ASUS - ZenWiFi AX6600 Tri-Band Mesh WiFi 6 System (XT8)

If you want to reuse your RT-AC86U, you would need Asus to make it easier. I have the XT8 and it was bad during the 1st year but after a certain firmware update, it just worked fine. (or maybe it was just our devices having more Wifi 6 and less Wifi 5). I now have the Asus Rog GT6 and they are also good. I have no experience on other brands but any tri-band router should be good. Just check the reviews for the specific model you are looking at.

I did not replace the XT8 due to performance issues. I just saw the GT6 on sale and thought they were going to be phased out since Wifi 6e and Wifi 7 were coming out. With the price of Wifi 7 routers then, I thought I was saving money. So I use the GT6 as main router and the other GT6 and XT8s as nodes. They do work well together. Sometimes more devices connect to the XT8 node. I have the XT8 connected to my desktop and NAS so I have a direct LAN connection to the NAS even if the backhaul is wireless.

Reviews only go so far. In my experience, you have to live with kit for weeks if not months to see how it’s truly going to perform for you. I banged my head on the wall for months with an ASUS XT8 setup. Most reviewers loved it. I won’t ever get an ASUS again. Regarding the paywall, do any consumer grade systems NOT have a paywall of some sort? If that’s a dealbreaker for you, consider Ubiquiti or Omada…but they too have their own issues.

Asus has worked fine here.

You need to wire ethernet to 2-4 spots in the house and set up acces points or a mesh system with Ethernet backhaul. Try not to fall for the marketing hype of a mesh system without a hardwired backhaul if you want full reliability. In my case, basement plus 3 floors, I have Asus XT8s in each floor, all wired with 2.5G to the basement switch. I'm getting 600 - 1000 Mbps reliably across the whole house over WiFi.

The first and most effective change would be a wired backhaul. Ethernet Cat 6 at each point and ideally a 2.5Gb switch to tie it all together. I have four Asus XT8 and couldn't be happier (there's newer and faster ones but I don't need that yet).

It’s definitely holding it back. Moving to a wifi6 setup or greater would be ideal. I swapped out our google wifi pucks for a dual asus xt8 setup and it’s night and day in throughput for us in the further locations. The problem with the google wifi was the lack of customization. I can map out the signal strengths and place the pucks correctly but not being able to pick the channels or assign devices to a specific puck really does limit your ability to manage the coverage the way you want it to be. You want to be able to force a band for the backhaul. Google was constantly swapping to 2.4ghz as a BH so that alone will gimp your 5ghz fronthaul to 2.4ghz like speeds. Having more control of your network topology is a must.

Just need a more robust and customizable mesh system. Some wifi6 deco units have the ability to dedicate a backhaul band but its only if the firmware allows it and some deco hardware revisions have it and others dont. All have the option on their wifi7 mesh. Asus aimesh has it too. Honestly the cheapest and best thing you can do first is position your google pucks in optimal locations and see how that goes. Get a laptop and use something like netspot or use a phone and wifiman to map the signal strength so you can place your first satellite puck. Then after the first 2 pucks are going go ahead and do the same for the 3rd puck. You want the pucks spread out enough but also not too far that the 5ghz connection between them breaks or else itll default back to 2.4 on the mesh backhaul. Its a fine balance to find but it’s what you gotta do.

Have the ax mesh and it’s good. Is there a better one you’d recommend?

Xt8. Seems ok. I just like new and ‘better’ https://www.pcmag.com/reviews/asus-zenwifi-ax-xt8

I am on Asus, much better than the Hawaii stuff beforehand (their USP was power line backup, but they weren't great on the whole). Asus is rock solid and fast so far.

Totally agree! It depends on the house layout and router placement, but XT8 packs are doing their thing!

Same setup with 3 xt8 the only issue I have is walking between floors causes the portal to dc when it’s swapping Ps5 is hardwired into 2nd though. Not sure if there’s a setting that would help but haven’t really tried looking into it

My Asus XT8 (in a 2 unit mesh) died last week and I upgraded to 2 x TP Link Deco BE65. I don’t have any WiFi 7 devices yet but I’m maxing out my 500Mbps fiber on WiFi 6, was getting around 300Mbps on my Asus XT8 and getting better coverage.

