RT-AC5300 drops connection, is it the router or the client?

[cosrocket]

I've had the RT-AC5300 for around 3 weeks now and it's been working well, except with my laptop which has the Intel AC-7260 wireless network card. The connection constantly disconnects, whether I am using Smart Connect enabled or disabled and on both of the individual 5GHz bands. When I first received it I immediately updated to the firmware which was current at the time. I was going to return it, but then I decided to try the Merlin 380.57 firmware and it's been working like a champ, completely stable and no disconnects. Well yesterday I noticed that Asus posted a new official firmware so I decided to try it, I reset to factory settings, installed the new firmware, then again reset to factory settings and within 15 minutes the connection dropped out again.

So my question is, is this the fault of the client or the router? I realize it doesn't help my situation but I always read reviews where the router is blamed for the drop outs, but it looks like it might be the client as all of my other devices are very stable with the RT-AC5300.

I will go back to the Merlin firmware but it's not looking good that I will not be able to use the official Asus firmware, especially that this is the second version I am having the problem with.

 

[hggomes]

Definitely it's the client, i have the same Intel 7260 WNIC and the driver is a real mess, its a very well known issue on that card (disconnects), you need to try a different driver and/or change some settings from Advanced Configuration on Intel WNIC, a good way to confirm this is to see if any other wireless client disconnects on your network beside 7260.