Question about AiMesh AC and AX mix

[dodko]

Hello,

I have an AiMesh system set up in my house, consisting of 2x RT-AC68U (1 ghz dual core version) and 1xAC-58U V3.
The house consists of 4 floors and the placement of the routers is as follows:
First RT-AC68U is in the basement, where the main internet connection is. It is also the main router.
Second RT-AC68U is on the first floor and the RT-AC58U is on the last floor. Everything is connected via ethernet.
The walls are pretty thick, and there is absolutely no wifi coverage on the 2nd and 3rd floors with this configuration.
I want to add 2 more routers to the system, to cover the 2nd and 3rd floor and I am considering getting 2xAX58U for each floor.
Here comes my question: The main router will remain the RT-AC68U, because the main internet connection can't be moved, and therefore the router has to stay in the basement. I don't want to put the AX58U there, because internet in the basement is rarely used. So my question is, will I be able to use the AX standard on the new routers, operating as nodes, if my main router remains the RT-AC68U? To be honest, I don't care that much about the new AX standard, but would be nice to have it.
I also wonder if the RT-AX58U will have as good, if not better coverage than the RT-AC68U. I am really happy with the latter, and was considering getting the AC86U, but I need the router to be wall mountable, so I landed on the AX58U.

Thanks in advance for any input.

 

[L&LD]

The RT-AX58U should be what you're expecting and more.

One way I see the AX features presented to your client devices is if you double NAT the two RT-AX58U's so that they are on their own 'network' (with new SSIDs, of course).

The other way may be to use the AiMesh AP mode feature if you can connect one RT-AX58U to the other via a LAN cable. One would be in AiMesh AP 'main router' mode and the other will be the AiMesh node. Again, this would need to be a separate network to get the AX class benefits.

To have the whole home on the same network, place a new RT-AX58U on the first floor as an AiMesh AP and connect all the other routers to that. You will need to remove all the nodes from the main router in the basement first, of course.

For the highest chance of this working (particularly the above), I would suggest considering flashing all the routers to the latest RMerlin 386.1 Beta 4 or later release which features AiMesh v2.0.

 

[dodko]

Thanks for the reply!
Unfortunately I ran into one problem.... The AX58U is not available anywhere where I live.... and I need to finish this project by next monday, so ordering it from abroad is not an option unfortunately.

So I'm left with a couple of options.... AX55, AX56U and AC66U B1.
I didn't find much info about the first one, so I don't know if it's worth it. I read many good reviews about the AC66U, I know it's an older model, but I found a 2pack bundle really cheap online, so I am really considering it. What do you guys think, should I just go for the AC66U, how is it compared to the AC68U in terms of coverage?

 

[L&LD]

Try searching for the RT-AX3000 model (they are identical).

The ones you have listed are appreciably below the RT-AX58U/RT-AX3000 that seems like the best match for you.

 

[dodko]

I tried that, but no results... Every single site is out of stock for that router. So I will have to choose one of those. I know they are worse choice than the ax58u, but it will have to do for now.
Will the AC66U be as good as thw AC68U in terms of coverage?
I will probably upgrade the whole system to AX after a year or so, but for now this will have to do ..

 

[L&LD]

If forced, then the RT-AC66U_B1 is the one I would choose in your situation today.

 

[dodko]

Thanks for the input, really appreciate it.
One last question - For my specific scenario, will I benefit from running merlin firmware, or stock will be enough? The AC58U V3 does not support it, so that one would be left on stock.

 

[L&LD]

I haven't run stock Asus firmware longer than it takes to flash RMerlin firmware on it.

As long as the firmware level of both RMerlin and stock is on the same branch, it should be okay to run both.