DDWRT for RT-AC87 - You should seriously consider it

[Flomsen]

Is that normal CPU Temperature ?
CPU 74.7 °C / WL0 44.90 °C / WL1 65.00 °C / WL2 20.00 °C

 

[dfran1]

Done, seems to work perfect

And wat is that good for?

It makes wifi stable for me in weaker areas, try without then try it with,
Long is for older wifi devices
Short is for newer wifi devices
from what I have read, I only have a 2nd gen iTouch (for old devices) and that still works, but wifi is more stable for me on both bands when set to short (no matter what firmware I use).

CPU 59.1 °C / WL0 40.26 °C / WL1 60.00 °C / WL2 20.00 °C
but that is with a laptop cooler

EDIT:
Reboot the router in the GUI after you make any changes to Wi-Fi settings.

 

[xzulu]

This is running perfectly on my RT-AC87

Firmware: DD-WRT v3.0-r27506 (07/09/15)
Time: 08:14:53 up 5 days, 15:26, load average: 0.12, 0.07, 0.05

ftp://ftp.dd-wrt.com/betas/2015/07-09-2015-r27506/asus-rt-ac87u/

I have 4 PC laptops, 2 smart TV's, 4 iphones, 1 Galaxy S6, Oppo 103, 4 iPads, 2 macbook pro's, and a Epson wireless printer. NO disconnects, streaming is flawless. I also have a laptop hard wired into the router with a 2 TB HD set up as a server and I am getting close to 50 mb/sec dl speeds. This is the best I have ever seen. On ALL the recent Asus firmwares my Galaxy S6 had terrible battery drain. As soon as I switched to this version of DDWRT the battery drain is completly gone. I think this is for all Android phones.

Prior to the latest DDWRT release there were problems but whatever they did in this latest release fixed them all. You owe it a try.

I tried all the Asus beta firmware's with the boat built in and they are terrible.

CC

Hi there I'm new to this forum, but been reading a lot on this forum for a long time. Thanks cc666, I've been running Asus Merlin on my old N66U for as long as I had it. When I got my AC87U earlier this year I didn't bother running Asus stock. Flashed it to merlin right away. But latety I've been experiencing 5ghz issues, dropping, unresponsive GUI when updating or changing 5ghz settings. But thanks to this thread I'm now on DD-WRT and the AC87U is much more stable now. Especially 5ghz.

Sorry Merlin i still love your firmware on my N66U.

 

[Adam64]

I'm finding that 5ghz works better with DD-WRT than with any of the stock firmware. My 2.4ghz and 5ghz networks have the same SSID and password, so it allows the client to pick the best one for it. In my Family Room, the furthest room in my house from the router, my clients were consistently on the 2.4ghz network with the stock firmware, but with DD-WRT they're consistently using the 5ghz network.

 

[Xerial]

Is the asus ddns available in dd-wrt? I really want to try it but have servers dependent on my current asus ddns.

EDIT: By the looks of the documentation at the WIKI it seems ASUS is not available as a predefined DDNS set. However one could perhaps utilize the custom preset and get it that way. One does need to know the manual settings though. Anyone here who is running ASUS DDNS on DD-WRT?

 

[thiggins]

I was looking at there site and man that stuff looks very compilcated to me, not that simple to do?? I have never used telenet and would not even know where to start?

If in doubt, DON'T do it, especially if it is your ONLY router. At least not without having a USB-to-serial dongle around.

 

[Xerial]

This is running perfectly on my RT-AC87

Firmware: DD-WRT v3.0-r27506 (07/09/15)
Time: 08:14:53 up 5 days, 15:26, load average: 0.12, 0.07, 0.05

ftp://ftp.dd-wrt.com/betas/2015/07-09-2015-r27506/asus-rt-ac87u/

I have 4 PC laptops, 2 smart TV's, 4 iphones, 1 Galaxy S6, Oppo 103, 4 iPads, 2 macbook pro's, and a Epson wireless printer. NO disconnects, streaming is flawless. I also have a laptop hard wired into the router with a 2 TB HD set up as a server and I am getting close to 50 mb/sec dl speeds. This is the best I have ever seen. On ALL the recent Asus firmwares my Galaxy S6 had terrible battery drain. As soon as I switched to this version of DDWRT the battery drain is completly gone. I think this is for all Android phones.

Prior to the latest DDWRT release there were problems but whatever they did in this latest release fixed them all. You owe it a try.

I tried all the Asus beta firmware's with the bloat built in and they are terrible.

CC

Hey CC,

Would you mind sharing your WIFI settings in DD-WRT? I'm struggling to get 867 Mbps on my link.