I’m running XT8s and it’s been great.

I have two houses, each with an ASUS 58u (also sold as the AX3000) as the main router and two XT8 or ET8 mesh nodes connected via 1Gbps wired back haul. The nodes run the stock ASUS firmware while the main routers run ASUS Merlin [open source firmware](https://www.asuswrt-merlin.net/) and have each been rock solid for years. I don't know specifically about the XD5 units you have but these recent ASUS models are mostly pretty similar and usually at least as reliable as other major brands. Before spending more money on something different, first check online that there aren't any known or widely reported issues with the particular model or firmware you're running. It seems like there's always some percentage of people who encounter mysterious intermittent issues similar to you with a new setup but this tends to happen with about the same frequency across most brands. People usually default to buying something else, which often ends up working and they just blame whatever brand they happened to pick the first time and move on. But in reality, the issue is often not due to the brand but rather your current configuration, setup or environment. While switching out for some other model and/or brand may appear to "fix it", that's often just due to randomly changing things up. It's likely the issue could be addressed faster, easier and cheaper with some basic troubleshooting and understanding what's going on. I always prefer trying to identify, at least in general, what aspect isn't working before just blindly "shaking the box" by buying something new.

I have this set, and added a third one off eBay for \~$80, and it covers a two story house with full basement (my office is in the basement) and have no issues. Best money ever spent. [https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-ZenWiFi-AX-Whole-Home-Tri-Band/dp/B083Q45V1V/ref=sr\_1\_3?crid=XJYLTVTKPM44&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.HzvEzx5TmccBdPdKLdemZVy59WgQY6W1NjKd9dsChp6julqqerKzLsffcC4qV8ol6H0mdGRR-T8aVfk-1CnUW4cgDzKWfog9CFVb1EY9dv0uY6nPlow4GyJ6BTq0tz7iYLqXDaH\_yidyb3infZBLnpWU-IGFkHisW31vJc73Ze41\_CMkGh0AxH6NH9Az2TpQgug1x\_1Ya\_VpiQ3dNTEzTxl8rDBc9rgtf1gKwA4h380KbPKL8Qm5\_Hzhv63vFP-T0C53HHfT\_Vh-ro3fFldX5r7v6Dyq5Tpq4CVQiCPcVBlSkiJRL5IYoJIAlPXuFLqJuJyeP\_vAnIjkfn-UIS-QQvU4FC5y9KD0BYBrmzOoQo4.qxX4sNNGHhuQ5\_\_E5vTm4WfvnGFZktCN7kaTT9Bb0eA&dib\_tag=se&keywords=asus%2Bmesh&qid=1738346725&s=electronics&sprefix=asus%2Bmesh%2Celectronics%2C123&sr=1-3&th=1](https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-ZenWiFi-AX-Whole-Home-Tri-Band/dp/B083Q45V1V/ref=sr_1_3?crid=XJYLTVTKPM44&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.HzvEzx5TmccBdPdKLdemZVy59WgQY6W1NjKd9dsChp6julqqerKzLsffcC4qV8ol6H0mdGRR-T8aVfk-1CnUW4cgDzKWfog9CFVb1EY9dv0uY6nPlow4GyJ6BTq0tz7iYLqXDaH_yidyb3infZBLnpWU-IGFkHisW31vJc73Ze41_CMkGh0AxH6NH9Az2TpQgug1x_1Ya_VpiQ3dNTEzTxl8rDBc9rgtf1gKwA4h380KbPKL8Qm5_Hzhv63vFP-T0C53HHfT_Vh-ro3fFldX5r7v6Dyq5Tpq4CVQiCPcVBlSkiJRL5IYoJIAlPXuFLqJuJyeP_vAnIjkfn-UIS-QQvU4FC5y9KD0BYBrmzOoQo4.qxX4sNNGHhuQ5__E5vTm4WfvnGFZktCN7kaTT9Bb0eA&dib_tag=se&keywords=asus%2Bmesh&qid=1738346725&s=electronics&sprefix=asus%2Bmesh%2Celectronics%2C123&sr=1-3&th=1)

Yes. That’s what I did. Twice actually. First time I got XT7 model (older) but I didn’t like that it was black and it always lagged behind its XT8 friends when doing any changes to my network, so I got another XT8. Easy peasy. The phone app is GREAT!!!

