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kintamanate

New Around Here
Hello,

I'll break my story into 3 parts, history, issue(s) and what I've tried, if you want to skim or just read ahead.

My life's story
About 8 years ago I started out with an AC68U. I used Asus and Merlin firmware on it. Two years ago when I moved into a bigger place I got an AC86U to put both into AiMesh mode. At the time Merlin didn't have AiMesh capability so I flashed it (AC68U) with stock Asus firmware, updating regularly, but skipping every few updates, TBH.

For the last 6-8 months I'd have sporadic disconnects from the network (WiFi only), but my devices would fall back to my ISP's WiFi router signal which was still broadcasting for guests (being completely isolated from the rest of my network services). My parents had the AC68U and were tired of the lack of WiFi in the whole home so about a month ago they switched to Orbi mesh and 3 nodes. When I was resetting to factory I saw that Merlin had updated and AiMesh was available in the firmware. Having fond memories of Merlin firmware, last week I flashed both the AC68U and AC86U firmware to Merin, specifically RT-AC68U_384.17_0 and RT-AC86U_384.17_0. I came from FW_RT_AC68U_300438481049 and FW_RT_AC86U_300438481049.

Issue(s)
From Thursday, 3 days after the flashing my partner had complained about steaming shows stuttering and cutting audio out. This was happening with streaming shows from the internet and videos over the network. Friday I saw first hand on Amazon Prime a show would stream normally, notice picture degradation 1-2 second audio gap, then the picture came back to normal (this was connected via LAN). Happened a few times over the course of the episode. I had some other projects I was working on in the office so I didn't get to do anything with it until Sunday...but that was too late. It was mid afternoon and all of a sudden my wired and wireless connection dropped. I couldn't connect to my Asus router at all. I went to physically look at the AC86U router to manually reboot it and saw that there were no lights on except for a steady white light on port 4.

To this moment whether I have a LAN cable plugged into any of the LAN ports or not, only 4's light is on. No power lights, no WiFi lights, no activity lights, not even the white light on the Asus logo at the back of the router is on like on the AC68U. For all intents and purposes I do not have an AC86U router on my network.

What I've tried
Tried using the WPS method
https://www.snbforums.com/threads/ac86u-seems-to-be-stuck-in-boot-loop-after-firmware-update.49585/

https://icr-am.asus.com/webchat/icr...-US&treeId=AM.US.EN-US.Network&tenantId=EN-US

Tried the Asus Firmware recovery method (no power light, so no blinking power light), and various combinations of button presses 5, 10, 20 second holds of the reset button before and during power on.
https://www.snbforums.com/threads/a...-boot-loop-after-firmware-update.49585/page-3 Retried the above method plugged into all 4 ports.

Each time I tried to do a portscan using Angry IP scanner and it only saw my PC's IP I set to 192.168.1.10.

No matter what I do, the port #4 light is the only light that remains constant.


I know I'm doing the firmware recovery method properly because I successfully performed it on the AC68U node so I can have at least that one working as a standalone until I can repair the AC86U. As of right now it's on stock Asus 3.0.0.4.385__20490.

What else can I try to bring life back into my AC86U?

TL;DR
Flashed AC68U and AC86U from stock ASUS to Merlin firmware RT-AC68U_384.17_0 and RT-AC86U_384.17_0, respectively. Worked, okay (sort of) for a few days, but wired and wireless connections while streaming were cutting out more frequently than it ever did on stock Asus firmware. Few days after flashing the AC86U completely died except for a steady white light on LAN port 4. Nothing I've done (see above) has made a difference. No power lights of any kind, no connection of any kind, LAN port 4 is the only light on.

Update
My router was returned. Repair notes indicate they just swapped out the whole unit.
 
Last edited:
Hello,

I'll break my story into 3 parts, history, issue(s) and what I've tried, if you want to skim or just read ahead.

My life's story
About 8 years ago I started out with an AC68U. I used Asus and Merlin firmware on it. Two years ago when I moved into a bigger place I got an AC86U to put both into AiMesh mode. At the time Merlin didn't have AiMesh capability so I flashed it (AC68U) with stock Asus firmware, updating regularly, but skipping every few updates, TBH.

For the last 6-8 months I'd have sporadic disconnects from the network (WiFi only), but my devices would fall back to my ISP's WiFi router signal which was still broadcasting for guests (being completely isolated from the rest of my network services). My parents had the AC68U and were tired of the lack of WiFi in the whole home so about a month ago they switched to Orbi mesh and 3 nodes. When I was resetting to factory I saw that Merlin had updated and AiMesh was available in the firmware. Having fond memories of Merlin firmware, last week I flashed both the AC68U and AC86U firmware to Merin, specifically RT-AC68U_384.17_0 and RT-AC86U_384.17_0. I came from FW_RT_AC68U_300438481049 and FW_RT_AC86U_300438481049.

