[Question/Recommendation] WRT3200ACM

Hello guys,
I'm thinking about getting a WRT3200ACM but while I was searching about it, I stated that it has some issues with wireless driver. Are they related with range and/or bandwidth? Does the news builds (stable and latest) still have these issues?
I saw people recommend the R7800 over the linksys so know I'm a little bit confused. Can you guys help me on this one please? :slight_smile:
btw, I have a 100/100 Mbps connection and my last router was a R7000 (advanced tomato).
Best regards

PS: Sorry if these questions were already answered, I tried my best with search function!

I am partial to the WRT series. I have a 1900acv1 and v2, and 3200ACM, all have been unbrickable.
The latest driver releases have almost eliminated any issues for me on the 3200ACM.

What connection do you have and what speed do you get via wireless?

10/150
on ac, i get 12/185

What image are you using?

So after weeks and weeks of problems with the WRT3200ACM's 5 GHz WiFi that forced me to go buy a Netgear R7800 for production use, I finally decided to test the router extensively using the stock firmware.

What I've found is that even the stock firmware doesn't work with my Android devices (Pixel, Pixel C, Nexus 6P, and Nexus 6). Some WiFi channels work for a little bit and then stop working until I reboot the router. Others, like Channel 149 at 80 MHz, which is what I'm now using, at least stay available without requiring a reboot. But on these frequencies my android devices regularly drop off the network and reconnect, making it impractical to do something like view a long youtube video. I know channel 149 isn't supposed to work at 80 MHz, but I think linksys quotes the low channel instead of the center frequency, because there isn't even an option for channel 155 at 80 MHz.

At this point I'm wondering if it's possible I just got a defective router. Given that I also saw problems with the WRT1900ACS, I was assuming that the WRT3200ACM just had crappy driver support. Unfortunately, at this point the device is so bad even with stock firmware that I have a hard time believing it.

Is there anyone here who has experienced flawless 5 GHz with the WRT3200ACM, and if so, can you please post your exact channel settings? I'm wondering if it's possible no one has ever made this device work well because it's fundamentally broken. If not, I'd like to try some known working settings and get warranty service if that still doesn't work for me.

I'm running a WRT3200ACM here with the 5 GHz working pretty good. The only thing that seems broken is DFS. Sooner or later my router will switch to a non-dps channel. Other than that, rock solid perfomance.

Lede-Version: SNAPSHOT, r4707
Kernel: 4.9.44
mwlwifi:4.9.44+10.3.4.0-20170713-1

Snip from my /etc/config/wireless settings (pretty straight forward):

  config wifi-device 'radio0'
    option type 'mac80211'
    option hwmode '11a'
    option path 'soc/soc:pcie-controller/pci0000:00/0000:00:01.0/0000:01:00.0'
    option country 'DE'
    option htmode 'VHT80'
    option disabled '0'
    option channel '132'

  config wifi-iface 'default_radio0'
    option device 'radio0'
    option network 'lan'
    option mode 'ap'
    option encryption 'psk2+ccmp'
    option key 'XXX'
    option ssid 'YYY'

@ledeweb -- Nexus 6 (yeah, I know, but no qi-charging on newer ones) user here. Last I've tried WRT3200ACM its wifi performance was flawless for about 6 hours before it all went to hell and I unplugged it and plugged back the Linksys EA8500.

I hope that the good wireless driver is eventually released, I hope it's a beta version radio driver issue, however I haven't used it with the stock firmware and Nexus 6 at all.

Hmm... Well my Nexus 6 seems to work okay with the 1900acs, while both the pixel and pixel c have huge problems. Perhaps not coincidentally, those are the two devices I have with Oreo. They do work with other routers, but I'm wondering if Oreo and Linksys somehow interact badly.

Hi

With default WRT3200 ACM Linksys firmware, and Android, I found out that after disabling Media priorisation, all works flawlessly.. with any version of Android, from 4.0 > 7.1

Pierrick

actually using radio2 from some days, now I see that radio0 is also AC :sweat_smile:, never had problem with radio2

Nice. I just ordered a refurbished one from Linksys website for $100. Hope it will go well.

Sorry replying a bit late, but what do you mean by disabling media prioritization? Do you mean unchecking the WMM box? This seems to impact throughput significantly in iperf3 benchmarks. What kind of throughput are you seeing?

Hi
Well.. between no Android and iperf whatever impact, I prefer to have my
phone connected to the same wireless.. conveniently..
And. I just wanted to leave that as a clue to resolve Android connections :wink:

Pierrick

But can you please explain your clue? What do you mean by disablnig media prioritization? If you mean unchecking the WMM box, it kills performance for all devices, not just android. And Iperf is something you can just get with lede:

opkg update && opkg install iperf3
iperf3 -s

But the effect is not subtle. Literally any other performance tool will make it abundantly clear. For example, with my Lenovo laptop with intel 7265 wireless, I enjoy download speeds over 650Mbps. If I disable WMM, I cannot crack 20 Mbps. That's not a typo--it's a factor of 32 slower without WMM, to the point that I'm better off using 2.4 GHz WiFi at that point. I've observed similar slowdowns with factory firmware as well and on other routers as well. You need WMM for any kind of performance.

So please nobody buy a WRT3200ACM with the intention of working around android problems by disabling WMM (unless you are developer who wants to make this router work well under lede).

Is radio 2 the one that can do both 2.4GHz and 5GHz channels? That one is significantly lower performance than radio 0. The most I've ever gotten out of that radio is around maybe 120/40Mbps, compared to 700Mbps bidirectional out of radio 0.

I investigated this in detail because my original hope when getting this router was to configure it as a relay where, through radios 0 and 2, it could be a client on one 5 GHz channel and an AP on another. Unfortunately, between WDS being completely broken and radio 2 having terrible performance, this was not a workable idea (independent of android problems).

radio2 Marvell 88W8887 1T1R 802.11ac, BT 4.2, NFC, FM rec
https://www.marvell.com/wireless/88W8887/

And for reference, @davidc502 builds the LEDE software with the latest patches from Kaloz's wifi, along with the (attractive) LuCI Material web theme.

You can get builds for all Linksys new routers at: https://davidc502sis.dynamic-dns.net/

I would avoid this router. Even with the latest driver, the 5ghz cannot last over a day.

Well, I have a "repeater" connected to the WRT3200ACM on the 5GHz channel, and has been up since I configured it, several weeks ago. Some people is reporting problems with this device, some of us are luckier.