T-mobile ac68u upgrade

[moose]

I upgrade to Merlin successfully when I purchased the Ac68u t-mobile brand, now that there's a new version of the firmware, do i backup JFFS and my settings? Then upload new firmware?

Also, I noticed that this router ping requests "time out" if my connection is under a load of any sort. Like if computer A starts uploading, a pingtest on computer b will return timeouts (used to just get long requests). Is there a settings causing the timeout? The old router did not timeout at least under load stress.

Edit: I noticed the problem comes from QoS, one pc uploads and disrupts the other connection. Does not happen when disabled. I do want to prevent lag with QoS Bandwith Limiter... does WAN packet overhead have something to do with it?

 

[martinr]

Not infrequently we get posts on the T-mobile RT-AC68U. For example, https://www.snbforums.com/threads/u...t-to-merlin-firmware-guide.28961/#post-329087

It might be worth having a search to see if there's any relevance to your model in general. In the meantime, it's always a good idea to backup your settings and jffs. John's NVRAM Save and Restore Utility is great because, unlike the backup and restore in the router'GUI, you can safely use it across firmware versions and even across different routers. Well worth the time to sit down and fully digest the instructions, which might look daunting at first sight, but they aren't at all.

Now, you didn't say which version of the firmware you are now using. That could be relevant to any additional advice.

 

[FreshJR]

Search fatwallet or Slickdeals for a complete tutorial.

You will have to downgrade your firmware first.
Then you will have to flash a custom cfe.
Then upgrade to whatever you want.

Anyway full guides have already been made.

 

[moose]

No I already got merlin on it... I just want to upgrade it.

 

[joegreat]

I just posted here how to save and restore USER entered settings - as a factory reset is always a good idea if you change the firmware version.

 

[martinr]

No I already got merlin on it... I just want to upgrade it.

Which version of Merlin is on it now? For the RT-AC68U, if your current Merlin firmware was earlier than 378.55, you could not flash directly to the current version: you would have to flash to the intermediate version 378.55 first . That's why I asked in#2 which version you are running now.

And this thread, currently on the go, will be of interest to you: https://www.snbforums.com/threads/upgrading-firmware-on-asus-rt-ac68u.41085/#post-346806

 

[moose]

I did the whole upgrade to 376 first for 64mb of jffs, I'm currently at 380.67

 

[martinr]

As you already have it running on 380.67, I would have thought updating to 380.68 would be trivial. Nevertheless, as I said in Post #2 above, it's always a good idea to backup your settings, ideally with John's Utility. Should you have any odd behaviour after updating, you should restore to factory default settings and then restore your settings (using John's utility).

 

[moose]

Still trying to resolve the ping timeout issue. Happens on both wired and wireless. Disabling Upnp and Nat seems to fix it for now. Is this a advisable option?

Is AP mode the appropriate mode coming from a modem/router? I notice it disables some features.

 

[martinr]

I don't understand what you mean in the final paragraph: "coming from a modem/router"? Perhaps you misunderstand what an access point is, or what it's used for? Here's something I copied from the Internet:
"A wireless access point (AP) in computer networking is a hardware device that allows wireless clients to connect to a wired network using Wi-Fi. The AP usually connects to a NAT router via a wired network, however, it can also be integrated as part of a wireless router as well.

What differentiates an access point from wireless repeaters/extenders is that it is connected via wired network to its gateway and possibly the internet."


I have an AP in my loft connected to my router via an Ethernet cable (~15m long). It gives me another
wireless network in parts of the house where the router's wireless signal is weak. But I still have only one network (eg 192.168.1.0/24)

So you should now realise why some features have to be disabled, being irrelevant, unnecessary or liable to break things: you downgrade many of the router's functions, because it's now acting as a wireless access to your gateway router. So, whilst it has the capacity to be a router, you've disabled everything other than those functions needed for it to behave as a mere AP. If you didn't, you'd run into all sorts of problems as the poor device tries to act as a router (in competition with your gateway router) and an access point at the same time. That's not to say you can't have a second router with a subnetwork connected to your gateway router, but that's something else.

As for disabling NAT, how would the gateway router know which device on your network to send the incoming, returning packets in response to a request made by that device?

 

[moose]

kk thank you goodbye

 

[martinr]

kk thank you goodbye

"kk", I've just learned a new phrase.

By the way, if you don't need upnp, you should turn it off, anyway; same with any other services that are Off in the default, as-supplied-by-Merlin, state, unless you need them, of course.

If I were you, and if ping is the only thing not working, I'd leave it alone unless for some reason you must have ping working.

You are talking about responding to ping from the LAN and not the WAN, aren't you?