Really, no bugs AT ALL so far. Wireless N is perfect, mixed mode is perfect. No disconnects, no GUI glitches. Nothing.
How long have you been using it?
So far, no instability here. With the last build I used, the router would slow to a crawl if I had a lot of FTP activity across my network to the Wii console (odd, I know!), and I'd have to reboot. Mixed mode never worked. It had random crashes too, but one thing I found I needed to do was set the UPnP to clear entries at reboot, as the NVRAM had several dozen entries for old forwarded ports littering it up, and I'd run out of NVRAM storage space. (This would likely cause any build to crash.)
The GUI is a problem though. Oddly enough, I can get the GUI to load perfectly each time on my Android phone across the network via wireless, yet it will not load reliably on Chrome, IE10 (which is bone stock as I rarely use it), and Opera (same). In fact, I can't get it to load at all right now. It's the only flaw I've found, but functionally this build is the most stable of all the builds I've used. I'm hoping a few others can try this build also.
Using it for just short of three months. GUI is fully functional without hitches.
Sweet! My 160 is still proving to be very stable on this build.
I'm considering trying mixed mode (G+N) to see if it gets enough throughput on the "N" if a "G" device connects. I think, though, that other than the Wii and Nintendo DS, I've upgraded all the other net adapters to "N". (I run the game consoles off of the Uverse router for now, using WEP.)
I have the 160 semi-retired, though, as I've picked up a WRT400N, and now use the WRT160N as a WAP to extend the range. So far they are playing very nicely together. My only issue is that I can't get the Acer laptop to connect to the 400, just the 160, and the cheap USB wireless N adapter on one of the bedroom computers won't connect to either the 160 or the 400. An identical USB adapter on another bedroom computer connects with no problems to the 160.
To configure the 160 when it's running as an access point, though, I'm thinking I have to connect it to a computer directly? I can't access it via an IP address I don't think...
The drops always occurred with N+G Mixed (or any mixed mode with N), so I'd be curious to hear your results if you do try.
OK, I'll be the guinea pig.
I reconfigured the WRT160N again and tried it with the Wii. The transmission rate does knock back to 54Mb/s (from 144Mb/s) when a G device connects, but that is normal behavior for a wireless network. It will scale speed back to the slowest device that connects to it. Unless it has dual band or dual radios, where you could assign 802.11b to one and 802.11n to another. (I don't believe the WRT160N is dual "anything", is it?)
I streamed a YouTube video on the Wii as the test. My InSSIDer on the laptop kept reporting a "144(N)" connection, yet the status page in DD-WRT showed the speed drop back from whatever it was down to 54Mb/s once the streaming started. If there is a more reliable way to monitor what actual speed the network runs at, I'm all ears!
I still am having weirdness in a few spots with my WRT400N/WRT160N dual setup (the 160 is an access point), but the 160 has been a lot more reliable with this latest build. Where was this build a year ago when I needed it?
Dual band (if I recall correctly) but not simultaneous. Cool! Keep an eye on it though, the drops weren't really a speed thing as much as it was the whole wlan interface dropping and apparently restarting itself while the router itself stayed up.
You using one of BS's latest test builds or still on Fractal?
Dual band (if I recall correctly) but not simultaneous. Cool! Keep an eye on it though, the drops weren't really a speed thing as much as it was the whole wlan interface dropping and apparently restarting itself while the router itself stayed up.
You using one of BS's latest test builds or still on Fractal?
Using Fractal 20202. So far, more reliable than anything else I've used. Not sure which magic KoolAid ingredient is in there but it seems to be working. I also don't have the random crashes in the router, but I finally discovered in November that the NVRAM was full.
I haven't noticed any total dropouts in the wireless yet, but I also don't monitor it a lot either. Prior to getting the WRT400N, while running 20202 on the WRT160N, we streamed a 720p movie (from a DLNA server on my computer, which is connected via Ethernet) to a Sony media player in another room. No dropouts for an hour and a half (where the player would throw an error message about a lost connection), although the picture and audio were stuttering a bit (which I feel was throughput, and the player not getting a strong wireless signal where it's at).
In the past, on the ancient build I was running from 2010, I could only run the router in B/G Mixed mode. (BTW, I can now run N/G mixed with no problems if I want to, but I run it in N-only to force all clients to use N.) On that old build (which BTW was the trailed build I originally installed), I could copy large files to other computers on the network by wireless with no problem, but for some reason, connecting via FTP to the Wii, and transferring a couple of large files, would slow down and eventually kill the router to the point where I'd have to reboot. A couple of other times that happened with FTP to/from servers on the Internet. Very odd, and that makes me think the problem might not have been Wireless (as I do my work from a "wired" connection, but something else in the build I was using.
Joined: 17 Jul 2009 Posts: 101 Location: Chicago North Suburbs
Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 16:28 Post subject:
No problems with the build this far. I used it in mixed G, G/N and N modes with no problems. I can still access by web GUI. Fractal looks good.
The original download link was for BarrtWare's FTP site that he was kind enough to let Fractal use to hsot his builds temporarily. The new FTP site is
ftp://ftp.basmaf.com/
I also have this router in my hand and want to give it a try! I see the new Fractal Build 20929 ...
dd-wrt.v24-20979_NEWD-2_K2.6_std_usb_nas-wrt160nv3.bin as 6089 KB .... So around 6mb .... how it's possible to inject a 6mb flash on a 4mb memory???? it's an error or what????
Joined: 28 Aug 2010 Posts: 5 Location: Santa Cruz, California, USA
Posted: Fri Mar 29, 2013 7:01 Post subject:
Hey folks! I've had a WRT160Nv3 for a while, and I've been using 14826 NEWD K2.6 eko for almost as long as I've had it. Newer builds would bork Netflix for a while there, but that was a long time ago.
Here's a question—is it true that these older builds don't handle 300Mbps rates at all? In if that's the case, I'll upgrade…because I can't get above 130Mb. _________________ 2 x WRT160nv3 (…running whatever the hell works.)
"[We] must so to speak throw away the ladder, after [we have] climbed up on it." Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus, §6.54
Last edited by keyofnight on Mon Apr 08, 2013 20:53; edited 1 time in total
Joined: 17 Jul 2009 Posts: 101 Location: Chicago North Suburbs
Posted: Sun Mar 31, 2013 22:53 Post subject:
After running Fractal 20801 since the last post, I've been starting to have issues with time restrictions for the past week or two. This has happened with previous Brainslayer builds as well. I will set times to restrict internet access for any machine except for a specific group of them. What ends up happening is that those machines are set on 24 hour restrictions and can't ever connect. I will try updating to the latest build (20979) and see if it fixes the issue.
