My RT-N66U experience

[icemankent]

Long story short.
I owned it.
I returned it.

I think one could boil it all down to buggy firmware and a lack of patience on my part to put up with it.
Sure, I could have loaded tomato or another build - but then I'd be looking at a performance hit - which I did not wish to entertain.
I could also have waited for the next firmware update from Asus - but like I said - my patience level for something this expensive was not high.

Here goes.

I love the look of the router - and the 3 antennae make it look like it means business.
The blue LED on the power plug was a nice touch as well.

Keep in mind that I am comparing this with my exisiting dlink dgl-4500.

Out of gate I thought it was a bit imposing - to force you to use a wizard rather than just let you set it all up manually (if you so chose). Yes, I realize that you can (eventually) get the option to do it manually - but it should have been one of the first options.

The UI looked cool, albeit they could have made the graphical part of it a bit less fancy, and concentrated on giving you the most info possible at a glance.
In other words, I don't really need a huge icon for the Internet, Connected Devices, USB, etc.... where they could be smaller, and thus make room for more info to be displayed on that page.

I set up the router, and immediately I noticed that it was a huge pain to reserve IP's for DHCP. There was no way to "release" the IP that the router initially gave out - short of rebooting/restarting those devices so the lease would expire. I thought that was odd.

I also found that in setting up the 2.4 GHz radio, it was strange that the only options were Auto, N only, and Legacy - with no real explanation on what those were.
In my dgl-4500 at least you could select a few other different options (I preferred "g only").
I know that tomato had that option - but surprisingly - Asus did not - or at least it was not obvious.

Another anomaly was the login - which seemed to (never) expire.
I was logged in on one machine, then tried to log in from a different one - and it would not let me - saying that there already was a login session - and therefore I could not log in !! Nice way to lock yourself out.
At least on the dlink if you logged in from a different machine it let you log in and it tore down the other session - in addition to timing out automatically after a period of time.

I will admit that the signal strength was very good.
It had an RSSI about 10db better than my dlink dgl-4500 (2.4GHz)
Mind you, when I owned a new dlink dir-857, it too had an RSSI of around 10db better than my current dgl-4500. (2.4GHz)
On the 5GHz band, the RSSI was about 10db less than the 2.4GHz band - which was almost the same behavior as the new dlink dir-857 - so signal strength and penetration in my home between the two routers was almost identical.

These next two items are the biggest reasons I returned the router.

1. QoS. I am not one to simply select the option to let the router do what it thinks is "best" for me, so I went into the section for User Defined Rules.
I understand the priorities, and how they attribute bandwidth and priority - no problem.
My issues were with adding new rules.
I simply wanted all traffic - to/from a given device (ip/mac.addr) to have a certain priority. I used the mac address, and selected "any" for the port - and left all the other boxes blank - then added the rule.
I have NO idea if that was the correct way to do it or not - NOR do I have any idea on how to prove that it is actually working.
There is no tutorial or user manual that describes HOW to add a QoS rule.
One of the things I love the most about my dlink dgl-4500 is how complex/yet flexible it is to set up a QoS rule. Not only that - you can also view the "Internet Sessions" - and it will display the various sessions - all with the priority that is assigned. You can easily see your QoS rule in operation - knowing that it was configured correctly.
The Asus just left me in the dark.

2. Buggy Buggy Buggy !! I wanted to test out the transmit power settings to see if I could boost the 5GHz signal to match what I was getting on the 2.4GHz band. It was set at 80mW so I bumped it to 100. No change in RSSI.
Then I bumped it to 120mW. No change in RSSI.
What gives ?
THEN, the Asus went all squirrelly on me. It froze, requiring a reboot.
When it came back, the UI was all botched up - it would (sometimes) not load the graphical part of the UI - and looked "half-loaded". It was slow and nearly un-responsive.
Not only that, changing the power seemed to have botched up the entire 5GHz band - I could no longer connect anything on that band - even though inSSIDer was showing the band was in operation.
So, I rebooted the Asus again - same thing. This time I put the power back to 80mW and then rebooted - things seemed to go back to normal.

THIS is when I unplugged everything, packed it back in the box, and returned it.

I SO wanted this to be the killer router for me - but it let me down.
I once trashed the dlink dir-857 because of some bugginess and shortcomings of its firmware - but this Asus takes the cake in that regard.

With the new 802.11ac routers slowly coming out on the market I will bide my time and take them for a test run - maybe, just maybe the killer router will be out there.
Asus may have some good hardware (but so does Dlink) - but the firmware cripples all that horsepower.
If Tomato did not impact that horsepower, then I probably would have kept this router.

