GT-AX11000 - All wifi disrupted.

[kylix_rd]

Hello,

Just attempted to upgrade to this router and it's behaving oddly. I have a separate dhcp server and a pihole running on the network. This all functioned just fine with my non-wifi wired router (a TPLink TL-R600VPN) and several wifi access points.

Once I replace the TL-R600VPN with the GT-AX11000 and configure it, all the existing wifi (the existing access points) cease to properly route wifi traffic to the internet. All the hard-wired connections function just fine. I've even disabled the wifi on the GT-AX11000 and relied solely on the existing access points and the problem remains. My mobile devices indicate "Limited connectivity". All the other wireless devices also cannot "see" the internet.

Without restarting anything (other than the cable modem), I can just reconnect the TL-R600VPN and the whole network returns to normal. I've even isolated the GT-AX11000 with itself, the modem and the dhcp(dnsmasq) and pihole and the wifi behavior remains. I can hardwire nodes into this isolated network and they work just fine.

I've just noticed that some firmware was just released today and has a curious entry:

9. Fixed anomalous 802.11 frame issues.

Not sure if this may be the issue, but I'll certainly try it. I'm not hopeful here since the problem I'm seeing involves *other* wifi access points (3 Netgear WAC124 for the curious), so I think it's something else with the router's handling of the wifi traffic from other access points (which it shouldn't somehow "know" it's wifi traffic).

I really want to make this router work since it's wifi 6, has a 2.5gbps Ethernet back-haul, Link-Aggregation from the DOCSIS 3.1 modem (SB8200), and mesh networking. For the wired connections without the Link-Aggregation even enabled, I can get 950Mbs+ throughput while I could barely hit 800Mbps with the TL-R600VPN.

[jzchen]

Did you notice TP-Link uses 192.168.0.xxx vs ASUS which uses (as far as I know) 192.168.50.xxx, and change it?

[kylix_rd]

All IP address ranges were changed to 192.168.4.xxxx.

I've also updated to the latest firmware and it had no effect. The wifi issue is limited to *mobile* and *IoT* devices (phones, tables, smart-switches, smart-speakers, etc..) I have a desktop computer connected wirelessly and it functions correctly :confused:

[kylix_rd]

On a whim, I installed the Merlin firmware. It's maybe a little better. My mobile devices no longer indicate a "Limited connection", but I still cannot browsed from the device or use most of the apps that need internet. Again, all wired and the desktop wireless devices still function just fine.

[kylix_rd]

The GT-AX11000 may be defective. I also have two RTAX92U I'd planned to set up as mesh access points. I took one and configured it as the router with all the same settings from the GT-AX11000... and it's working just fine. I updated the firmware and it's running just fine.

I'll factory reset the GT-AX11000 and reconfigure it and see if that fixes things... otherwise, it's going back for a replacement...

[kylix_rd]

Welp... factory resetting the GT-AX11000 did the trick :confused:. The network is now running with the new GT-AX11000, all the existing wifi APs and the integrated wifi are all routing to the internet just fine. Looks like some internal setting was foobar'd and once it was factory reset that cleared it up.

Now I need to get WAN Link Aggregation working and then begin to decommission the existing WAC-124 APs and replace them with a couple of RT-AX92U mesh APs.

[jzchen]

Glad to read it is beginning to work out for you. (I know it's a significant investment). Please let us know how the WAN aggregation works out. (There's a few settings to set in ASUSWRT just in case you don't already know). We see very few people ask about it and even less about if it works well or not.

[Saltgrass]

kylix.rd wrote:
Now I need to get WAN Link Aggregation working and then begin to decommission the existing WAC-124 APs and replace them with a couple of RT-AX92U mesh APs.

Since you indicate you have one modem with two ports, could you advise exactly how you will be setting up Link Aggregation? There are other threads on this topic and I don't remember anyone getting that working with just the one ISP.

Otherwise, glad you got it working.

[kylix_rd]

Saltgrass wrote:
Since you indicate you have one modem with two ports, could you advise exactly how you will be setting up Link Aggregation? There are other threads on this topic and I don't remember anyone getting that working with just the one ISP.

Otherwise, glad you got it working.

It turns out that enabling Link Aggregation is what seems to be causing the problem I outlined in the original post. When I went to set it up again, I followed the support doc here. Once Link Aggregation was enabled on the router, all internet communication ceased. The router could not get an IP from the modem and it just said either "Disconnected" or "Something went wrong with getting the IP". Multiple reboots and power cycles had no effect.

If I hard-reset the modem back to factory to disable the Link Aggregation setting and turned it off on the router, it still doesn't work. The router is now in a strange, non-internet-communicative state. Yet another factory hard-reset of the router (a little painful to get it set back up) brought everything back online.

So for now, the Link Aggregation is still off. Which means I'm leaving some of my paid-for bandwidth on the table:(:mad:. I'll give it another try this weekend and see if I can get it working.

Oh, I do have the aimesh working which is nice. Managing all the devices from one login is worth it. However, I do still find the hand-off between the mesh points to not really be much better than individual APs. I'll walk from one end of the house and my phone will drop one mesh point, and take about 20-30 seconds to acquire the next one.

[kylix_rd]

Some more information about Link Aggregation that may be relevant: I have been running the Asus-Merlin software (planning on move to the onboard dnsmasq). This post on SNBForums the mentions the fact that Link Aggregation is broken on the current 386.7 firmware. It also implies that this issue is also in the Asus firmware on which the Merlin FW is based.

WAN Aggregation (two cables between router and modem) does not work with 386.7, works with all previous firmware - probably the only issue that can be reproduced or fixed by ASUS.

I will also point out on my search for an answer on Link Aggregation that there are more than a few posts of "don't bother with Link Aggregation since it's only a small bump in speed" posts... That all smacks of a very defeatist, sour-grapes attitude. If you pay for the extra bandwidth (even if it's only a 10-20% bump) and there is a way to get at it, why not? Anyway, I'll probably post something over on the SNBForums to see if there is any progress on it and whether or not it's actually a bug.

I'll downgrade to 386.5_2 this weekend and try again.