Possible Router Upgrade Questions

[marcmccl]

Newbie looking for ASUS AX router advice. I currently have an ASUS RT-AC68U and RT-AC1900 running in AiMesh. They cover my house upstairs and downstairs pretty well and have . Looking to upgrade for some future proofing as I have an increased number of devices active in the house to 30+, most are AC, but I have a few AX and future device upgrades will be AX. I also would use the 2.5 Gb port to connect my NAS.

I am looking at the ASUS RT-AX86U as the main router. I know for full capabilities I would need to mesh with another AX86 instead of an AC1900. I may buy a second AX86 soon for this.

Some questions I had are shouldn't the AX86 have better range than the AC68/1900? I know my AC devices will still be limited to AC on the AX86, but shouldn't the AC performance of the AX86 be improved over the AC68/1900? Would the AX86 handle more devices than the AC68?

Thanks in advance for any feedback anyone has.

 

[L&LD]

Welcome to the forums @marcmccl.

Use a single RT-AX86U in a (wired) central location for the best network experience (if this is possible). Either directly off the modem/ONT or, using one of the older routers with the Wi-Fi radios turned off.

You can use the two older routers in Media Bridge mode to connect any wired capable devices that are now using Wi-Fi too.

Media Bridge Mode


The maximum per radio limit for almost any consumer router I know of is 32 clients. This doesn't change substantially with the latest models today.

While I expect the RT-AX86U to have a better range than either of the routers you have now, its strength is much higher throughput at similar distances though. This is true of all current routers and particularly of AX models.

Yes, the AC devices should perform equally or better on the latest AX capable routers, depending on the specific client devices we're considering here.