I will keep monitoring this forum in the hopes that the magic bullet will finally be shot and Asus (or tomato) will have a winning h/w and f/w marriage that makes this router phenomenal.

For now, I will stay with my dgl-4500, and wait for the day that I can UPgrade it to something that has earned its right to be called a worthy successor.

 

[RMerlin]

I mostly agree that the firmware is what is currently holding back this router, which has excellent hardware. Asuswrt is still a young piece of software, and Asus has shown dedication into improving it, by making frequent releases. I'm even willing to do what I can to help, both by releasing custom builds, and by sending them code patches (one of them actually was used in their recent build 144 release). But I can understand why you would expect a 170$ router to be working properly, considering it is amongst the most expensive home routers available out there.

I'd just like to clarify a few points however:

1) DHCP leases can't be released from a router, because that's not the way DHCP works. What DHCP does is receive a broadcast from a client requesting an IP, answering the broadcast, and assigning an IP to the client, with an expiration time. The only way to release a DHCP lease is to release it on the client. There is no other way, just removing it from the router's database wouldn't tell the client that it should relinquish it. Under Wndows, it implies simply running this in a command prompt:

ipconfig /release
ipconfig /renew

Linux will typically be something like ifdown eth0; ifup eth0.

You can also go the lazy route: unplug or disable the network interface 10 secs, then re-enable it. It will request a new lease from the router.

2) Testing QoS is always a difficult thing, no matter what router you are using. The only way is to actually reproduce a scenario you are trying to help, and see what your throughputs are.

3) Recent Tomato builds are using the same driver as Asus. I haven't tested it myself, but I expect that their performance should now be pretty close to the Asus firmware, aside maybe for some more esoteric features such as AiRadar (whether this is a real performance enhancer or just marketing speak, I honestly do not know). It could actually be interesting if someone with a sound methodology could do a fresh bunch of benchmarks running recent Asus and TomatoUSB firmwares.

 

[RogerSC]

From the behavior of the router as seen by inssider, it does appear that the AiRadar thing is helpful...the signal strength from inssider seems to increase (about 10dbm) when one actually starts to use wireless from the router. Which sort of feels like the router is able to focus it's radiation towards clients. Weird, yes, I've not seen this sort of behavior from a router before, usually the signal strength from a router stays the about the same in a particular location, whether the signal from the router is used or not.

This is totally empiracle, but it has worked this way for me every time I've had both an AP and the rt-n66u and switched between the two. The signal strength of the rt-n66u increases when I switch to using it with a particular client.

 

[drinkingbird]

From the behavior of the router as seen by inssider, it does appear that the AiRadar thing is helpful...the signal strength from inssider seems to increase (about 10dbm) when one actually starts to use wireless from the router. Which sort of feels like the router is able to focus it's radiation towards clients. Weird, yes, I've not seen this sort of behavior from a router before, usually the signal strength from a router stays the about the same in a particular location, whether the signal from the router is used or not.

This is totally empiracle, but it has worked this way for me every time I've had both an AP and the rt-n66u and switched between the two. The signal strength of the rt-n66u increases when I switch to using it with a particular client.

You'll always see that, especially with 802.11N. When you aren't associated with a network, you're just measuring the strength of the beacons. When you associate, not only are you seeing more data points to measure, but with 802.11N you're getting a stronger and more reliable signal via MIMO and MRC, even without beamforming. Since the 66u has 3 transmits, if you're using a 2 stream card, this should be even more evident, as it can pick the best 2 out of 3. It varies some with drivers and different hardware implementations, but not that much.

I've confirmed this with InSSIDer and APs with and without beamforming support.

AI Radar is a "beamforming on a chip" implementation which can certainly have some benefits but very unlikely to be responsible for a 10db increase. Maybe with only a single client connected but even then it is unlikely (the more clients you have, the less beamforming will help you, especially if they're spread out). Unless you're using something like the Ruckus AP with 19 antennae etc.

I have a Cisco 1142 AP and can turn beamforming on and off, and the difference is nothing stellar, even with a single client. This one also uses "Beamforming on chip".

 

[icemankent]

I mostly agree that the firmware is what is currently holding back this router, which has excellent hardware. Asuswrt is still a young piece of software, and Asus has shown dedication into improving it, by making frequent releases. I'm even willing to do what I can to help, both by releasing custom builds, and by sending them code patches (one of them actually was used in their recent build 144 release). But I can understand why you would expect a 170$ router to be working properly, considering it is amongst the most expensive home routers available out there.

