a supposedly sealed system, then he knew he had a leaky junction, and said his busiest times of year were the start and end of warm weather causing the expansion and contraction of the coax. (Is there enough consistency in timing to say the internet/tv degrades at sun up and/or sun down?) When the modem reboots, it renegotiates the sub-channels it uses (within limits), and so finding better communications it'll run for a while until the degradation itself shifts channels. It might even be something like a scheduled reboot of an amplifier upstream that then messes with the channels.

I figured I should add a more recent example. Last November, I started having trouble watching my DVR recordings (cloud-based DVR). A neighbor, in the same condo building, was experiencing trouble with video-on-demand (unknown to me). The Tier 1 support team never said "oh, two people from the same building; maybe it's a common problem." I finally caved-in, accepted the "we'll charge you if it's your stuff that's bad" disclaimer. and had a technician come out. The neighbor saw his truck and went out to complain about the VOD. Turns out that cloud DVR and VOD share the same non-internet channels. The issue was found upstream and had to be kicked up to the backbone team that orly worked at night to be fixed 2 days hence. Too many Tier 1 teams are discouraged from boosting complaints up to Tier 2 or Tier 3. I joke that my cable company's motto is: "the customer is always wrong".

 

[Tech9]

next to an open window with cool 12C nighttime air coming in, my AC86 is 71-72C.

The thermal pads inside your router are leaking. This is very high temperature next to an open window with 12C air coming in. If you open your router you'll see large oily stains around thermal pads. This worsens the thermal transfer capabilities of the material. Happens after around 2 years use on this model. Every single one I opened had this issue (10 routers) in different stages.

That'll shoot back up in the morning to about 77-78, and then creep up to 80-81

Another evidence of the above - a new RT-AC86U holds around 74C in 26C room with little air circulation.

So while one member calls BS

Count two. Your observations are perhaps unrelated to temperature and the reasons this CPU operates at close to 80C (with thermal protection threshold 100C) is barely enough size heatsink with minimum machining (resulting in large gaps) and inferior quality material thermal pads used. Both cost cutting measures. Replacing the pads with better quality ones drops the temperature with 10C. Closing the gap and use of good quality thermal paste drops the temperature with 20C. It's the same passive cooling method, but better made. Asus just saved $1 (or less) in manufacturing cost.

but there are published operational temperature ranges for the router

This router can't operate at 0-40C ambient temperature. It will overheat at 40C guaranteed. Yours will overheat at lower temperature.