Issue(s)
From Thursday, 3 days after the flashing my partner had complained about steaming shows stuttering and cutting audio out. This was happening with streaming shows from the internet and videos over the network. Friday I saw first hand on Amazon Prime a show would stream normally, notice picture degradation 1-2 second audio gap, then the picture came back to normal (this was connected via LAN). Happened a few times over the course of the episode. I had some other projects I was working on in the office so I didn't get to do anything with it until Sunday...but that was too late. It was mid afternoon and all of a sudden my wired and wireless connection dropped. I couldn't connect to my Asus router at all. I went to physically look at the AC86U router to manually reboot it and saw that there were no lights on except for a steady white light on port 4.

To this moment whether I have a LAN cable plugged into any of the LAN ports or not, only 4's light is on. No power lights, no WiFi lights, no activity lights, not even the white light on the Asus logo at the back of the router is on like on the AC68U. For all intents and purposes I do not have an AC86U router on my network.

What I've tried
Tried using the WPS method
https://www.snbforums.com/threads/ac86u-seems-to-be-stuck-in-boot-loop-after-firmware-update.49585/

https://icr-am.asus.com/webchat/icr...-US&treeId=AM.US.EN-US.Network&tenantId=EN-US

Tried the Asus Firmware recovery method (no power light, so no blinking power light), and various combinations of button presses 5, 10, 20 second holds of the reset button before and during power on.
https://www.snbforums.com/threads/a...-boot-loop-after-firmware-update.49585/page-3 Retried the above method plugged into all 4 ports.

Each time I tried to do a portscan using Angry IP scanner and it only saw my PC's IP I set to 192.168.1.10.

No matter what I do, the port #4 light is the only light that remains constant.


I know I'm doing the firmware recovery method properly because I successfully performed it on the AC68U node so I can have at least that one working as a standalone until I can repair the AC86U. As of right now it's on stock Asus 3.0.0.4.385__20490.

What else can I try to bring life back into my AC86U?

TL;DR
Flashed AC68U and AC86U from stock ASUS to Merlin firmware RT-AC68U_384.17_0 and RT-AC86U_384.17_0, respectively. Worked, okay (sort of) for a few days, but wired and wireless connections while streaming were cutting out more frequently than it ever did on stock Asus firmware. Few days after flashing the AC86U completely died except for a steady white light on LAN port 4. Nothing I've done (see above) has made a difference. No power lights of any kind, no connection of any kind, LAN port 4 is the only light on.

If the 86U doesn't run normally with stock firmware, reset, and config; then it likely has a hardware fault. If it's within the 2-year warranty period or close enough, call Asus Support for an RMA.

OE
 
If the 86U doesn't run normally with stock firmware, reset, and config; then it likely has a hardware fault. If it's within the 2-year warranty period or close enough, call Asus Support for an RMA.

OE

2-year warranty?! I thought it had just 1 year. Out of this world! Let's see what Asus Support says. Thank you
 
2-year warranty?! I thought it had just 1 year. Out of this world! Let's see what Asus Support says. Thank you

Warranty could vary with point of sale. Asus will confirm what is possible for your serial number.

OE
 
The Asus support was..let's say light on the support front, but I got an RMA number and I'm putting together the package for shipment as I type this.
 
Less than 2 weeks turnaround time. Repair notes indicate no repair was done, but instead I was issued a new (or refurbished - I do not know how to tell from the serial number - ) unit, antennas and power adapter.
 
What year was the unit you received manufactured? It is in clear text on the router's label.
 
Less than 2 weeks turnaround time. Repair notes indicate no repair was done, but instead I was issued a new (or refurbished - I do not know how to tell from the serial number - ) unit, antennas and power adapter.

My RMA replacement was Built 2020 in Vietnam (not 2018 China), so relatively new build and probably not a refurbished unit.

OE
 
...all of a sudden my wired and wireless connection dropped. I couldn't connect to my Asus router at all. I went to physically look at the AC86U router to manually reboot it and saw that there were no lights on except for a steady white light on port 4.

Not been on this forum in over a year since mostly ditching ASUS networking equipment for Ubiquiti Networks UniFi and haven’t looked back. However still had a 86U knocking about so took it to my office and updated it OTA to what was the latest firmware sometime in first week of June 2020. Today I returned to the office and powered the 86U back on. All was working fine and then suddenly it has died in exactly the same way as you have described yours did, as quoted above. I purchased it from Amazon in September 2018 so I’ll RMA so I can sell the replacement for anything I can get for it but I’m not going to be back in UK until November due to flights being cancelled so who knows how that may affect any exchange. I’m only slightly annoyed because it as a temporary thing while I ordered a UniFi USG and WAP which I’ve now done this morning. I’ve brought the 86U home and it’s still exhibiting the identical fault you described. It’s another piece of junk like all ASUS most networking equipment I’ve owned (GT-AC5300 too).

The only Asus routers I do like and haven’t experienced problematic issues with are their two 4G models (55U and 68U). My preference is for the 55U because the SIM card slot is better designed with a tray, unlike the 68U where one can inadvertently slide the SIM card inside the shell of the router which requires some dissasembly to retrieve.

Probably won’t post here again for a while as nothing further to add to this debarcle and this forum is prejudiced towards users in some locations, constantly bombarding then with a capture to login and do anything every other moment. You probably won’t have experienced it but I’m in Brazil so users here are probably considered dubious traffic by Cloudflare.

Thanks for your post. Made me realise it wasn’t something I did.
 

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