Nazeem.Me

A blog about technology, football and all the other random stuff in my life

Tag: networking

  • Network Upgrades for 2024

    As 2024 comes to a close, I want to reflect on how my home network has evolved. This year, I made the big step up to 10Gbps WAN and LAN networks by changing my ISP as well as incorporating 10G routers and switches.

    I started by upgrading my router to the new Wifi7 capable Asus RT-BE88U, and moved my previous primary router, the GT-AX11000 Pro to an AiMesh mode. I also use an old AX-56U as an additional node in one of my rooms. This was the year I finally retired the Asus RT-AC5300 Router after 8 years of service. It was crumbling apart!

    As my new primary router had 2 x 10G ports (1 being an SPF+ port), I figured it was time to jump into the world of 10Gbps internet speeds. I signed up with a new ISP who provided an XGS-PON network which generally delivers up to 8.2Gpbs real-world speeds. I had to get an SPF+ to RJ45 converter (TL-SM5310-T) to enable compatibility with the rest of my network equipment.

    Speedtest result on the new 10Gbps XGS-PON connection

    From the router, I added a TL-SX1008 TL-SX1008 8-Port 10G Desktop/Rackmount Switch which connected to the patch panels which runs Cat 5E to each room. I was worried that this older category of cabling would hamper my local network speeds. Thankfully, because of the short distance, I was seeing almost close to 10Gbps speeds.

    iperf3 throughput test showing close to 10Gbps across Cat 5E cabling

    I also had to add another TL-SX1008 to my study room to provide a 10G ethernet backhaul connection to the GT-AX11000 Pro as well as provide sufficient ports for my main PC and my server. I had to upgrade all my PCs/servers with PCIe 10G NICs which I bought cheaply off AliExpress. They all run the Marvell AQC113 chip.

    I also got a new M4 Mac Mini to replace my ancient HTPC, and I configured it with a 10G ethernet port too. I also purchased a Thunderbolt 3/4/USB4 to 10Gbps adapter to plug into my laptop. I lastly added a 5Gbps USB dongle to add a high speed connection to my NAS.

    While I didn’t need a 10Gbps network, this new setup works seamlessly and I’ve not had any network disruptions in the month that I’ve had it running. With this upgrade, my home network is setup with high bandwidth networking that will enable me to explore setting up a homelab to experiment with Proxmox and Docker on my server. Additionally, a 10Gbps NAS may be on the horizon in a year or 2. 😅

  • Gadget Review: Asus RT-AX56U Router

    Last month, my AC87U started acting up. It was randomly disconnecting from my wireless clients, and was often failing to handover the connections to the AC5300U. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to bring a portion of my infrastructure up to Wifi 6 standards.

    A little bit of a background – the 87u sits near the entrance of the house, and is mainly to service the living-room, balcony and kitchen. Due to the presence of 2 large aluminum backed mirrors, I had to place the 5300u in the study room, so that it could service the 4 bedrooms.

    Since the 87u was no longer fit for purpose. I was on the lookout for a new router that could integrate with my existing hardware. I had heard about the Asus AIMesh functionality, but the reviews had been poor for the first couple of iterations. But the latest reviews were starting to sound good, so I knew this was an option.

    I also researched other standalone mesh systems, but the price to feature ratio did not make sense for me. I didn’t want to be paying $400 for a device that had better Wifi 6 speed, but then loses out on the configurability (?!) that I can get from the Asus WRT software and especially from the Merlin firmware. Long time readers (all 2 of you) would know I love this firmware because of the OpenVPN integration and the general performance boost.

    So a quick search online and I found that Asus had more than a few options:

    Asus Wi-Fi 6 router line-up compared by model, bands and rated speedSource: https://www.asus.com/sg/Networking/Wireless-Routers-Products/

    The Asus RT-AX56U caught my eye for a couple of reasons:

    Cheapest of the lot
    AI Mesh compatible
    Merlin firmware compatible
    Dual band (Since this would be placed near the entrance of the house to serve only a few clients, it didn’t need to have mind-numbingly high throughput)
    A quad-core broadcom 1.5Ghz CPU with 512MB of RAM (double the 87u)
    A quick trip to the hardware shop, and here it:

    A fresh Asus RT-AX56U

    Out went the 87u and in its place went the 56u. The usual process through the Asus connection wizard and I was up and running. Of course, I had to import all the settings from the 87u, but that didn’t take me more than 30 minutes. I used my only Wifi 6 device (Samsung Galaxy S10) to connect to the router, and lo-and-behold, would you look at that Network Speed!

