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Wireless LAN types for newer models (AXE11000/16000, AX11000, etc.)

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Viktor Jaep

Part of the Furniture
Hi All,

Traditionally, on our "older" model Asus routers, wl0 = 2.4GHz, and wl1 = 5GHz... that seemed to be pretty easy to deal with. Now, on these newer GT-AXE16000-esque routers, things seem to have been jumbled up a bit more now that they're supporting multiple 5Ghz interfaces, and adding a 6GHz interface.

Thanks to some help from @ugandy to determine what's what, we ended up determining that on the GT-AXE16000, it looks something like this:
wl0 = 5GHz (1), wl1 = 5GHz (2), wl2 = 6GHz, wl3 = 2.4GHz

I'm trying to find some resource that accurately lists these assignments of the wireless lans on these new routers... because, does the GT-AXE16000 match up with that of the GT-AXE11000? Or not? What about the GT-AX11000? It seems to be either missing an extra 5GHz lan, or perhaps the 6GHz lan? I can't quite tell. I know @RMerlin posted a snippet about this some time ago, but I cannot seem to find it for the life of me in the bowels of snbforums. ;)

Please let me know where I can go for this kind of info?

Thank you! :)
 
Traditionally, on our "older" model Asus routers, wl0 = 2.4GHz, and wl1 = 5GHz...
That was never the case. For example on an "old" RT-AC68U the primary 2.4 GHz wireless interface was eth1, whereas the first 2.4 GHz guest network was wl0.1. Or are you talking about the nvram variables rather than the network interfaces? If you explain what it is you're trying to do maybe the question will become clearer.
 
That was never the case. For example on an "old" RT-AC68U the primary 2.4 GHz wireless interface was eth1, whereas the first 2.4 GHz guest network was wl0.1. Or are you talking about the nvram variables rather than the network interfaces? If you explain what it is you're trying to do maybe the question will become clearer.
Sorry... yes, looking at the nvram variables... when I run, "nvram get wl0_ifname", depending on the router I'm looking at, that could either be a 2.4GHz (eth5 on a AC86U) or 5GHz (eth7 on AXE16000). Where can I find info on how these are all mapped (like which wl's are marked as 2.4, 5 or 6GHz) in order to provide the best possible compatibility?

As I mentioned, on my AC86U, wl0 = 2.4GHz, wl1 = 5GHz
On the GT-AXE16000, wl0 = 5GHz (1), wl1 = 5GHz (2), wl2 = 6GHz, wl3 = 2.4GHz

On the GT-AXE11000, wl0 = ?, wl1 = ?, wl2 = ?, wl3 = ?
On the GT-AX11000, wl0 = ?, wl1 = ?, wl2 = ?
 
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I believe RMerlin said in that other thread that the order is arbitrarily set by Broadcom (or was it Asus). Although previously they had always followed a predicable pattern. Again, if you explain exactly what it is you're trying to do or what information you're trying to obtain I might be able to offer some suggestions.
 
I believe RMerlin said in that other thread that the order is arbitrarily set by Broadcom (or was it Asus). Although previously they had always followed a predicable pattern. Again, if you explain exactly what it is you're trying to do or what information you're trying to obtain I might be able to offer some suggestions.
I'm trying to make my one-size-fits-all tool RTRMON work for any router that comes its way. So when I query "nvram get wl0_ifname", and I get back its interface name, that I also know whether it's 2.4GHz, 5GHz or 6GHz so that I can pull statistics for them, and make sure they are all lined up in their order of 2.4/5/6 sections on the page:

1662487102097.png
 
It looks like there's no foolproof generic way of making associations that would work now and for future devices. Even RMerlin has had to hard-code an exception for the GT-AXE16000.

Sure, you could do nvram get wl_ifnames and I'd guess that the order would correlate to wl0, wl1, etc. But there's no obvious way of guaranteeing which set of variables is associated a particular band as it's shown in the GUI.

EDIT: Looking at some of the other code it looks like after some shuffling around of things the firmware is currently hard coded to use variables wl0, wl1, wl2 and wl3 for 2.4, 5(-1), 5-2 and 6 GHz respectively.
 
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EDIT: Looking at some of the other code it looks like after some shuffling around of things the firmware is currently hard coded to use variables wl0, wl1, wl2 and wl3 for 2.4, 5(-1), 5-2 and 6 GHz respectively.
Do you know which router that firmware was for, because that wasn't the way it looks for the GT-AXE16000... that seemed to go in this order: 5-1, 5-2, 6, 2.4 GHz (Then again, this is based on looking at just one of them sofar)

Definitely frustrating. Thanks for your assist with figuring this puzzle out. ;)
 
I was looking at the source for the Wireless General page and the way it uses wl_unit to switch between the band settings. If that doesn't match up with what you're seeing then I don't know what's going on.
 
I was looking at the source for the Wireless General page and the way it uses wl_unit to switch between the band settings. If that doesn't match up with what you're seeing then I don't know what's going on.
OK I see there's more hard-coded exceptions for the GT-AXE16000. For example here it's using a modulus calculation to change the unit number from what you were seeing, but here it's using a different set of variable prefixes for the guest WiFi. Yuck.

I suspect all of this is going to be in a state of flux as Asus brings new models as possibly changes to the firmware. So I think for the time being the best approach is to do what RMerlin has and create exception code just for the GT-AXE16000.
 
OK I see there's more hard-coded exceptions for the GT-AXE16000. For example here it's using a modulus calculation to change the unit number from what you were seeing, but here it's using a different set of variable prefixes for the guest WiFi. Yuck.

I suspect all of this is going to be in a state of flux as Asus brings new models as possibly changes to the firmware. So I think for the time being the best approach is to do what RMerlin has and create exception code just for the GT-AXE16000.
Thanks @ColinTaylor. You're right... YUCK. ;) That's going to definitely change my approach....
 

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