May be overkill for them, but I have the Asus xt8 system in my home. 2 units covers from the basement to 3rd floor. Whatever you choose, do yourself a favor and make sure it is a tri band system. That 3rd band transfers all the data and leaves the 2.4 and 5ghz bands open for maximum data transfers.

Im really disappointed but I know technology constantly changes. I have 3 Asus XT8 routers. They do not handle 6e or 7. Been debating going with Orbi 770 or 960. I feel the 770 having wifi 7 would be best. Im open to other ideas. I have roughly 80 wireless devices connected to my current mesh and have xfinity gig service. Thinking of switching to frontier fiber 2 gig. Anyways what router would you go with.

I got Asus ZenWiFi AX (XT8) on sale and it is working great with 2 nodes for the whole house.

Another vote for ASUS's mesh system. Just seems to work. Upgraded from the XT8 pair linked below to 2xROG GT-AX6000 routers as I needed a bit more 5GHz range and more ethernet ports on the devices. I have them linked by ethernet and they cover a 5 bedroom house (2 floors) and a 25m long garden.

I’m using 2 x asus xt8 and no issues with the portal so far (wireless backhaul). PS5 is wired and portal on 5ghz

I tried a bunch of different brands. The only one that I found to be consistently reliable is the Asus XT8 series. I've had them for 4-5 years and they still perform like absolute champs.

I have asus xt8 mesh, 3 devices. They are connected with ethernet,even tho it supports 160mhz uplink between them, and it generally works great. However i have a scheduled weekly reboot in 3am. I have also used openvpn long time that is built in and ddns

Well sometimes i did face strange behavior so weekly morning reboot cant harm. Even twice a week is just fine, you forget about it anyways😄

I bought an Asus zenwifi system but eventually hardwired the satellites to a switch plugged into the main unit. Works great.

I had terrible luck with Asus XT8s. Moved to Ubiquiti and it’s been rock solid.

ASUS xt8 x 2 is working great for me. 18 months now or so after I upgraded from nest WiFi.

Great 👍 I just checked and I ordered mine in December 2021 so a lot longer than I thought LoL My house is approx 200 square metres and coverage is great

If you can't run ethernet cables and don't have coax then you are stuck with a quality mesh system or a quality enterprise level access point. I have 2 asus xt8 in mesh, and I can get around 400-600M out of my 1G connection on wifi

I have a 2 ZenWiFi AX’s on each floor of my house. WiFi everywhere, including a bench at the back fence of the property kicks butt. I’m using wired backhaul over coax between the two and another wired to living room entertainment center that has a lot of smart home hubs. I have 1gig up and down fiber to the house and the 1gig coax adapters I use work well. The entertainment center that is after two coax connections gets 650 gb still.

I bought that same mesh system you posted from Costco last month for $399 Although I prefer Asus, I didn’t want to spend $800+ for wifi7 speeds and Costco doesn’t sell Asus. Costco also has an unlimited return policy on WiFi routers. I previously had the zenwifi ax system and was getting 400-500mbps around my house. Now I get 700-1000+mbps with the BE11000 on my 6e and 7 clients

Not sure why you’d want to stay away from mesh. It’s a great system especially if you use a wired backhaul (even over a MOCA network) like I do. I have over 100 devices in my HomeKit/HomeBridge home with 3 Asus ZenWifi AX APs/Routers. Totally rock solid connection 95% of the time (sometimes I have to reset a couple Meross light switches when I reboot/update the WiFi). How many Sq Ft in your place?

You are right they are apples and oranges but they are complementary tech …. However afaik you’ll not get 802.11r on consumer gear unless you can set up a radius service on it. My mesh setup ASUS AX as far as I know uses 802.11k & 802.11v in its implementation. I can actually see in the logs where it boots clients off the network when it detects they’ve a weak signal from their connected AP and I can then see the client reconnecting on another AP. This is all managed from the main node.