 

[Lucter]

Is parental control available in dd-wrt?

 

[cc666]

Hey CC,

Would you mind sharing your WIFI settings in DD-WRT? I'm struggling to get 867 Mbps on my link.

Wireless Basic Settings:

2.4 GHZ
wireless network mode: N Only
channel:6
channel width: wide 20+20
extension: upper
all rest default

5.0 GHZ
channel:Auto
wireless network mode: AC/N
channel:Auto
channel width: VHT 80+80
extension: upper upper
all rest default

WLO Advanced:
preamble: short
tx power: 100
all rest default

WL1 Advanced:
preamble: short
tx power: 100
all rest default

CC

 

[Xerial]

Wireless Basic Settings:

2.4 GHZ
wireless network mode: N Only
channel:6
channel width: wide 20+20
extension: upper
all rest default

5.0 GHZ
channel:Auto
wireless network mode: AC/N
channel:Auto
channel width: VHT 80+80
extension: upper upper
all rest default

WLO Advanced:
preamble: short
tx power: 100
all rest default

WL1 Advanced:
preamble: short
tx power: 100
all rest default

CC

Thanks! And what link speed do you get good sir? On your PC(s)?

 

[cc666]

Thanks! And what link speed do you get good sir? On your PC(s)?

No mimo best is 867 with my PC, the Macbook Pro is over 1000.

CC

 

[cc666]

Is parental control available in dd-wrt?

There is an access control tab, you can set times of certain clients to be active.

CC

 

[Xerial]

No mimo best is 867 with my PC, the Macbook Pro is over 1000.

CC

Thanks again, but what does no mimo translate into?

 

[dfran1]

hey cc666,
I am now on tx power on both bands to 300mv.
All seems still normal for temps. I was told Asus uses 316mv, as my tests finds it may be the case, at 300mv it seems coverage is just as good as Asus firmware.

I had some hiccups, so I cleared nvram, and flashed with reset again.
I loaded from a settings file backup, all is working good. (dd-wrt may not have the asus problem of loading all settings from scratch after new builds with new wifi drivers).

I also had my iPad air 2 only use the 2.4 GHz (it is on iOS 9 beta 2) so I reset the network on it this morning and its still on 5GHz now.

I still think there is some design flaw that causes this router to get bugs after every reboot (or power cycle), but only noticeable after about 10 reboots at most (or more).

 

[jeziu]

Latest version 27600:

ftp://ftp.dd-wrt.com/betas/2015/08-11-2015-r27600/asus-rt-ac87u/asus_rt-ac87u-firmware.trx

So far works very stable on my Asus RT-AC87U.

 

[Xerial]

For several hours I have been flashing back and forth and regardless of what I do I cannot set the Channel Width on WL1 to VHT (80+80). Anyone else with this issue?

 

[SLK350]

For several hours I have been flashing back and forth and regardless of what I do I cannot set the Channel Width on WL1 to VHT (80+80). Anyone else with this issue?

Yes same for me, when flashing back to build 27506 i can set 80+80.

 

[clayhans]

Well comrades I gave dd-wrt a try for three days. First it was a bear to install on the RT-AC87U, after a day of trying to install it I finally figured it out, with some research online. OH the 5Ghz worked well enough but the signal was real weak and 2.4Ghz was even worse. Thanks but I spent enough time experimenting with dd-wrt. It may work for some but not for me.

 

[Adam64]

I've tried it a few times as well. While I like it's level of sophistication and their development tempo, I thought it was too complex for my uses. While the Asus software can be pretty limited, it's easy to use and offers some good and simple tools. I'm settled on Merlin's version of the Asus software for now.

 

[System Error Message]

There seems to some wifi misconceptions in this thread. The default settings for DD-WRT wifi settings are for stability rather than performance so you can use either firmware and still get the same results in wifi if you configure.

The main difference that should be noted is does DD-WRT use the tiny processors in the AC87U?
Is there hardware NAT for WAN?
Asus adaptive QoS is configured for gamers so it gives priority to games, VOIP and than only other things. So it works well for many gamers who love to play, chat and torrent at the same time but not everyone.
Trend Micro AiProtection isnt bloatware. Its a network antivirus which if you ask any expert is necessary in a non tech environment such as a home, families, businesses, cafes and such who cant tell if something is a malware infront of them. This is why i like RMerlin's firmware because you get these features and more and if you need something that isnt there you can configure/install it into the linux subsystem of the router. Let any user use a PC without an anti virus and it will end up with one very fast whereas i never use anti virus nor let others use my PCs but i have not gotten any malware either. Even with antivirus many users still end up with malware so a network UTM is a very good idea and the network AV is just one component of it.