Dual-Band Router with Tri-Band Nodes

[Kalis909]

Is the xds6 dual band then?

I received my xt9’s today - enabled smart connect on my ax82u and then took the second node (the one without the start with me sticker) and associated it to the existing network. It looks like it is using the 5ghz backhaul, but I’m new to the wireless backhaul stuff so maybe I’m missing something. I’ll attach screens if what I see

The limitation here should be that the ax82u can only serve at 2.4ghz, which is fine with me as everything intensive can be wired.

I’ll edit this in a moment with the screenshots.

Yes, is dual band, you can easily review which band are using in the Asus app.

 

[Aphonic]

Yes, is dual band, you can easily review which band are using in the Asus app.

I’ve added the screens to my post but in a nutshell 2.4, 5-1, and 5-2 are all being used right now on the node and 5/2.4 are both being used at the router side.

To me it looks like this is working with dedicated backhaul, but I just hope to confirm!

Thanks for taking the time, I appreciate it.

Edit, that said - my phone is connecting to 5ghz on the router (ax82u)

Maybe it’s using a 2x2 and leaving a 2x2

 

[Aphonic]

[AiMesh] What is Dedicated Wireless Backhaul(DWB)? How does it work? | Official Support | ASUS USA

This says a dedicated wireless backhaul will be established between a dual-band & tri-band node or router, that's nice

Sorry to resurrect this but I fail to understand how, as according to ASUS, a dual band router with tri band node can use a dedicated wireless backhaul.

I’ve set up a dsl-ax82u with one xt9 and it does connect with a wireless backhaul on 5ghz… but clients are still connecting to the router on the same 5ghz, so how is that a dedicated backhaul? I suppose they mean that the clients connected to the node doesn’t share bandwidth with the backhaul, but Then… not maxing the backhaul in this case.

Weirdly in my setup if I connect the “main” xt9 in ap mode directly to the router and then link the xt9 node to that, performance actually seems worse(or certainly no better) than using the mesh from the dsl router that’s not separated.

Is my thinking right about the not so dedicated backhaul here or am I missing some kind of magic dust they sprinkle to split channels etc ?

I’m not in love with the xt9 for two reasons. No merkin and so slow on restart (the 82u isn’t great either on that front). Trying to deal with this frustrating wall in a small flat, it’s enough to screw up my video calls, PlayStation remote play, and more, and I don’t want to spend a to solve issues with rental!

Thanks for your thoughts and clarity on the dual to tri node cited above in the linked comment.

 

[L&LD]

It can't.

 

[Aphonic]

It can't.

Thanks for confirming. Weird that the xt9 as a node with the ax82u offers better performance in some cases than the two xt9 router node setup. I think they’re going back.

I’m sick of this wall.

 

[DenisPruch]

Sorry to resurrect this but I fail to understand how, as according to ASUS, a dual band router with tri band node can use a dedicated wireless backhaul.

I’ve set up a dsl-ax82u with one xt9 and it does connect with a wireless backhaul on 5ghz… but clients are still connecting to the router on the same 5ghz, so how is that a dedicated backhaul? I suppose they mean that the clients connected to the node doesn’t share bandwidth with the backhaul, but Then… not maxing the backhaul in this case.

Weirdly in my setup if I connect the “main” xt9 in ap mode directly to the router and then link the xt9 node to that, performance actually seems worse(or certainly no better) than using the mesh from the dsl router that’s not separated.

Is my thinking right about the not so dedicated backhaul here or am I missing some kind of magic dust they sprinkle to split channels etc ?

I’m not in love with the xt9 for two reasons. No merkin and so slow on restart (the 82u isn’t great either on that front). Trying to deal with this frustrating wall in a small flat, it’s enough to screw up my video calls, PlayStation remote play, and more, and I don’t want to spend a to solve issues with rental!

Thanks for your thoughts and clarity on the dual to tri node cited above in the linked comment.

It can't.

Hmm. I would expect If you have a router with single 5ghz wifi and a node with two 5ghz wifi, I suppose that the node should use dedicated wifi for connection to the router. The router will NOT use its own dedicated wifi. But the node will (Router connects to node_5ghz-1. Node's clients to node_5ghz-2). From the node's perspective, this should double the speed for clients that use the node. From the router perspective, it simply serves the clients from the node as its own. And they all share the bandwidth of router's single 5ghz wifi.
I know that wasn't the case in 2020. And AiMesh did NOT use a dedicated backhaul unless both devices (router and node) had a dedicated bandwidth. But according to the asus website now it should work as I described (I hope so)
Or am I missing something?