I'm on eero in... 6 households (parents, siblings, etc). Some have 1st gen that are still working (no updates) and some have Max 7. It's still the easiest and best I've used. Velop drove me mad, Orbi was ok but sometimes unstable and an eyesore. Asus XT something (I forgot) I used for 3 days and returned due to frequent lost of wifi. I'm a power user and I now ended using pfsense for the router aspect because I needed somethings on the firewall side that the eero couldn't do but most users won't ever need in a home environment.

Asus with Ethernet back haul. Router + 2 APs. Works great, gigabit access all over the house!

Bingo. So many of us are essentially engineers either by profession or by hobby, so a general list on popularity or even satisfaction is going to be worthless. I love my ZenWifi, but I also chose my particular model based on the availability and features of open source firmware (Merlin). I considered Eero with the thought that I'll give up the tinkering, but found the feature set too limiting.

Asus Zen wifi is trash. I've tried everything and can't get the node to maintain a connection. I'm not the only one, plenty of people report the same issue.

Nah. Get the Asus Zen WiFi routers, instead. Low-end mesh routers aren't great for high-bandwidth applications.

I've had success with Asus Zen Wifi and Amplifi; but I think Asus is a better product personally. I have Ubiquiti in my home right now and don't particularly like it.

EERO is popular because of cost - that is it. I tested them out and they are HORRIBLE in a highly dense area (ie Lots of neighbors with Wifi). UniFi is the best mesh- its what businesses use, but more complex to setup and maintain; not friendly for the consumer market. Depends on your requirements Out of the others I have tested: Orbi - easy to get started; great mesh; CON: Subscription for parental or added security; Not the best speeds (but generally good). Netgear - Same as orbi ASUS ZEN - Fantastic speed; Unbelievable configurability/features; No subscriptions for parental or added security; CON: Milage varies because of quality. Asus notoriously has issues with their firmware and new products. ASUS ROG - Same as ZEN; has more Gimmicks I ended up with the ASUS ZenWiFi BT10 - replaced the Orby Mesh. Very happy . I needed parental and added security; Needed VPN; Needed 10gig / 2.5gig WAN

To echo what plenty of others are saying, but also provide links to specific items to Do-It-Yourself and save money but still get good finished product. Assuming you have roof/attic access above the rooms and can run power to the attic: * buy bulk CAT6 cable, shielded twisted pair, not CCA (CCA stands for copper coated aluminum). [Get good shielded copper wire, like this](https://a.co/d/ijNWYa0). * buy a [crimper toolkit like this](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C7GRX9DW) * watch a few youtubes on terminating Cat6 cable. * buy a mesh wifi system like Amazon Eero, tp-Link Deco, Asus Zen Wi-Fi, etc. [Here's a good article / review of mesh systems and what to look for](https://www.cnet.com/home/internet/best-mesh-wifi-routers/) **NOTE:** mesh wifi is the consumer grade solution. If you can afford it, you're better off getting Wifi Access Points (APs) - the business grade solution - Ubiquiti is the best known of the AP options. Connection works similarly, with one key difference -- APs require power over ethernet (POE) instead of an electrical outlet / power supply. There are pros and cons of installing either Mesh or APs. * buy at least one [Unmanaged Ethernet Switch like this](https://a.co/d/88WLwNn) - this one is 8 port (1 connection in, 7 out). * You'll run an ethernet cable from your Comcast box to your wifi mesh router. Then you'll run a **long** ethernet cable down toward your L-corner dead zone. You'll plug that long ethernet cable to the Unmanaged Ethernet Switch. Then you'll run another ethernet cable from the Unmanaged Ethernet Switch to one of your mesh wifi satellites. BAM! Good internet within reach of that mesh satellite. You'll need to estimate/experiment with how many satellites the system needs (get multiple people to watch netflix on iPads, and spread them along rooms close to the mesh satellite -- see how many people / how many rooms you can cover before you need to add another mesh wifi satellite). I did a low-key simplified version of this at my house. Reply here if you have questions / need help. # You can do this yourself.

Upgraded our RT-AC68U router to a Wifi 6 capable RT-AX86U Pro.  Ran an ethernet cable for wired backhaul, put the AC68U as a mesh node.  The Asus mesh system works really well. 

I've been using AiMesh since the beginning, and it was rocky at first, but now I'm currently quite happy with it. One solid main router and two APs outside. What unifi did you get to replace your setup and do you think it was worth the cost?

