[SOLVED] Asus 59u versus AX 86U ?

[anant024]

hi
1. i am currently using Asus 59u. i am having issue with its range if router is on 1st floor and right bellow on ground floor room, is Fire tv stick to play content, it use to give sold 400mbps wifi network speed but currently its gone less than that. i am only looking for 5ghz. Is there any way to move antenna to push more 5Ghz at ground floor.

2. Ram usage hitting 90% with smart plugs, etc connected to it, total 11 devices. But not much cpu usage. Is it bottle necking my devices ? all on 2.5 ghz

3. If i get Ax86U will i see drastic change in 5ghz range ? i am not looking for wifi 6 right now, but i got get new one might as well get this one. but its not currently available here in India, google and Asus are still dumping old tech here ! They are selling AC86u at same price here as Ax86U.

4. Not wanna get into AI mesh etc. would prefer one router if possible !

5. Anyone know when will Ax86U launch in india, I am not looking to go any higher than this router if I need to get new one, in terms of price.

 

[kanewolf]

hi
1. i am currently using Asus 59u. i am having issue with its range if router is on 1st floor and right bellow on ground floor room, is Fire tv stick to play content, it use to give sold 400mbps wifi network speed but currently its gone less than that. i am only looking for 5ghz. Is there any way to move antenna to push more 5Ghz at ground floor.

2. Ram usage hitting 90% with smart plugs, etc connected to it, total 11 devices. But not much cpu usage. Is it bottle necking my devices ? all on 2.5 ghz

3. If i get Ax86U will i see drastic change in 5ghz range ? i am not looking for wifi 6 right now, but i got get new one might as well get this one. but its not currently available here in India, google and Asus are still dumping old tech here ! They are selling AC86u at same price here as Ax86U.

4. Not wanna get into AI mesh etc. would prefer one router if possible !

5. Anyone know when will Ax86U launch in india, I am not looking to go any higher than this router if I need to get new one, in terms of price.

If the 59U has failed, then an AC86 or AX86 might improve things. But, all routers have the same limits on transmit power, and the problem is the lower power transmission from the devices. Even if you could "blast" a 100W signal, your devices can only respond with 1/1000 of that.
There is no magic to fix WIFI, except having multiple WIFI sources closer to your devices. You need a wired network of some kind to the other floors. Then have WIFI access points on those floors. There is no way to guarantee that a single WIFI router can cover an area.

 

[bill001g]

If you can get wifi6 for the same price I guess its ok. Be aware there is newer technology coming to market called wifi6e. This will make wifi6 obsolete so it depends on how much use you can make of the wifi6 before you get tempted to buy wifi6e. As far as how good a wifi6 router the ax86u is that router is very good. Unlike some of the other ones it has support for very high mimo and it really runs at 160mhz. Many cheap wifi6 routers only do 2x2 mimo and only run 80mhz. Note the vast majority of wifi6 end device can also only run 2x2 on 80mhz so you would have to shop around to find a end device that could fully use the ax86u.

Pretty much those routers will be identical for wifi5 since the ax86 will just drop back to 802.11ac if none of your end device can take advantage of the wifi6 feature.

I have no idea where to get stuff in india, the pricing is really strange. India rules on radio frequencies are also not exactly the same as other countries so maybe there are special models which makes it hard to get.

Note if coverage is your primary concern look at kanewolfs post closely.

 

[anant024]

thanks guys for your responses will see if AC86U drops down to some realistic prices here, its still here @$250. Was hoping to just grab AX86U and get over with it for now, i don't do anything too fancy on WiFi like heavy gaming etc. but do need enough good speeds and coverage to not let any of my smart devices like smart plugs etc fail.

ya true, 6e is launched, honestly i came to know about it just few days ago i initially thought WiFi 6 is 6ghz router , these tech marketing people sure know how to make things confusing..

i don't really plan on using 6e or wifi 6 anytime soon and probably when i have any device that does these expensive routers would have fallen in price. I think even NVIDIA shield pro does not have wifi 6e/6 yet i wanted to grab one but again not available in India, and too expensive with import taxes here !

 

[bill001g]

Even in the USA the ac86u is $150-$180. The ax86u has a list price of $249 but many times the vendors don't have them in stock.

You might consider tplink routers they are a bit cheaper.

To get more coverage I would look at powerline network devices. They have models that have a wifi AP build into the remote unit. You want units that are based off AV2 technology. You would put one by your router and the remote unit on the otehr floor someplace.

 

[anant024]

i am not really in super hurry to get it, due to pricing of it, gonna wait it out, the current one is working better now, had issue with my isp too ACT broadband . i got request time out doing ping test request. The ISP repaired it after a week, of nagging. Range is still issue undoubtedly as it has fallen to 262 mbps on my Fire Stick where i use to get around 390mbps i don't know if it was due to smart plugs i added on it which all run on 2.5ghz though. Total devices again is under 12 and none being used for heavy streaming all the time.
and ram being used at 90% even with no heavy load..is definite concern to get new one as soon as possible !
thanks again all for your responses

 

[kanewolf]

i am not really in super hurry to get it, due to pricing of it, gonna wait it out, the current one is working better now, had issue with my isp too ACT broadband . i got request time out doing ping test request. The ISP repaired it after a week, of nagging. Range is still issue undoubtedly as it has fallen to 262 mbps on my Fire Stick where i use to get around 390mbps i don't know if it was due to smart plugs i added on it which all run on 2.5ghz though. Total devices again is under 12 and none being used for heavy streaming all the time.
and ram being used at 90% even with no heavy load..is definite concern to get new one as soon as possible !
thanks again all for your responses

The other thing to think about is moving all the smart plugs to a separate WIFI source. Use your current router as an access point with a separate SSID just for your IOT devices.

 

[anant024]

i just came to know today that since Asus uses Broadcom chip, it uses 90% ram all the time as cache to make faster access when ram needed.. if anyone wanna read the full thread just google Asus 86U high ram usage, multiple threads will pop up.

But i still don't know why suddenly my router from 390mps link speed suddenly dropped to 260mbps or so..i hope asus fixes it with firmware update if some software issue and we should even be able to see in main software if all antenna are working properly. There is no way to tell if all are working as they should !