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Major SMB disconnect problems w/ethernet and 86U

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SteverinoLA

Regular Contributor
I have a USB3 hard drive attached to 86 (yes, I know 86U not a NAS) that has lots of music, video and movie files on it.

My desktop is connected via 1G ethernet to 86U (Intel i219-V). I can not at all copy large files or folders of large files in Windows 11 w/o File Exloring pausing and then eventually stopping. I can see in the Event Log that the problem here is this happening over and over again for the Windows SMB client:

A network connection was disconnected.
Instance name: \Device\LanmanRedirector
Server name: \RT-AX86U
Server address: 192.168.1.1:445
Connection type: TCPIP
InterfaceId: 14

The client lost its session to the server.
Error: The transport connection is now disconnected.
Server name: \RT-AX86U

The connection to the share was lost.
Error: The transport connection is now disconnected.
Share name: \RT-AX86U\Media
Session ID: 0x360D
Tree ID: 0xAD35


Any ideas why? Drivers for I219-V are fully up to date. Interestingly, this disconnection problem olnly occurs w/ethernet. Using WiFi there are no problems at all, but my WiFi is half the throughput of my ethernet for some reason.
 
I can not at all copy large files or folders of large files in Windows 11 w/o File Exloring pausing and then eventually stopping.
(yes, I know 86U not a NAS)

Since you know your router is not a NAS - what's the problem?
You start your large transfer again and it happens again until one day you lose your files and finally realize your router is not a NAS and whatever was mentioned in Asus advertisements for USB share only applies for occasional small size file transfers and nothing close to NAS-like transfers.
 
I think it's quite reasonable to except that I can copy a 1G file from my computer to a USB drive attached to AX86U and vice versa. Are you really saying nope, the USB ports on AX86U aren't capable of file transfers?
 
It may be a reasonable expectation on the part of users, but history shows otherwise.

For some, it works. For others, they need another approach. A 4-Bay NAS (QNAP) is what I suggest considering today (even if you only fill up a few of those bays initially).
 
I think it's quite reasonable to except that I can copy a 1G file from my computer to a USB drive attached to AX86U and vice versa. Are you really saying nope, the USB ports on AX86U aren't capable of file transfers?
Well, maybe..
Is the drive externally powered?
Is the drive within the Asus external drive specs? https://www.asus.com/us/support/FAQ/1047043/

Check the system RAM. SMB can max out RAM usage even on a 1 GB AX86U. Adding a swap file may help (Yes, you can add a swap file to Asus factory firmware)
 
Are you really saying nope, the USB ports on AX86U aren't capable of file transfers?

What I'm saying is home routers have very limited RAM and from my experience with Asus routers running Asuswrt the more you push transfers in both speed and size the sooner you run into issues ranging from device unavailable to router crash and data corruption. Nothing related to the USB port.
 
Well I think mine is the proper use case for USB attached drive. I don't use it as network storage, it's just computer backups and repositories for media, which is also shared via UPnp to my home theater system. There's very little activity on the drive daily or weekly.

This problem happens w/both SSD and HD. I've been examining the smb and nmb logs, etc but find nothing to explain the SMB disconnection. Nor why this only happens w/the my ethernet connection. No problems w/WiFi but the WiFi6 160Mhz connection is half the speed of ethernet in transfers.
 
As people say - YMMV. If it doesn't serve your needs - get a NAS. USB attached storage is broken on many Asus routers and I found a way to crash any model including 1GB RAM models without even touching it. My latest experiment is here with the result here. With real large transfer 512MB RAM router can't hold even 10min before crashing. This is partially Asuswrt issue because other routers can complete the same transfers successfully in slower pace.

You have better chances of success if switching USB ports to USB 2.0 only. The file transfer will be slower, but it may go longer before issues start.
 
Ah, interesting. I read your test in the links. Are you seeing corresponding SMB client errors in Windows event log? You have to find them:

1675044441915.png
 
Windows is just saying Destination Unavailable when the router crashes. The router logs are saying Out of Memory. No need to look at Windows logs.
 
Gotcha, my 86U router doesn't crash. I see memory utilitzation go up to 99% and see a couple CPU's pegged at 100% usage, but no actual crash. I know what a crash is like b/c I had lots of crashing w/a AX55 which is only 256GB RAM but that was just in normal usage since it didn't have USB ports.
 
Yup, I've found the experience with this long-standing feature to be disappointing as well.

It's frustrating that my 2013 vintage Asus AC router with 256MB of memory was trouble-free, and performed better than a 2021 vintage AX-68U with four times the memory in this respect.

Sure, it does more has more features according to the marketing copy, but that's not the kind of progress I was looking for.
 
I did the following:
1)Delete all mapped connection net use * /delete in cmd administration
2)Delete router credential at windows credential
3) Change usb 3.0 to usb 2.0 at ASUS GUI (This might be the problem)
it maneged to connect to the mapped drive
 

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