Older ASUS AiMesh user here, and similar story. Portal plays shockingly well, and my PS5 isn't even hardwired.

Most mesh systems will support as many nodes as you wish. But not all nodes are created equal. You’ll obviously need fewer nodes with a high powered node vs a cheap node with little range. I would HIGHLY suggest wired backhaul if possible, no matter the hw you ultimately decide upon. Ubiquity has a good solution for your use case at attractive price points. Asus’ AIMesh setup also works well, allowing you to easily tailor the hw for your home’s needs

Over the past 10 years I have setup and used both types of networks discussed here: -          (1) wired access points, and -          (2) wired mesh system.  Overall, I prefer my mesh system (AiMesh), but this may be due to my setup. In my house, the router sits in my basement where the fiber and the ONT were installed.  I had run 4 cat 5E wires:  2 to the first floor, and 2 to the second floor.  I purchased routers when they were heavily discounted and set them as access points (disabling DHCP).  The network was composed of equipment from Linksys, Netgear, and the free router from the ISP and provided whole house Wi-Fi and also Ethernet ports (100 Mbps) at each access point.  It worked fine.  Because each access point had a Lan ip address, the access points could be managed anywhere in the house.  The only hitch each access point had a different name, and you had to manually switch from one access point to another.  Also, if updated firmware was to be installed on an access point, the access point would have to be reconfigured manually. Afterwards I purchased inexpensive T-Mobile (AC-1900) routers to replace the old access points, which met the 802.11n standard.  These routers were just the Asus RT-AC68U router but had many features disabled in the firmware.  I replaced the T-Mobile firmware with the Asus firmware, and they worked fine as access points having the 802.11ac standard.  Subsequently, Asus then came out with AiMesh system where multiple compatible Asus routers could be connected wired or wirelessly into a mesh.  As long as these routers were supported AiMesh, you could mix and match.  The AC68U supported AiMesh.  Currently, I have 4 converted AC68U routers connected as wired nodes or access points to the main router, Asus RT-AC88U.  Because the system is wired, I have excellent Wi-Fi coverage plus 1 Gb Ethernet ports at each node.  I have run wired speed tests from the main router and the nodes, and the speeds are comparable.  The AiMesh system is easier to manage as updated firmware could be installed on the nodes without having to reconfigure.  The main issue is that the router and nodes have to be Asus, and Asus has done a good job updating older equipment (e.g. RT-AC68U) to use AiMesh.

Orbi is good for coverage and speed but sucks for support and any problems. I went with asus AI mesh and the 3rd party firmware. More control and less issues. I’ll never go back to Orbi but my parents use it for simplicity.

Yeah I’d grab a single asus router then and get one with long range and try that. If you need more I’d aimesh it and build it out yourself then

I’m using ASUS with AiMesh and it’s awesome and very stable. Two meshes: 2.4 and 5 with Ethernet backhaul. On the three channel router models, I did the smart connect setting where it combines the two 5ghz channels into one 5ghz channel. After some settings tweaks it’s really nice and supports the 30+ non-IOT devices in the house.

Asus AiMesh can be configured without an app and uses local credentials for management.

100%. Just make sure you reboot the doorbell once your mesh is set up. It will then hop on to the WiFi node with the strongest signal. You should be able to configure your mesh so that the doorbell remains connected to that node, probably by assigning its MAC address to that node. I have two regular ASUS routers that have their own proprietary mesh called AiMesh. I’ve connected them to each other via an Ethernet cable that runs up through the attic (single story home). It also supports a dedicated WiFi connection between nodes, but hard wired is the way to go if at all possible.

I went from DD-WRT for years to ASUS AiMesh and have been on Unifi equipment for a good four years now. I never have any issues with roaming (3600+ home) and I can fine tune whenever necessary (rare). I love the Unifi and don't plan on moving away any time soon. If you want peace of mind, I definitely also recommend Unifi.

Avoid tp-link and any other CCP networking equipment. Don't intentionally put stuff with backdoors in them just to save a few bucks. Unifi is great but it's expensive and you really should use it wired. If you're just looking for plug and play mesh Asus has good offerings. Their AI mesh system works well