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Will RT-AC66U B1 work as an extender with the same SSID?

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oldserverguy

Occasional Visitor
I want to replace the last of the ancient technology that I have in my network - WRT54GL with DD-WRT used as a wireless extender. It looks like the RT-AC66U B1 (AC1750) can be used for this. I also want to keep the same SSID as I've done with other networks. The download manual is out of date and I can't find where this is covered anywhere. The B1 looks idea with the 4 ethernet ports and my other newer ASUS routers are fantastic.

Is this a good choice for $80 and can I keep the same SSID?
 
Asus calls a WiFi extender "Repeater Mode". That would normally appear under the Operation Mode settings. Looking at page 77 of the manual (April 2019) that mode is not present. I can only assume therefore that is not a supported mode.

That is quite surprising given that the RT-AC66U_B1 is almost identical to the RT-AC68U, which does support Repeater Mode. So it's probably best to avoid that model and get an RT-AC68U (or another model) instead.
 
I want to replace the last of the ancient technology that I have in my network - WRT54GL with DD-WRT used as a wireless extender. It looks like the RT-AC66U B1 (AC1750) can be used for this. I also want to keep the same SSID as I've done with other networks. The download manual is out of date and I can't find where this is covered anywhere. The B1 looks idea with the 4 ethernet ports and my other newer ASUS routers are fantastic.

Is this a good choice for $80 and can I keep the same SSID?

I assume you’re wanting to use a wireless backhaul and the AC66U will not be wired?

I used a wired AC66U as an “extender” with the same SSID just fine. But mine was in AP mode.
 
It's not in the download manual but there's some info on it. This is a snip from asus.com

upload_2020-7-15_12-30-51.png
 
It's not in the download manual but there's some info on it. This is a snip from asus.com
That looks like a page for the RT-AC66U which is much different to the RT-AC66U_B1..... although that does show the same panel.

Untitled.png


Maybe ask Asus customer services before buying just to be sure.
 
I tried CS but they are of no help with presales (and of course I'm semiretired rather running an IT support company so my one off purchases don't entitle me to a support rep that I can personally directly contact). After power on did a manual firmware update to the 7/28/2020 version.

It was easy peezy - just have to look under the administration tab. Some of the documentation of course needs an update. I used the repeater mode rather than the AiMesh even though the headend router is an ASUS and used a static IP. Wanted to keep things straight forward and I can add my old repeater back in if I really need to. I did change the "suggested" name to the same name as the headend and didn't run into any problems.
 
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