GUI not working on AiMesh

[Blueball]

Hi all, I've always been able to find the answer to my problems using this forum as a guest. But now I've got a problem thats much harder to solve. I bet one of you Gurus will know what I should do...

I recently struggled to setup an AiMesh with my AC3200 and 2xAC66u B1 but I found out (on this forum) my AC3200 is not AiMesh compatible .. so there goes one afternoon. So I bought another AC66u B1 to replace the AC3200 and updated ALL the firmware(s) to the newest (3.0.0.4.386_46065) but now I can't print or access the Web GUI from any computer on the base node. (I haven't tried on the extended nodes), HOWEVER, I can access the GUI from my phones' chrome browser (the app does not see my network at all).
I can ping everything on the DHCP list, which shows all of my devices and 2 nodes, and the devices connected to the nodes.
I have changed my PC to a static IP. No help
I have re-installed the newest firmware on the base node. No help
I have tried a USB wifi adaptor. No help
I have tried a EA-N66 network wifi adaptor. No help
I have tried direct ethernet cable to the router from PC. No help
I have tried Microsoft edge browser (I mainly use Chrome). No help
I have rebooted the router many times. No help.
I had no problem connecting to the GUI on my AC3200 or before I setup the AiMesh.

What could it be?

 

[Tech Junky]

When you connect through your phone what address are you using? If it's the LAN 192.168.x.x you should be able to use the same from any PC on the network. If it's a URL that redirects you to the system it might be doing a DDNS lookup to the WAN IP to get access.

Kind of seems like there's a NAT issue or a FW issue. I have a similar issue hitting my cable modem management page through the LAN but, a direct connect PC works fine. Another way around these issues would be to SSH into the devices w/ putty or any terminal program.

 

[Blueball]

Thanks for the reply Tech Junky!
I use router.asus.com to access the GUI from my phone. 192.168.1.1 wont connect to the GUI.
Unfortunately the SSH workaround wont resolve my printer issue. My printer says its connected and I can see it on the DHCP list but no PCs can print (offline).

I think I'm going to factory reset the base node, then reload the firmware via USB or ethernet (I loaded all the firmwares using my phone) and see if I can access the GUI then. If so, I'll rebuild the AiMesh.

Any other suggestions?

 

[Blueball]

I cannot access the GUI from my PC on wifi using the router.asus.com, only from my phone.

Oh, btw, something odd to add ... A new SSID shows up on my phone called XXXXXX_2 which is NOT listed in the Asus GUI and has a Wifi6 symbol. When connected, I still can't access the GUI.
In addition to the 2 typical listed in my GUI which is one without anything added to the SSID and the other _5G.
So in total I have 3 Wifi options being broadcast. Is this something to do with AiMesh?

 

[Tech Junky]

router.asus.com

This is is probably doing some DDNS to redirect to the IP set for management. If you ping it you should get the management IP.

If you ping from one PC to another does it work?

Do you have VPN active?

The SSH option would be a test to see if it's blocking access.

Printers / PC's not being accessible leads me to think there's a firewall rule blocking intra-LAN communication or VLAN isolation...

The 3-SSID's should correlate to 2.4 / 5.1 / 5.2 and 5.2 would be a backhaul communication between R1 / R2 or could be a subset guest network that got setup.

 

[Blueball]

This is is probably doing some DDNS to redirect to the IP set for management. If you ping it you should get the management IP.

If you ping from one PC to another does it work?

Do you have VPN active?

The SSH option would be a test to see if it's blocking access.

Printers / PC's not being accessible leads me to think there's a firewall rule blocking intra-LAN communication or VLAN isolation...

The 3-SSID's should correlate to 2.4 / 5.1 / 5.2 and 5.2 would be a backhaul communication between R1 / R2 or could be a subset guest network that got setup.

OMG! You nailed it!

I have always had a VPN running on every PC but not my phone. However, before installing the AiMesh network, I had no issues accessing the GUI from my PC using router.asus.com. So something related to this new network is different than what I used to have.

And BTW, I was able to ping the other devices but I didn't try to ping another PC that had a VPN running. So that would have revealed this problem.

I just knew a Tech Junky was exactly what I needed!! Thank you so much. I learned something.

 

[Tech Junky]

Running the VPN per client is blocking LAN <> LAN access as designed. That's why it's not working.

Moving the VPN function to the "router" would fix that but, depending on which VPN / protocol OVPN vs wireguard will make a difference in how the speeds are. OVPN is slower / older and consumes a lot of CPU where the WG doesn't and you get faster speeds w/o the CPU being hit as bad.

If you switched to a home brew PC as your router or even setup a PI as your VPN server and pointed all LAN traffic to it as your default gateway the performance will be better than the Asus CPU. I use Nord w/ WG aka nordlynx on my "router" and can hit wire speed 1gbps+ on a 1gbps ISP connection. I have a cable modem that lets me tie together up to 4 1gbps ports into a single "pipe" allowing me to hit ~1500mbps down. but with OVPN that gets chopped to 500-600mbps and depending on the WG server I connect to anywhere from 900-1400mbps.

It all comes down to the HW / service / protocol.

 

[Blueball]

I don't need Gigabit performance for my network. My ISP is 150Mbps which is plenty for what I need.

Oddly, cycling the VPN on/off now allows me to print with the VPN on?!?!
I am using PIA (Private internet Access). Which frequently needs me to download and install updates. So I'm assuming I wouldn't be able to use as the router VPN?

 

[Tech Junky]

Where can I find your OVPN files? - Knowledgebase / Technical / Troubleshooting / OpenVPN - PIA Support Portal

www.privateinternetaccess.com

OVPN though if you run a speed test from your PC will probably result in speed ~50-100mbps.

If you want to be able to use your full bandwidth that you're paying for then using the WG option on individual PC's is better. However printing might remain an issue along with GUI access.

Understanding the WireGuard Protocol - Knowledgebase / Technical / Application Settings and Features / Application & Features - PIA Support Portal

www.privateinternetaccess.com