Help with my N66U

[Henrik]

Hi,

Ive been running this router fine for some time now using its stock firmware.
I dont know exactly what could have caused the issue but let me explain the issue and perhaps someone could point something out for me.

So it seems to happen only when I play a game like BF3.
I have 1 Ipad, 2 Iphones, 5 computer clients, Xtreamer, and an Apple TV connected to it. A Router ADSL modem 24mbit, where I only get 9mb down 1mb up.

So far everything is fine, and I maximize the bandwith I have wireless on all clients streaming etc.

Then I start BF3 and playing for 20 min or so, all of a sudden my stable ping on 22ms goes to 200-500 which makes it impossible to play.
I shut down reboot router and modem and its still the same issue. When Im in this poor ping state, I try a speed test run, and I only get 1mb down and 0.008kb up. And its stuck in this state for a good time. Like I said reboot doesnt help.

Ive tried default wireless router settings, and N only mode etc. No difference.
If I disconnect the Asus Router from the Modem, everything goes back to normal speed. As soon as the Asus router is connected to the modem it gets back to the poor state. I dont know what makes the router go back to normal state, but sometime I just find it back to normal in the morning after x hours. Or if I change some settings reboot some times and then it goes back to normal. Disconnects clients etc. Even if I plug in a cable to the router when in this poor state I still have the bad performance, so it doesnt seem to be wireless.

I do have VPN enabled because I have some outsiders using that every now and then to commit files to my network, but it seem to happen even when they are not logged on. So they are not using my network when this happens.

Ive tried stock firmware, 162 and the latest one 260, same issue on all these.

Can anyone please help me with this issue, Ive contacted Asus support with this, but they suggested it could be VPN, but it cant be since it happend with that not being used. After their last email they suggested me to try another router if that works I should replace the Asus router.

Now what do you think? Could the router be dead? Is there a way to see/monitor what the router does when this bad state happens to identify what could be causing it? Or should I just replace it? Strangest thing is, that the model just before this N66U the one without 3 outer antennas, We tested that router in a office with 50 computers, and everyone was playing a game, all of a sudden they all got very poor ms, this was reminding me of the same issue I have right now with the 66U.

What do you think guys?

Thanks

 

[RMerlin]

Make sure the cable between the modem and the router is either Cat 5e or Cat 6. The router's WAN port is gigabit, so an older Cat 5 cable can cause stability issues.

 

[Henrik]

Make sure the cable between the modem and the router is either Cat 5e or Cat 6. The router's WAN port is gigabit, so an older Cat 5 cable can cause stability issues.

Thanks for a quick response!
Yes Im using the cable I got with the Asus router, its a black thin 5e cable connected to my router modem.

Strange thing is that it is a random pattern, not to often, but starts almost every time I start play BF3. When not playing a game like that, it often acts like normal.

What could be wrong here?

 

[RogerSC]

A few thoughts...have you checked to see if there's an upgrade for your client BF3 computer's wireless network interface (or network interface card if it's a wired rather than wireless computer)? Do you clear the nvram and power-cycle the router, and then manually re-enter your settings, after upgrading the firmware? Do you ever look at the messages in the router's log to see if there's something unusual there when this happens?

Don't know if any of these relates to your issue. You might try removing particular client devices from the router and see if any one of them is involved with this problem; e.g. remove a device and start playing the game that precipitates the problem and see what happens. Actually, if I were you, I'd remove them all, and try to see if this happens when the computer you use for BF3 is the only thing connected to the router.

I hope that some of this might help, or at least remove some possibilities. It is possible that the router is broken, of course, but it doesn't sound like you're quite there yet.

 

[SoCalReviews]

I concur with RogerSC's debug suggestions. Henrik, I ran into the same problem immediately after upgrading from the 32k firmware 3.178 to 64k firmware 4.220 . I had extremely bad ping rates. Upload on my 100/5 rated internet connection was reduced from 5 to almost zero. Browsing and gaming was extremely slow and erratic. To solve these problems I did a fifteen second hard button reset of the modem after establishing the internet connection. That alone turned out not to be enough. I also had to power cycle both the modem and the router and waited a few minutes with them off. I ended up power cycling the router at least two times. The slow ping, lag and slow upstream seemed to be solved afterwards and I didn't notice it to be a problem for browsing or playing MW3 on my PS3.

