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RT-AC88U issues with 5Ghz

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Roz

New Around Here
Hi,

I am facing some slowness issues with a brand new RT-AC88U wifi router and was wondering if anyone here could give me some pointers on what else to check.
(Just want to also mention that I have a network background (not so much Wi-FI though), so I could rule out/test some things myself).

I have Fios gigabit internet at home and this RT-AC88U router directly connects to it via an RJ-45 cable. There is no ISP modem in between, is what I am saying. Wired computers work just fine, no issues there. Wireless is stable enough on the 2.4 Ghz channel, so no complaints there also.

The problem is with the 5 Ghz wifi (separate SSID). It's signal strength is quite good, which I confirmed by walking around the house with one of those wifi analyzer software running. I even had a continuous ping going (to a random internet site) while I was walking around just to see if pings drop, but it doesn't. So that part is good. But the problem is, web sites load very slowly and some sites don't even load at all. The clients are mostly Apple products (macbooks + iPads). I don't have any custom or special setting on the router like VPN, QoS or anything like that though I do have parental controls enabled for time scheduling. And when it's slow, all I need to is, switch over to the 2.4 Ghz channel and everything works just fine as it should. Posting some screenshots of the settings I have in there. Any thoughts/suggestions, would be much appreciated! Thank you.

This is for the 5Ghz channel:
1605122136734.png


1605122253462.png

1605122438330.png


1605122523383.png


1605122601877.png
 
Hi,

I am facing some slowness issues with a brand new RT-AC88U wifi router and was wondering if anyone here could give me some pointers on what else to check.
(Just want to also mention that I have a network background (not so much Wi-FI though), so I could rule out/test some things myself).

I have Fios gigabit internet at home and this RT-AC88U router directly connects to it via an RJ-45 cable. There is no ISP modem in between, is what I am saying. Wired computers work just fine, no issues there. Wireless is stable enough on the 2.4 Ghz channel, so no complaints there also.

The problem is with the 5 Ghz wifi (separate SSID). It's signal strength is quite good, which I confirmed by walking around the house with one of those wifi analyzer software running. I even had a continuous ping going (to a random internet site) while I was walking around just to see if pings drop, but it doesn't. So that part is good. But the problem is, web sites load very slowly and some sites don't even load at all. The clients are mostly Apple products (macbooks + iPads). I don't have any custom or special setting on the router like VPN, QoS or anything like that though I do have parental controls enabled for time scheduling. And when it's slow, all I need to is, switch over to the 2.4 Ghz channel and everything works just fine as it should. Posting some screenshots of the settings I have in there. Any thoughts/suggestions, would be much appreciated! Thank you.

This is for the 5Ghz channel:
View attachment 27585

View attachment 27586
View attachment 27587

View attachment 27588

View attachment 27589

Try different, non-DFS 5.0 channels.

My 5.0 WiFi settings:
- set 5.0 WLAN to SSID, n/ac, 20/40/80 MHz, ch 36-48 52-144 (DFS) 149-161 165, WPA2-AES*

Disable Airtime Fairness and Universal Beamforming.

Forget and recreate your Apple WiFi connections.

Suspect faulty 5.0 WiFi on the new router.

OE
 
Will try those and revert back, Thank you.
Regarding the channel, I am currently on 149 which I think is already non-DFS?

The weirdest part is - so I now have a browser open on the laptop connected to the 5 Ghz wifi. And in it, I have the apple.com web site open. Now if I try to open a new site (which I haven't visited recently) say like ibm.com, it just sits there like for ever. No timeout or anything, just keeps on 'circling'. And all the while, I can do steady pings to any random internet web site, the ping never drops!. I am starting to also suspect some web filtering/Qos aspect of it that may be broken, but as to how it all gets back to normal just by switching back to the 2.4Ghz channel, I have no idea.
I do see that n the below screen, the 'web and apps filters' thing always keep turning back ON (I think after a reboot) even though I keep turning it off.

1605124631545.png
 
Will try those and revert back, Thank you.
Regarding the channel, I am currently on 149 which I think is already non-DFS?

The weirdest part is - so I now have a browser open on the laptop connected to the 5 Ghz wifi. And in it, I have the apple.com web site open. Now if I try to open a new site (which I haven't visited recently) say like ibm.com, it just sits there like for ever. No timeout or anything, just keeps on 'circling'. And all the while, I can do steady pings to any random internet web site, the ping never drops!. I am starting to also suspect some web filtering/Qos aspect of it that may be broken, but as to how it all gets back to normal just by switching back to the 2.4Ghz channel, I have no idea.
I do see that n the below screen, the 'web and apps filters' thing always keep turning back ON (I think after a reboot) even though I keep turning it off.

View attachment 27592

That's weird.

Flash the latest firmware, reset to factory defaults using the webUI Restore w/Initialize, and then configure from scratch.

OE
 
Just to provide an update, I tried multiple things like what was suggested earlier and it originally didn't seem to help. But after a while (a few hours later), everything just started to work. So I guess it needed a while after the changes were made, anyway now it's all fine and I hope it stays this way. I didn't do the factory reset though.
Thanks vey much for the suggestions!

Had a few more questions on the RT-AC88U

1. I disabled NAT acceleration because parental controls/time scheduling was working a bit off (once blocked, for some clients it would stay off even though the time limited ended). But, does disabling NAT acceleration negatively affect the throughout this router (wired and wireless)?

2. With this router, what maximum throughputs do you guys see over the 2.4 Ghz Wifi network? I know this is such a broad question due to the many different variables involved, but I just wanted to get an idea thats all.

Thanks again.
 
Just to provide an update, I tried multiple things like what was suggested earlier and it originally didn't seem to help. But after a while (a few hours later), everything just started to work. So I guess it needed a while after the changes were made, anyway now it's all fine and I hope it stays this way. I didn't do the factory reset though.
Thanks vey much for the suggestions!

Had a few more questions on the RT-AC88U

1. I disabled NAT acceleration because parental controls/time scheduling was working a bit off (once blocked, for some clients it would stay off even though the time limited ended). But, does disabling NAT acceleration negatively affect the throughout this router (wired and wireless)?

2. With this router, what maximum throughputs do you guys see over the 2.4 Ghz Wifi network? I know this is such a broad question due to the many different variables involved, but I just wanted to get an idea thats all.

Thanks again.

Someone else will have to comment on the NAT acceleration... I don't have that control on my AC86U.

2.4 speed will be a function of protocol/link rate speed (n might be 150, 300, 450 Mbps), bandwidth (20 MHz to be nice to your neighbors), number of antennas/streams (1x, 2x, 3x), signal strength/distance/obstacles, channel interference, client adapter drivers, etc.

Here are some numbers from a 2.4-focused speed test I performed awhile back with my AiMesh:


OE
 

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