Asus rt - Hardware 2024

After a year of relative calm in the world of routers, and with a wave 2 that has been little known, we are going to analyze what seems to be the next contender to beat in the high range: The Asus RT-AC88U. It is an AC 4 × 4 router, in this case with a Broadcom chip, compared to the discrete Quantenna of the RT-AC87U. In this case, even though we have the same theoretical 1733mbps in the 5Ghz network, we went up to the figure of 2167 thanks to NitroQAM technology, exclusive to Broadcom devices. The 2.4Ghz band goes up to the theoretical 1000mbps with NitroQAM, which will be 450mbps with the vast majority of devices.

We will be testing with an EA-AC87 as an access point, as unfortunately Asus has not been able to loan us two router units to perform the tests in the most optimal scenario. We thank the Asus Ibérica team for the loan of the router and the access point to carry out the review.

We thank Asus for trusting the product for its analysis:

Technical characteristics

Asus RT-AC88U

The box could easily be confused with that of its younger brother, the RT-AC87U, although it stands out for size and weight.

On the back we see a preview of the features, the benefits of NitroQAM taking advantage of the hook of the games, and the EA-AC87 as a recommended client.

The design is very aggressive, with touches of red as soon as the lid is lifted, and a protective plastic that covers the entire device.

The aesthetic section is spectacular, I would say that in this aspect they always exceed the high bar of the previous model. A considerable increase in size compared to the AC68U, and even the enormous AC87U, is evident.

As for connections, this is the most ambitious Asus router to date, one of the few with 8 RJ-45 ports, and the first to natively support link aggregation (802.3ad), ideal for those with a NAS with support for this function and do not want to spend the high price that 10GbE teams still have.

The connector layout is similar to that seen on the AC87U. On the front it repeats the USB3.0 port, covered by a protective cap

Detail of the button to turn off the LEDs and enable / disable WiFi on the opposite side

On the back we see, from left to right: The reset button, the WPS button, a USB2.0 port, the 8 port RJ45 switch with Gigabit speed, the WAN port in blue, also Gigabit Ethernet, the socket power, and finally the switch.

We repeat with a horizontal only distribution. We must go back to the RT-AC66U to see an asus router with support for horizontal and vertical position. Likewise, in this case it is very understandable given the size and weight of the device.

An interesting contribution is the two hanging points, covered with rubber for aesthetics. They are seen in the rear area next to the generous vents and a secondary heatsink.

The accessories are the expected ones, an ethernet cable, a warranty card, the disk with documentation and utilities (such as device discovery, normally it will not be necessary) and a paper manual with the basic data, in several languages, including Spanish. The power supply is again a 19V / 2.37A model (max 45W), as in the RT-AC87, we are dealing with high performance routers but with considerable consumption at full load.

A free subscription to WTFAST is attached, a Global VPN dedicated to lower latency in our online games. In case of having a connection with a very low ping per se (<100ms to the game server), we do not recommend its use, since many times the change of route through the WTFAST network can be more of a loss than an advantage. However, if you live very far from the servers (ping> 200ms) or in countries that restrict online game traffic, we can see appreciable improvements.

We finished with the antennas, 5dbi and similar to the views on the RT-AC87, although this time with red tones as expected in a ROG series product.

Going a little deeper…

As it has happened on two previous occasions, Asus does not want to lose ground and has once again opted for the most cutting-edge components available on the market. We raised the RAM from 256MiB of its predecessors to 512MiB, and in a very unusual move in home routers, an 8-port switch is included (compared to the usual 4) and support for link aggregation. Link aggregation technology takes time with moderate use in large networks, especially since the cost of infrastructure at speeds above 1Gbit / second was still high, although it is rare to see it on home computers, except for some high-end NAS. In this case it is a compromise solution, to keep the cost at reasonable levels (the 10Gbit / sec networks are still reserved for data centers, with prices of the switches around $ 1000 for 8-port models) and at the same time allow higher speeds than usual when working with NAS. By the way, they are cured in health so that the speed of the cable network is not an obstacle to the fast wireless network, although for the moment, without NitroQAM at least, it seems that 1Gbps is still enough.