 

[DenisPruch]

But in your screenshot I could see that the node has both 5ghz networks available to clients. If everything worked as I described one of the networks would have to be hidden and inaccessible to clients.
Well. I still don't know if single-5ghz router use dedicated wireless backhaul with double-5ghz node (as asus promises), or not.....

 

[glens]

... 2.4, 5-1, and 5-2 are all being used right now on the node and 5/2.4 are both being used at the router side.

To me it looks like this is working with dedicated backhaul, but I just hope to confirm!

It cannot be a "dedicated backhaul" unless the router's sole 5GHz radio is servicing nothing else except the node. Perhaps it's just semantics, but that is the truth of the matter.

How is the single-5GHz router controlling the /other/ 5GHz node radio? The router has no concept of an alternate broadcaster in that band. Better check the security on the node's second 5GHz radio; seems there's been relatively-recent discussion here about the surprising result.

 

[tgl]

Yeah, AIMesh is known to have issues controlling nodes that have radios that don't also exist on the parent router.

To me, "dedicated backhaul" means that both the node and the parent have radios doing only backhaul. That's not possible given the hardware you have, unless you disallow clients from connecting to the parent's 5GHz band, which doesn't sound tremendously attractive.

 

[DenisPruch]

Yeah, AIMesh is known to have issues controlling nodes that have radios that don't also exist on the parent router.

To me, "dedicated backhaul" means that both the node and the parent have radios doing only backhaul. That's not possible given the hardware you have, unless you disallow clients from connecting to the parent's 5GHz band, which doesn't sound tremendously attractive.

You are right. Real "dedicated backhaul" means that both router and node have dedicated radio (second 5GHz wifi module). But think about this. Does the main router really need a dedicated line to work with nodes? I think it's actually only necessary for the nodes. Since they are must receive data from the client and at the same time send this data to the main router. As a result, node's client can use only half of node's wifi speed (The first half for client and the second for the main router). The router does not need to waste half of its bandwidth. Just accept data from the client as usual.
Based on my naive reasoning, it seems to me that using a node with two 5GHz modules and a router with one 5GHz should be almost as good as when all network participants have two 5GHz modules. Of course, assuming that Asus does their job well.

 

[tgl]

You are right. Real "dedicated backhaul" means that both router and node have dedicated radio (second 5GHz wifi module). But think about this. Does the main router really need a dedicated line to work with nodes? I think it's actually only necessary for the nodes.

You're apparently assuming that there are zero clients connected directly to the parent. Otherwise, the node backhaul traffic is competing with them for the parent's airtime.

Now, to the extent that your available bandwidth-out-to-the-internet is limiting how much two or more clients can do, it may not matter: the parent's total radio throughput might not be the limiting factor anyway. But usually one of the reasons for a multiple-AP setup is the hope of getting more than one radio's worth of throughput.

This is all kind of academic of course unless you can get the APs configured like that. I have no personal experience with trying to get AIMesh to control a node that's got radios the parent hasn't got, but there are negative reports about it in these forums. I gather that the extra radio simply doesn't show up in the GUI.

 

[DenisPruch]

You're apparently assuming that there are zero clients connected directly to the parent. Otherwise, the node backhaul traffic is competing with them for the parent's airtime.

Now, to the extent that your available bandwidth-out-to-the-internet is limiting how much two or more clients can do, it may not matter: the parent's total radio throughput might not be the limiting factor anyway. But usually one of the reasons for a multiple-AP setup is the hope of getting more than one radio's worth of throughput.

This is all kind of academic of course unless you can get the APs configured like that. I have no personal experience with trying to get AIMesh to control a node that's got radios the parent hasn't got, but there are negative reports about it in these forums. I gather that the extra radio simply doesn't show up in the GUI.

I see your point. But I don’t want to use mesh system to increase speed, but to increase the coverage area. In this case I would expect that 5 clients on the single router would have the same speed like 2 clients on the main router and 3 clients on the node (or vice versa. Because all 5 clients share bandwidth of a single main’s router WiFi)

 

[L&LD]

When a node (wireless backhaul) is actively sending/receiving, the total bandwidth of the entire network is halved.

If two wireless nodes are active, then the total network bandwidth is halved again to 1/4 of the total possible for that environment.

The speeds are further reduced when the main router is also servicing client devices.