Posted: Mon Feb 29, 2016 11:25 Post subject: RT-N16 w. slow wifi - from tomato(shibby) => ?
Hi!
My Asus RT-N16 (currently with Tomato Firmware 1.28.0000 MIPSR2-132 K26 USB AIO, but same problems with lots of older versions) has terrible wireless speed (says it has 11 Mbps most of the time, but effective / measured wifi data transmission rate over time stays well below 1 Mbps).
I've tried just about everything except using a different "brand" of firmware to solve this problem (configuration, different tomato builds, location of the devices, switched antennas, checked caps, improved power supply, drove the f.*ing thing into the forest to make sure it's not interference from outside...)
So now I'm giving up on using tomato. But I'm not sure which other firmwares I should try in what order.
- I'm guessing it's easier to go from dd-wrt back to stock asus than the other way around, so dd-wrt first?
- I'm also guessing, trying open-wrt doesn't make much sense if dd-wrt turns out not to do the job?
- I'm having a hard time finding reliable information on what RECENT dd-wrt builds I can flash directly from tomato. I mean RECENT as in: "no horrible publicly known vulnerabilities". Unless there's no other option and it's not "toooo bad". There might not be one available with that nasty DNS query bug fixed yet?
- Also not sure which different builds I should check out (there's probably not much sense in comparing versions that all use the same kernel modules for the wifi adapter?)
- And of course everything looks like a huge mess. And out of date. Can't figure out if I have to flash an old firmware first or if I can directly use a new one from tomato.
Could someone please give me some hints on what firmware to start with etc to maximize my chances of ending up with a nice, working setup before I'm so frustrated with that router that I finally brick it (using a brick. That thing has been messing with me for several years now and I don't feel like it has much time left before I'm bound to snap at this point.)?
Posted: Mon Feb 29, 2016 15:04 Post subject: Re: RT-N16 w. slow wifi - from tomato(shibby) => ?
You're testing this wireless speed against a LAN share files or an internet speed test, etc? Is your signal strength ok, just poor wireless speed? And have you tried adjusting advanced wireless settings?
datwrtuser wrote:
- I'm guessing it's easier to go from dd-wrt back to stock asus than the other way around, so dd-wrt first?
I use AsusWRT on my N66U; but don't have a N16. I would think that put AsusWRT on would qualify as OEM but ...you've got some research to do.
Wiki included router forums threads in Links at the bottom:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Asus_RT-N16
The signal is "great" according to all devices and it's "not great but still kind of ok" according to the router.
Either way, the effective throughput is WAY too low to be explained by... well... anything that I was able to measure. Not just "slow". Or shouldn't "everything always below 1Mbps" be considered "much too slow" for an "up to 300 Mps router" under any (normal-ish, even kind of suboptimal) circumstances? I mean, I've seen better wifi rates between adapters I forgot to screw the antennae back on after cleaning the contacts *truestorybro*!
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And have you tried adjusting advanced wireless settings?
I have tried adjusting everything. I have tried running scripts that adjust and test wireless settings for me. I have made any adjustment that anyone has ever posted on the internet in every possible combination.
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Reading through the router model thread would likely net that info but in general, you must always go back to stock first, when changing 3rd party firmware.
I read trough a router model thread, a router model thread summary thread, a router model thread summary thread summary and several router model wiki pages, one router database and lots of random internet stuff.
There's lots of reports where people did it and it worked "better and easier than flashing from stock". Couldn't find any reports of where it failed... yet everyone says "not to do it". And everything on the subject seems to be at least 3 years old...
Same thing goes for "flashing to older wrt first".
Well, probably better to do it the safe way *sigh*. Maybe I'll test the other way after the router manages to finally drive me insane and post the results.
Oh... I got the impression that that was basically just "the stock rom with some new bugs added" (not sure where I read that) but I guess there has been progress since then? I'll take another look at it, thanks!
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You've read the Broadcom forum announcements, right?
I've read just about everything at this point, but I'm sure in the end it'll turn out I missed the one thing that was actually very relevant anyway.
Do you mean the "Peacock" Thread? It looked kind of obsolete (no edit date... not sure how long since last maintained), but I skimmed it. Anything in particular I should pay more attention to?
Does that mean the "wiki" really still is the "only / best way" to go? Somehow I expected things / methods to have changed + improved more since most of that information was first collected there... with all the "new random confusing information" that has accumulated everywhere else in the meantime?
The "Announcement: Peacock Thread-FAQ" is definitely still up-to-date, and required reading (as the other announcement also state)...it just has a -lot- of historical info in it. There are still questions daily from users still using those old routers and/or builds. The edit date...ah, I know why it doesn't show one; cuz its the latest (/only) post. I know Murrkf updated it to add build 27858 to the 'recommended' list a few months ago. It was for general info, esp to avoid bricking if you decide to try DD.