As in the RT-AC87U, it is a 4 × 4 router, which makes a total of 1733mbps for the 5Ghz band and 600 in the 2.4 band (with 4 streams, a configuration included in the 802.11n specification but very rare). However, using 1024-QAM modulation, Broadcom has decided to exceed the 802.11ac specification, offering 2167Mbps in the 5Ghz band and 1000Mbps in the 2.4 band. Using the nomenclature that manufacturers often use, adding both bands and rounding down, make this an AC3100 router. We note that it is possible that we will soon see a router with precisely this name, Asus RT-AC3100, with similar specs to this but only 4 ports, but that does not belong to the ROG range.

We note that it is somewhat misleading to add the numbers directly, since for the connection to a client only one of the bands is used, and not both simultaneously (although it is possible that in the future we will see some type of load balancing).

The brain of the router is a BCM47094 processor, a dual core ARM processor running at 1.4Ghz. These specifications make it, under ideal conditions, 40% faster than that seen on the RT-AC87U and RT-AC3200, or if you prefer, 75% more powerful than that seen on the RT-AC68U. Undoubtedly, good news, since although the vast majority of functions are hardware accelerated and require little power from the router's processor, on a computer that offers itself as a VPN client for WTFast, encryption must not be a great limiting for speed.

The memory is made by Nanya, and it is a DDR3L memory operating at 800mhz (1600MT / s effective). We went from the usual 256MiB of almost all high-end routers to a whopping 512MiB, making this router a real hardware beast. While it is not the first router to opt for this configuration (the Linksys WRT1900ACS already did) it is a highly desirable upgrade to the Asus lineup.

Two BCM4366 chips deal with the management of the wireless network, BCM4366 one for the 2.4Ghz network, and one for the 5Ghz network, both with a 4T4R configuration.

In this case, despite the newness of the model, we do have support for the latest versions of the DD-WRT firmware. Due to time constraints we have not been able to test it, however everything seems to indicate that the results are good, although adding load to the CPU due to loss of hardware acceleration. The installation process is identical to that seen on the RT-AC68U.

The cooling is passive, as in previous models, with heatsinks in red in this case, respecting the color combination of the ROG series, to which this router belongs. It is surprising to see fewer fins than in other models, but the size is generous, and the temperatures are finally in the correct range.

The left heatsink corresponds to one of the BCM4366 chips, while the center-right heatsink is larger and cools both the router SoC and the second BCM4366. As usual, the PCB is well laid out, the antennas use standard connectors, and the solder is flawless.

The firmware is appreciated very worked, with all the available options and without important absences as it happened in the RT-AC87U at the time of its launch. It's probably thanks to Asus' experience with Broadcom drivers, a longer prototype period, or a combination of both.

Testing equipment

To make the performance measurements we will use the following components:

1 Router RT-AC88U firmware version 380_858

1 RT-AC68U router configured as client, firmware version 378.56_2 (Asuswrt-Merlin) 1 Access point EA-AC87 firmware version 374.2849 Pendrive USB3.0 Sandisk Extreme (approximately 200mbps read / write), formatted as NTFSE Device 1, with card Intel (R) 82579V Network Kit 2, with Delock USB3.0Jperf version 2.0.2 network card (a convenient Java graphical interface for IPerf use)

Performance with external storage

We expect really high USB throughput on this router, having a 400mhz processor faster than the RT-AC87 and RT-AC3200. Around 40% more power for both 1-thread and multithreading.

To evaluate this section we will copy a mkv video file of approximately 5gb from our PC to a USB flash drive shared by NFS in the router, one way and the other, obtaining the average speed in both cases. Note that USB read / write is one of the tasks where the processor performance of a router is most noticeable, since all wireless communication, NAT and switch functions are accelerated by hardware and, except for unrealistic loads, the processor does not have too much work.

