ASUS RT-AC88U

[cucubits]

Does anyone else have this router?

I've been using it for a few years now and I have a few annoyances/issues which I haven't ironed out yet. Maybe discussing here we can shed some light...

 

- I'm running the latest Merlin firmware and for some reason when I go to the wireless settings section in the menu, it all goes wonky. No tabs show up and lots of options seem to be missing. Can't even see anymore the separate 2.4/5Ghz setup tabs.

- on the initial setup page, there's a "clients" section, which should show all the devices connected currently. This never works, always shows zero. Any ideas?

 

Anyone else seen similar issues?

[Hiew]

I used to have the RT-AC66U which is fairly similar but pretty old at this point. Good choice on using Merlin, it was my choice as well once I weeded out the others (Tomato, DDWRT..etc) I had very few problems however they were generally reserved to issues which were related to port forwarding rules not correctly applying.

Apparently the clients list function on Merlin is closed source by Asus. And now that you mention it, I do remember wireless clients not showing in the client list, but did show my hard-wired devices.

Assuming you're on Windows have you tried running:

arp -a

in command prompt? This command shows devices on the same network. You can also use a program like Glasswire.

 

If all else fails factory reset then re-flash maybe?

[cucubits]

arp -a

...works but it doesn't show too much information.

For when I forget the IPs of some devices (NAS, a couple RPIs for automation tasks) I usually run a little windows program "Angry IP Scanner". It's quick, shows all the clients on the network. I should also probably set up static IPs to avoid this but I just haven't got around to do this properly.

I also used to run a whitelist on the WIFI network but since switching to Merlin I ran into that settings issue and can't get to these options anymore.

 

I know I should reset/re-flash but I need to plan for everything to go offline for a while when I do that and I also need CEO approval (wife). She works from home too and I can't risk ending up offline for too long.

[Hiew]

Angry IP scanner works great, top of the legendary status for that sort of thing.

Static IP addresses can be bound to hardware MAC addresses easily and without restarting the router.

I believe its just LAN -> DHCP (or DHCP server)

Look for the device's MAC you want to bind on the drop down list and assign it an IP

(taken from asus' website)

33 minutes ago, cucubits said:

I know I should reset/re-flash but I need to plan for everything to go offline for a while when I do that and I also need CEO approval (wife). She works from home too and I can't risk ending up offline for too long.

I hear ya, gotta get Board approval first, ha! Its a tedious as hell process too unfortunately.

*** Just remember though if you assign an IP address that is already taken you might need to unplug all devices and reboot. Best way forward is to assign them their currently leased IP addresses to avoid conflict ***

[cucubits]

When you get a chance, what does your Wireless menu look like?

When I click on mine, it goes here, all the left tabs go missing and most drop down selections here don't work. Tried several browsers. Strangely, only the wireless settings seem to be doing this:

 

[Hiew]

I recently switched off of that router due to it not being supported anymore. But that page is definitely not as it should.

You might need to just schedule a day for downtime and a couple hours sadly.

[Sandy Bridge]

I'm also on the RT-AC66U, although with Asus firmware rather than Merlin; haven't had a need to go non-stock on this one yet.  Here's a screenshot of my wireless tab:

The dropdown for Band works as you'd expect, as well.  I can also confirm that the client list is working as expected.

I don't suppose you have an old router that could be recommissioned for the day of re-flashing?  I have an old 150 Mbps 802.11n Linksys that serves that purpose; it's pretty much worthless on the secondary market but my laptops all remember its credentials so it got recomissioned last year when my RT66U got misplaced while moving.

[cucubits]

Thanks, yeah, this is how I remember it looked before it went wonky. To be honest I don't recall exactly what firmware I was running then or why I ended up going to Merlin... it's possible this issue was what made me try it...

I will dedicate some time to reset and reflash properly.

[Hiew]

42 minutes ago, cucubits said:

Thanks, yeah, this is how I remember it looked before it went wonky. To be honest I don't recall exactly what firmware I was running then or why I ended up going to Merlin... it's possible this issue was what made me try it...

I will dedicate some time to reset and reflash properly.

I liked the extra features Merlin had to offer but you may not need the extra features (asus' firmware is one of the best stock options out there)

https://www.asuswrt-merlin.net/features

[Samir]

I'd search the official merlin support forum over at snb as they have a tremendous amount of history (like the NBR of merlin):

https://www.snbforums.com/forums/asuswrt-merlin.42/

It's also pretty active for support too so maybe someone there knows even if a solution hasn't been posted previously.

[LeBlackNight]

I used to use multiple RT-AC86U ASUS routers before moving to a ubiquity setup, but the Merlin firmware was the way to go when I used them. I think ASUS was one of the first to support mesh with their consumer routers and you could mix and match various routers together, but the Merlin firmware was originally not allowed to implement mesh (believe this has now changed), so I was forced to stick with the ASUS official firmware to make it all work. Eventually ran into a myriad of issues due to the number of concurrently connected devices as I added a ton of smart home devices to my network and decided to look for a solution where I could have more control over segmenting devices on the network.