But anyway...
I have seen some threads (DD, obviously, not Tomato, but relevant) where a user would have this kind of issue and find that either the router or their device had gotten set to a low upper limit speed, vs 'auto'. Is everything fine on a wired connection? What wireless devices have you tested?
For some additional rambling info...I noticed on recent builds since ~Dec, on my WNDR routers, that if I adjust advanced wireless settings, I almost never get over 1-3 Mb/s. So the last couple builds I've left them alone, and get ~50-70 on G and 60-90 on N.
If you're done w/ Tomato anyway, I'd put AsusWRT on it and do some testing w/ it, since you should have it anyway if you decide to later try DD. There's an extensive changelog if you want details; scroll down to release 378.50. Good luck! _________________ #NAT/SFE/CTF: limited speed w/ DD#Repeater issues#DD-WRT info: FAQ, Builds, Types, Modes, Changes, Demo#
OPNsense x64 5050e ITX|DD: DIR-810L, 2*EA6900@1GHz, R6300v1, RT-N66U@663, WNDR4000@533, E1500@353,
WRT54G{Lv1.1,Sv6}@250|FreshTomato: F7D8302@532|OpenWRT: F9K1119v1, RT-ACRH13, R6220, WNDR3700v4
Is everything fine on a wired connection? What wireless devices have you tested?
Wired connection was fine. Tested with several different modern android phones, laptops, tablets and 2 linux PC. Most of which have been tested with other routers and are a lot faster there.
Also flashed the router in the meantime:
- Tried AsusWRT: same problem. Also I hate the Asus GUI. A lot.
- Tried AsusStock: Same problem.
- Tried old "recommended" DD-wrt: Still same problem.
- Tried newer DD-wrt: bricked it (not sure why)
It's probably just soft-bricked (rt-n16 is pretty hard to brick AFAIK), but since I'm pretty much out of options anyway when it comes to fixing WIFI speed, I probably won't try to un-brick it.
Or does anyone have another really good idea on how the slow wifi could be a (non-hardware) fixable problem?
I presume with all that testing you were doing resets after flashing? Not that I imagine it would matter, at this point. Maybe try an 'erase nvram' from telnet, assuming that is safe on this router; which you'd -really- have to verify. Assuming also that you get it unbricked, to that end...
I suppose it could be a hardware failure; I've had -lots- of bad caps on older routers that caused a multitude of issues. Unfortunately, you need an ESR meter to check them (none of the bad ones I found has any visible errata, unlike most other devices' cap failures).
I think I know what's wrong. The router is clearly possessed. Have not been able to figure out by what sort of entity yet, but it's clearly malevolent and I think I'm getting closer.
When I tried to unbrick the router, the router bricked the attached PC instead. The PC froze and - after reboot - briefly gave me a "possible voltage or overclocking failure" message before going black and refusing to start up again. Had to remove the CMOS button cell and half of the RAM. Apparently the board is capable of restoring an old BIOS version on its own, but that old version doesn't support as much RAM as the updated BIOS did, so it just refused to start up or even beep until I took some out. Oh well...
After that, I managed to flash dd-wrt on the router again with tftp. Managed to update it without bricking it this time, too, but then the bridges were broken somehow by default so I could only access the GUI trough WIFI. Had to update the firmware trough WIFI + reset NVRAM multiple of times - when I reached ""dd-wrt.v24-29048_NEWD-2_K3.x_big", then LAN ports finally started working again.
... and now I'm pretty much back where I started except the GUI seems a bit more powerful and a LOT less comfortable than tomato.
Initially, I tested uploading a big file from the PC attached to LAN port to a smartphone right next to the router with nothing else connected and I briefly managed to get ~40 Mbps.
But since the other devices re-joined the network, I haven't seen a combined effective rate bigger than ~2Mbps over WIFI even while most of the devices don't have any open connections. And the GUI display is stuck @ "5.5 Mbps" again.
Without extensive testing I can't tell for sure if the WIFI is better than before. It's a little bit better probably, but nothing spectacular - that could just be a result of me having moved the router while I was fixing it. Not the big / instantly noticeable difference I was looking for. :/
So, now I'm trying to take advantages of dd-wrt features that I didn't have with tomato. But don't really know where to start...
Router says:
Mode AP
Network N-Only
Channel 11
TX Power 20 mW
Rate 5.5 Mbps
Received (RX) 12186 OK, no error
Transmitted (TX) 14544 OK, no error
( Also: dd-wrt fails to resolve the hostnames of the linux PCs and just calls them all "*"? Is this normal? Tomato didn't have any problems with those. )