When reading / writing to a USB disk, however, the processor is still, in general, the biggest limitation. Although we have tried to overclock as in previous models, in this case we have not been able to go above 1400mhz as standard. It seems logical since in this case the SoC is already close to its limit, while in the models that start from 1000mhz there is a considerable margin to go up.

Even without overclocking we see that the result is the highest of the tables. The additional 200mhz vs. the overclocked AC3200 seems to be noticeable on read only, suggesting that we are probably reaching a point where the performance of the USB3.0 ports no longer scales linearly with the processor frequency, possibly because it is limited by some of the others. buses participating in the transfer. At the moment it does not seem that increasing network bandwidth to 2Gbps using link aggregation is a short-term need.

As was the case with the RT-AC3200 at the time, it regains the position of the fastest router working with external storage to date. Surprisingly, the option to "reduce USB interference" is checked by default, so we must disable it to experience these speeds.

Much faster than most USB flash drives on the market, and more than enough to take advantage of a mechanical hard drive not far from the speed limit that a Gigabit port offers us. Again a solid option as a home multimedia center, being able to completely replace a NAS if our needs are relatively basic (not many simultaneous users, without data redundancy, and without services that go beyond the download manager and the file sharing).

Wireless Performance

We return to a somewhat particular case, since no 4 × 4 client (AC1734) has yet been launched in Spain to be able to test this router directly. Luckily, Asus has provided us with an access point / media bridge EA-AC87, with which we can see the maximum speed that this router can give (unfortunately, without NitroQAM, and without much hope of seeing it one day as it is a technology proprietary to Broadcom, since the EA-AC87 mounts quantenna chip).

The Broadcom and Qualcom chips have shown more consistent performance than the Quantenna solution seen in the AC87, so we have used both the EA-AC87 (4 × 4, theoretical 1734Mbps) and the RT-AC68U (3 × 3, Theoretical 1300Mbps), appreciating that over long distances the performance is, curiously, better with the second. It is not surprising since in the review of the RT-AC87U a slight regression was already evident when using the router in 3 × 3 mode. We hope to be able to repeat the tests in the future with two RT-AC88U, or failing that with a client that supports NitroQAM, to see all that this router can give of it, taking advantage of all its capabilities in the WiFi field.

Once again we find a router that allows to completely replace a cable installation in medium distances, both for speed and stability.

To carry out the tests, we will use JPerf 2.0.2, with a team in our network acting as a server and connected to router 1, and another as a client connected to router 2, one way at a time. We will also see how the number of streams affects speed and if the router correctly manages its 4 links if there is only one active connection.

Waiting for solutions from other manufacturers, the result is spectacular. Although in the RT-AC87U we saw lower performance in 3 × 3 mode, in this not only are there no regressions, but the performance over short distances and with a stream is more than 50% higher than any other router on the market. Undoubtedly an excellent management of the 4 streams, since we observe that we are above the theoretical maximum speed of a single link (433mbps).

Once again, walls are the biggest enemy of networks at 5Ghz. We use the same testing environment as in previous reviews, testing on various channels of those available and with 80Mhz of channel bandwidth, to achieve the maximum possible speed, since using 40mhz divides the speed by two, and using 20mhz by 4 Although it may slightly improve performance over long distances. The distance takes its toll on the speeds but we maintain very good numbers, more than enough to make the most of any connection if the distance is not very great and, above all, there are few walls along the way.

It can be seen that in this router they did not want to make mistakes, with a long testing time and a really clean firmware in line with the latest releases, and far from the stability problems that could be seen with the first wave of 802.11ac routers just released to the market, such as the RT-AC66U, which took several months to integrate the repeater mode and work 100% stable. The developer RMerlin already has its popular firmware with add-ons available for this router, and luckily it is also supported by the latest beta versions of the popular DD-WRT, which unfortunately we were unable to test due to time constraints.

The ping is low, hovering around 1ms via WiFi on average if there is line of sight, both with the EA-AC87 and with the RT-AC68U. Without a doubt, of the non-proprietary solutions, this is the router with the fastest wireless network of the moment. It probably won't be long before we see competition from major home router manufacturers, especially Netgear.

