Your opinions on ASUS RT-AC68U.

[Lola]

I would appreciate opinion's on this router. I intend to use it with Cat 6 wired ports on the router.

 

[Misi]

Hi, I am using ASUS RT-AC68U since last year August. There are good reviews here so I would recommend you to read them however my opinion shortly:


- This is a very good device. I used in the very beginning with the original firmware, and then I was using with Asuswrt-Merlin for a while and now I am using with HGG’s firmware (custom version of Asuswrt-Merlin) which fits to me the best.

- The ASUS RT-AC68U is very reliable as a hardware only you need to find a good firmware.

- This device is also good to go with DD-WRT firmware which is one of my favorite however as because of the CTF module (NAT acceleration) is closed source, and even manufacturers themselves don't have access to its source code it is not supported on DD WRT. This is Broadcom specific (router cpu). However NAT acceleration can be compensated with increasing the CPU MHz (overclock) easily on DD-WRT. Also NAT acceleration makes sense if you have greater internet speed than 300Mbit/s.

- Unfortunately the USB 3.0 is not performing very well on that device. This is mentioned in the reviews too. Maybe the USB shield is not well designed. So don’t buy this device if you need very good performance for USB storage.

- The device comes with 800MHz CPU speed which is the Broadcom’s ARM based CPU. Almost all of them can run on 1200MHz if you are interested to overclock. However this needs some practice and reading as it can be done only in the command line interface not in the GUI (or in the GUI on DD-WRT).

- I think it has great performance in both 2,4 and 5GHz radio. The radio can handle a lot more power than the factory default. However you need to respect your country regulation.

- If you are located in the US I would advise you to buy the RT-AC68P rather than the RT-AC68U as they increased the CPU frequency and also they improved the USB 3.0 issues. However currently RT-AC68P is only available in the US so when I bought mine in Europe I had no option to go for it.

- I have a 500/200Mbps internet at home with this device and as I mentioned I am using HGG’s firmware. It is obvious that on the LAN I can get all full speed of the 500/200Mbps internet speed. On 2,4GHz I get 120/100 and on 5GHz I could get 270/215. (I tried to attach pictures I hope that I could attached them. The pictures are not showing exactly the best measured values as I run them now but what I described here was the best what I could measure.)

- In overall I can recommend buying the ASUS RT-AC68U but it is depending on your needs a lot.

Regards,
Misi

 

[microchip]

I don't own the AC68U personally, but I can tell you I read mostly positive remarks on it, both on here and on other places. At the moment, I stay a bit away from ASUS routers as they run hot and I lost two of them due to that. Next time I'll buy a fan to blow at it/them, unless ASUS improves the design

In the summer, it gets hot at my place (up to 30°C inside, if not more) so you can imagine how hot the router gets without sufficient cooling.

 

[Lola]

Thanks very much guys I really appreciate your expertise in answering my question. I'm sort of undecided on just what router I will get so I was looking for personal experience. Once again thank you for taking the time to reply.

 

[Phoenix]

Thanks very much guys I really appreciate your expertise in answering my question. I'm sort of undecided on just what router I will get so I was looking for personal experience. Once again thank you for taking the time to reply.

I have owned the AC68U, AC88U, AC3200, and now the AC5300.

The AC68U was the most stable of them all but only on the stock firmware. Later firmwares to me personally caused it to be slower in terms of ping. I suggest you use it and stick to whatever firmware comes with it as the older firmwares are not available for download anymore.