I used the same procedure after upgrading to Asus firmware 4.246 but I didn't apply the hard button reset procedure and only power cycled the modem and router after the upgrade. At first everything seemed ok but I after a week I noticed problems with the 4.246 firmware that became more apparent as I used the router. I had wireless lag, inconsistent throughput (sometimes it seemed fine and other times it was poor) and random disconnects while gaming. When I rolled back to firmware 4.220 everything worked again as it should. Last week I upgraded from 4.220 to 4.260 and everything seems to be working well so far. I even have kept GRO enabled as it was for the default settings (which is supposed to be problematic for some users) but I haven't noticed any problems.

My routers, modems and networks are forced to run the daily gauntlet. Some days I use up to 35GB of bandwidth on one of my two internet connections. I have had up to 28 devices of all types...laptops, PCs, multiple PS3s, Apple Macs, iPhones, iPads, Androids, Android pads, Slingbox, VoIP devices, HD movie streaming, etc... connected at one time with most of those being wireless. I don't reboot or power cycle the router unless I am flashing the firmware. Because of the persistent heavy workload if there is a major problem with my RT-N66U or it's firmware I should be able to notice it.

I am wondering if the RT-N66U router has a tendency to hold onto old operational configuration settings that only apply to previous firmware code or if settings sometimes get corrupted during firmware upgrades. In order to discourage these kinds of problems I also power cycle the modem before firmware upgrades. I confirm that the router fully reboots and re-establishes the internet WAN connection with the modem before I flash it with firmware.

 

[Henrik]

Thank you guys for the suggestions,
Just to clarify a power cycle on the asus router, how do I perform that correctly?
When I did one firmware update from when I had the same issue I did hold the reset button for 20s or so, as it said on the website, then I started it, one hour after I got the super low speed again and bad latency. So I reverted back to an older one and tried that, but same issue there.

Just to clarify also, I get the same issue when I use a cable, so its not only on wireless. And I really dont know what causes it to go back to "normal" response and speed again, I always have a speed test website up or usualy the browser for BF3 servers, if I click refresh I instantly see the ping is 500+ or worse then I know Im in that state, if its 20ish then I know its normal state.
Same with speed test, if it instant ping and get 9mb down I know its normal, if it takes a few sec to ping then I know its stuck on 1mb down and 0,008up.

So you suggest I should power cycle the router a few times? Could you please let me know exactly how? And should I try the merlin latest firmware?

It gotta be the router doing something, because if I turn off my wireless client comp when the bad state occours and I plug my client with a cable directly to the modem I still have the same issues, its not until I removes asus from the modem it goes back to normal instantly. I was thinking could the modem router be causing this as a conflict with asus router? I access the modem router as I access the asus router when I use the modem only, but when I plug the asus wan port cable 5e to port 1 on my router modem, I access asus only on the same ip browser interface.

Thanks

 

[SoCalReviews]

I just posted a detailed method of how I upgraded from 32k to the newer 64k firmware in another thread in this forum. There are other methods and other users might have success without all the procedures I use but the way this process has worked well for me. I use a router button reset and power cycle (power router off for fifteen seconds then on...and I power cycle the modem also needed to re-establish the internet connection)...

http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/showthread.php?t=8595

I don't what ISP you use but since you seem to be mostly having trouble with BF3 what I would recommend is seeing if you can put your ADSL router in bridge mode. There are many different instructions about how to improve the gaming performance using port forwarding or putting the gaming machine in the DMZ but most of my problems went away changing my Motorola DSL modem settings to bridge mode. Use your brand and model of DSL modem and do a web search for how to set it to bridge mode if you haven't already made those changes previously. Some of the newer DSL modems are more difficult to set since many ISPs are now discouraging users from making major changes to their provided modem's hardware settings but most of the newer DSL modems can still be configured for better internet gaming. If you don't find answers using the web search try to check in your ISP's user support forums and in the BF3 gaming forums for additional help and advice.

Note: If you are using an XBox 360 gaming console with it's internal wireless radio...some users have reported incompatibilities with the RT-N66U wireless router and some models of that system. If you are experience these problems with an XBox360 gaming console then using a compatible USB gaming modem or a separate wireless bridge might be the best solution.

 

[Hothersale]

You don't have QoS turned on do you?