    1.1 Gbps wireless connection speed – welcome to the future!

    I’m obviously happy with that connection from 2 meters away, but what I was really keen to test out was the mesh network handover. Using the S10 I walked step-by-step towards my bedroom. As expected, the hand-off occured the moment I passed the 2 aforementioned mirrors. (Sidenote: The 5300u backhaul is connected using an ethernet cable for maximum stability. ) That is exactly how I wanted the router to perform, and I am happy that that’s what it does out-of-the box.

    One caveat about Asus routers – they tend to run hot. After an hour, my 56u was hovering in the 70 C range. I put a USB fan under it, and the temperature went down to 50 C.
    Router in DB Box with a USB fan for cooling

    In summary, if you are looking for a cheap Wifi 6 router that can serve as an AI Mesh node, look no further than the Asus RT-AX56U. It is priced in the S$159 – S$199 range, and it’s good value for a simple but capable router. I’m happy with my purchase, but there’s that little voice that tells me I should have bought the RT-AX58U for the triple band connection. Let’s see how long we can ignore the upgrade bug!

  • Gadget Review: Asus RT-AC5300 Router

    I just re contracted my home broadband to a 1Gbps plan, and felt I wasn’t getting all the features I wanted out of my existing router.

    My primary concern was that I could not run OpenVPN on the router directly, and had to do it on a client by client basis. With the ongoing issues with OpenVPN, Windows 10 and IPV6, I prefer to have the client sit on the router instead, so that my entire home network is protected behind the VPN.

    My VPN provider of choice is privateinternetaccess. The main reason I chose them is because they don’t store logs, and they are reasonably cheap. I’ve been using them for the better part of three years, and in that time, they’ve added more features, including a server in Singapore!

    I strongly believe in the right to browse anonymously and privately, without your ISP or governments spying on you (hear that NSA?), so my best bet is to secure my home network from the primary point – the router.

    Which brings us back to the RT-AC5300. My current ISP provided router was decent, but it could not support OpenVPN, so out it went. I looked at the latest routers, with Asus being the first (and only) port of call. I’ve had great experiences with Asus routers. I’ve owned the RT-N56u and the RT-N66u (which is still in use as a wifi extender), and love the GUI and the features of Asus WRT (which is a fork of DD-WRT). I particularly enjoy using Merlin’s firmware. So when I read that the RT-AC5300 was the newest router from Asus, I knew I had to get my hands on it (being the gadget-freak that I am). My wife took a little convincing, but now, this monster is sitting on my console:

    The Asus RT-AC5300, a large black router with eight antennas, sitting on a console table

    Design-wise, it looks like a facehugger. But that only makes me like it even more!

    From a hardware perspective, it run’s on Broadcom’s newest 4×4 MU MIMO chip that is supposed to provide

    1000 Mbps on the 2.4 GHz band and 2167 Mbps on each of the 5 GHz bands for a total of 5333 Mbps theoretical bandwidth (Anandtech)

    What that basically means is that as of the end of 2015/start of 2016, this is the most sizzling-hot piece of networking hardware in the market. And it looks like a freaking alien!

    The first thing I did when I got it was install Merlin’s firmware. Then I ran the Quick Internet Setup, which automatically detected my ISP’s settings. Lastly, I set up my wifi security password. I was online in under 2 minutes.

    Like I said, OpenVPN is a priority for me, so I first went to VPN –> OpenVPN Clients, and entered the following details:

    The tricky part for me was the Custom Configuration portion – there are a few different guides available online, but the one that finally worked for me was:

    tls-client
remote-cert-tls server
reneg-sec 0

    Now, with just 1 click, I can toggle on or off my VPN.

    Of course, that wasn’t the end of the set up for the new router. I also had to do the following:

    • Port forwarding (for Plex and other gaming servers)
    • Disable WPS (best practice for home network security)
    • Disable guest networks
    • Set static IP pool for my server and other lan line devices
    • Test IPV6 to make sure it works, but disabled it untill the OpenVPN issue is resolved
    • AIProtection Security test: This is a new feature, which scans my router for potential vulnerabilities.

    Today is the 3rd day I’ve had it running, and its been rock-stable ever since I turned it on. And as for the internet performance, here’s the first speedtest result once my new plan was activated:

    Speedtest result on the newly activated 1Gbps broadband plan

    Blistering!