Firmware and configuration

The configuration is again based on a web assistant that helps us to have our router connected to the internet in a few minutes. As in previous models, the excellent firmware supports VLAN tagging (such as "special ISP requirements") and we can use the router as a complete replacement for some providers' equipment such as telephone, leaving only the router and the ONT.

Overclocking

As we were advancing in the previous section in this case, and for the first time on an Asus router, we have not been able to upload the router's processor frequencies. It is completely understandable, since all the processors manufactured by Broadcom in this series (those that start with BCM470-) start from the same base, and are bined based on the frequencies they support. Although 1000mhz (or 800, as in the RT-AC68U) are low frequencies for what these chips support if the cooling is sufficient, the 1400mhz that the BCM47094 of this router has as standard is already a value close to the expected limit.

Likewise, since the overclock depends on each specific unit, we attach the necessary commands to raise the router's processor to 1600mhz (just under 20% overclock). As always under the responsibility of each one and keeping the temperatures under control.

Firstly, we enable telnet access from the Administration - System panel of the web interface. We restart the router, and we connect via telnet (using, for example, the PuTTY program) with our administrator username and password.

We see below the necessary commands to check the frequency of the processor, and then raise it to 1600mhz. The values of the clkfreq parameter are given in the form ,

nvram set clkfreq = 1600, 800 nvram commit reboot

To return the router to its frequencies, we do the same, but this time we adjust the clkfreq parameter with the numbers we have seen previously (1400, 800). We can check that the value has been changed correctly with the command nvram get .

nvram set clkfreq = 1400, 800 nvram commit reboot

Another option is to completely erase the nvram, either by restoring the factory settings from the web interface, or from the recovery by pressing the reset button for 10 seconds when starting the router by selecting "Erase nvram" on the page that appears on the IP the router. We have not needed to enter the recovery at any time, since despite not being stable at 1600mhz, the router is able to load default values autonomously if it does not start when restarting. With 1500mhz we have not gotten the router to work either.

conclusion

We are facing the reference router, at least for now, in terms of wireless networks. Improves the performance of the RT-AC87 (which stayed at the remarkable high) to levels never seen before outside wired connections.

Asus does not repeat errors in terms of choosing the SoC, once again opting for one of the most cutting-edge models available, the BCM47094 with dual 1.4Ghz cores. USB performance makes the improvements evident, and the excellent serial firmware and support for DD-WRT are the icing on the cake.

Some very cool features, and oddly rare to see outside of business switches, include link aggregation support, and 8 Gigabit ports. Unfortunately, to take advantage of the benefits of MU-MIMO (greater use of the available bandwidth with several simultaneous devices that do not use the 4 streams of the router) we must have clients that support it, which are few and very recent. If these are already rare to see, let's not say clients that support NitroQAM, which also restrict us to a single manufacturer (Broadcom), which we hope will appear at the beginning of the year.

As you hit, the price is very high, and certainly hardly justifiable despite the improvements made. We hope that with the arrival of other models this point will no longer overshadow an excellent result.

ADVANTAGE	DISADVANTAGES
+ EXCEPTIONAL WIRELESS PERFORMANCE.	- REALLY HIGH PRICE. VERY FEW CUSTOMERS WILL TAKE INTO ACCOUNT A ROUTER OF € 400.
+ DUAL CORE ARM PROCESSOR AT 1.4GHZ, 512MB RAM AT 800MHZ. USB3.0 PORT SPEED.	- CONSIDERABLE ELECTRIC CONSUMPTION AT FULL CHARGE.
+ DOUBLE BAND 2.4 / 5GHZ AND USB 3.0 PORT.
+ SUPPORT FOR OUTLET DD-WRT. FIRMWARE ASUSWRT EQUALLY COMPLETE.
+ AT LAST, LINK AGGREGATION IN A DOMESTIC ROUTER. AND 8 RJ-45 PORTS.
+ POSSIBILITY TO TURN OFF THE LEDS.