I'd just like to clarify a few points however:

1) DHCP leases can't be released from a router, because that's not the way DHCP works. What DHCP does is receive a broadcast from a client requesting an IP, answering the broadcast, and assigning an IP to the client, with an expiration time. The only way to release a DHCP lease is to release it on the client. There is no other way, just removing it from the router's database wouldn't tell the client that it should relinquish it. Under Wndows, it implies simply running this in a command prompt:

ipconfig /release
ipconfig /renew

Linux will typically be something like ifdown eth0; ifup eth0.

You can also go the lazy route: unplug or disable the network interface 10 secs, then re-enable it. It will request a new lease from the router.

2) Testing QoS is always a difficult thing, no matter what router you are using. The only way is to actually reproduce a scenario you are trying to help, and see what your throughputs are.

3) Recent Tomato builds are using the same driver as Asus. I haven't tested it myself, but I expect that their performance should now be pretty close to the Asus firmware, aside maybe for some more esoteric features such as AiRadar (whether this is a real performance enhancer or just marketing speak, I honestly do not know). It could actually be interesting if someone with a sound methodology could do a fresh bunch of benchmarks running recent Asus and TomatoUSB firmwares.

Thanks for the response.
I know of your efforts to improve the stock firmware and that you've had good results - it is nice to know there's folks out there who are doing this for the user community.

For the DHCP thing - what I was comparing this to was functionality that I have on my dlink router - where you can "revoke" an IP from a client - which then forces it to re-establish (with the static ip you have assigned) - thereby getting rid of the prior ip association - negating the requirement of anything to be done on the client end. That's a nice feature that I simply got used to and thought was a kind of "table stakes" functionality that everyone had on their routers (by now).

It is funny how all the different manufacturers do things VERY differently on their router's UI.
You'd think they would all at least "try" to ensure that they supported as many features as possible as their competition - to maybe even do a few ones even better.

Oh well - kudos to you folks who are sticking it out and actually improvising to make this router work optimally.

 

[njweb]

Long story short.
I owned it.
I returned it.

I think one could boil it all down to buggy firmware and a lack of patience on my part to put up with it.
Sure, I could have loaded tomato or another build - but then I'd be looking at a performance hit - which I did not wish to entertain.
I could also have waited for the next firmware update from Asus - but like I said - my patience level for something this expensive was not high.

Here goes.

I love the look of the router - and the 3 antennae make it look like it means business.
The blue LED on the power plug was a nice touch as well.

Keep in mind that I am comparing this with my exisiting dlink dgl-4500.

Out of gate I thought it was a bit imposing - to force you to use a wizard rather than just let you set it all up manually (if you so chose). Yes, I realize that you can (eventually) get the option to do it manually - but it should have been one of the first options.

The UI looked cool, albeit they could have made the graphical part of it a bit less fancy, and concentrated on giving you the most info possible at a glance.
In other words, I don't really need a huge icon for the Internet, Connected Devices, USB, etc.... where they could be smaller, and thus make room for more info to be displayed on that page.

I set up the router, and immediately I noticed that it was a huge pain to reserve IP's for DHCP. There was no way to "release" the IP that the router initially gave out - short of rebooting/restarting those devices so the lease would expire. I thought that was odd.

I also found that in setting up the 2.4 GHz radio, it was strange that the only options were Auto, N only, and Legacy - with no real explanation on what those were.
In my dgl-4500 at least you could select a few other different options (I preferred "g only").
I know that tomato had that option - but surprisingly - Asus did not - or at least it was not obvious.

Another anomaly was the login - which seemed to (never) expire.
I was logged in on one machine, then tried to log in from a different one - and it would not let me - saying that there already was a login session - and therefore I could not log in !! Nice way to lock yourself out.
At least on the dlink if you logged in from a different machine it let you log in and it tore down the other session - in addition to timing out automatically after a period of time.

I will admit that the signal strength was very good.
It had an RSSI about 10db better than my dlink dgl-4500 (2.4GHz)
Mind you, when I owned a new dlink dir-857, it too had an RSSI of around 10db better than my current dgl-4500. (2.4GHz)
On the 5GHz band, the RSSI was about 10db less than the 2.4GHz band - which was almost the same behavior as the new dlink dir-857 - so signal strength and penetration in my home between the two routers was almost identical.

These next two items are the biggest reasons I returned the router.

