Poor performance with Parental Controls

[KPUK]

On my RT-AC88U router, I put in a few time-scheduling rules for some devices. I then noticed that those devices had terrible network performance. I took the rules off for one device and it because super quick again. The problem remained for the others, so I removed all rules and they all run perfectly now.

I don't recall having this issue with my older RT-AC66U_B1 unit, so I THINK this is something related to the 88U. Either way, the time scheduling under parental controls is unusable for me.

Anyone any thoughts? Of course, I'm not sure whether the issue exists in the stock firmware, or whether this is specifically Merlin.

 

[ColinTaylor]

I can't think of a logical reason why Parental Controls might effect network performance. It's either blocking access to something or it's not.

Maybe you could give an example of the rule you're using and how you're seeing this "performance" change. Then we might be able to recreate it.

 

[KPUK]

No - it's not that complicated! It's simply a time-schedule rule. As soon as I remove time-schedules for the device, it flies again instead of crawling. That across a phone, Chromebook and Android TV - all the same. Nothing else - just time-scheduling.

 

[ColinTaylor]

So does the parental control still block the device outside of the allowed times?

 

[KPUK]

So does the parental control still block the device outside of the allowed times?

Yes - it blocks access, as it should Just that the devices listed for time control schedules have terrible performance. Removing the devices from the list of those under time controls remedies the issue immediately.

So - as far as I'm concerned, with current firmware on this device, the time schedule part of parental controls is broken and unusable.

 

[L&LD]

@KPUK what have you done to try to narrow this problem down?

When you upgraded to the RT-AC88U from the RT-AC66U_B1, how did you migrate your setup to the newer model?

Have you ever performed a full reset to factory defaults on the RT-AC88U? Followed by a minimal and manual configuration to secure the router and connect to your ISP?

Going to a new router offers the chance to find/create new settings and features that may be significantly different than what the old router offered or was capable of. Did you take advantage of that or did you 'blindly' use the old settings from the old router?

If you do not have your router in a good/known state, then your conclusion may be incorrect and your statements misleading for others.

Please see my signature below for the links on the info to get your router to a good/known state and either fix this issue or at least properly troubleshoot it further.

 

[gffmac]

On my RT-AC88U router, I put in a few time-scheduling rules for some devices. I then noticed that those devices had terrible network performance. I took the rules off for one device and it because super quick again. The problem remained for the others, so I removed all rules and they all run perfectly now.

I don't recall having this issue with my older RT-AC66U_B1 unit, so I THINK this is something related to the 88U. Either way, the time scheduling under parental controls is unusable for me.

Anyone any thoughts? Of course, I'm not sure whether the issue exists in the stock firmware, or whether this is specifically Merlin.

Did you try with NAT Acceleration disabled?

 

[KPUK]

The migration used a brand-new, clean and factory-reset AC-88U. Settings were not copied frpom the AC66U_B1 other than basic manual ones. In general, the settings are default and the only exceptions are to add some LAN MAC-IP mappings, the WAN authentication details, enable dual WAN (using a LAN port as the secondary and in failover) and a couple of port-forwarding rules for incoming connections. And there is a PPTP server set-up (but generally no client connected). That's it. The rest are default. Oh - and WiFi radios are switched off and the Aiprotect Network Protection options are enabled. Spanning Tree is disabled.

So I really don't think this is about strange or incompatible settings.

 

[ColinTaylor]

Try disabling NAT Acceleration as per @gffmac's suggestion. If it still doesn't work you could post the output of the following command for us to look at:

iptables-save