1. QoS. I am not one to simply select the option to let the router do what it thinks is "best" for me, so I went into the section for User Defined Rules.
I understand the priorities, and how they attribute bandwidth and priority - no problem.
My issues were with adding new rules.
I simply wanted all traffic - to/from a given device (ip/mac.addr) to have a certain priority. I used the mac address, and selected "any" for the port - and left all the other boxes blank - then added the rule.
I have NO idea if that was the correct way to do it or not - NOR do I have any idea on how to prove that it is actually working.
There is no tutorial or user manual that describes HOW to add a QoS rule.
One of the things I love the most about my dlink dgl-4500 is how complex/yet flexible it is to set up a QoS rule. Not only that - you can also view the "Internet Sessions" - and it will display the various sessions - all with the priority that is assigned. You can easily see your QoS rule in operation - knowing that it was configured correctly.
The Asus just left me in the dark.

2. Buggy Buggy Buggy !! I wanted to test out the transmit power settings to see if I could boost the 5GHz signal to match what I was getting on the 2.4GHz band. It was set at 80mW so I bumped it to 100. No change in RSSI.
Then I bumped it to 120mW. No change in RSSI.
What gives ?
THEN, the Asus went all squirrelly on me. It froze, requiring a reboot.
When it came back, the UI was all botched up - it would (sometimes) not load the graphical part of the UI - and looked "half-loaded". It was slow and nearly un-responsive.
Not only that, changing the power seemed to have botched up the entire 5GHz band - I could no longer connect anything on that band - even though inSSIDer was showing the band was in operation.
So, I rebooted the Asus again - same thing. This time I put the power back to 80mW and then rebooted - things seemed to go back to normal.

THIS is when I unplugged everything, packed it back in the box, and returned it.

I SO wanted this to be the killer router for me - but it let me down.
I once trashed the dlink dir-857 because of some bugginess and shortcomings of its firmware - but this Asus takes the cake in that regard.

With the new 802.11ac routers slowly coming out on the market I will bide my time and take them for a test run - maybe, just maybe the killer router will be out there.
Asus may have some good hardware (but so does Dlink) - but the firmware cripples all that horsepower.
If Tomato did not impact that horsepower, then I probably would have kept this router.

I will keep monitoring this forum in the hopes that the magic bullet will finally be shot and Asus (or tomato) will have a winning h/w and f/w marriage that makes this router phenomenal.

For now, I will stay with my dgl-4500, and wait for the day that I can UPgrade it to something that has earned its right to be called a worthy successor.

Sorry it did not work for your needs. :-(

1. I do not have QoS enabled so I can't comment on that. Did you contact Asus support to ask them whether there is a way to verify that it is working and how to set it up?


2. Re. the firmware being buggy. I have not had any firmware issues (I admittedly don't muck around with it much, but I did at one point experiment with different power settings and did not experience anything requiring a reboot. Sometimes I closed the browser window if the admin UI was not responding, but the router never needed a reboot as a result.

In fact the router itself has been rock solid for me which is more than I can say for some other models I have owned especially older models (newer ones seem better in general).
I have never had to reboot it, even in this hot summer weather (100 degrees the other day and my house was very warm since I was not home). The only time I reboot it is right after a firmware upgrade.

My wifi connections have also not lost the wireless signal (use mostly 2.4 GHz) once in 5 months of extensive use.

Anyway, I hope you do find something that meets all your needs.

I tried the Amped wireless R10000 (before their even newer models came out), the expensive Zyxel NBG5715 and the Linksys E4200 v1. The Asus (RT-N66U) performed by far the best and met all my feature needs (excellent comparative wifi throughput and range, external antennae, dual band wifi, IPv6 support, customizable power output [more of a nice to have] and rock solid stability).
I was also going to try the Netgear WNDR4500 at the time but it was not in stock at Staples and then all the great Asus 66U feedback and reviews started to come out, so I skipped the Netgear. Luckily too, since I was tired of returning / reselling / gifting routers.

I am sure your feedback will help someone who has the same concerns (about QoS). There is an Asus rep. who just joined the forum a few days ago. Maybe he can help you. But since you returned it, it might be too late.

As far as firmware crippling the hardware is concerned, I guess it depends on your (functionality / feature) needs and expectations.

For me getting 5 bars of signal strength and good throughput in the furthest reaches of my home with the RT-N66U and not having any wifi dropouts in 5 months of heavy use, the ability to tweak TX power and not having any other strange gltches like the Amped router seemed to have with not being able to display all Netflix cover art - perhaps a weird caching issue, exceeded my expectations.

That is the beauty of having options (many router mfrs and many models to choose from).
Let us know which router you end up getting to replace the Asus and how it performs. I love seeing comparative reviews since it helps us all in our future decisions.

I recall how difficult it was to do any type of research before the internet (and forums) took off.