Last year, the home intranet was upgraded to a 2.5G full Wi-Fi 6 intranet, and the LAN ports of the ROG Rubik's Cube are all gigabit, so the cross-node level of wireless mesh can only break the level of more than gigabit. At that time, the idea was to replace the master node with BE96U or 88U, and then use all the magic cubes as sub-nodes, so as to ensure that the wired link is fully supported by 2.5/10G.
Because I have been working in the branch, I only tested the ASUS RT-BE88U in the company dormitory this time, and I plan to do networking and in-depth testing when I go home. At that time, more specific test subjects will be set up to study new features such as MLO multilink aggregation.
However, the front of the BE88U package does not list all the functions and parameters, and the lower left corner only marks dual 10G ports, quad-core 2.6GHz processor, commercial-grade security system AirProtection Pro and game acceleration.
Let's take a look at the backplane of the router first, RT-BE88U is equipped with 1 10G electrical port and 1 10G optical port, 4 2.5G network ports and 4 Gigabit interfaces, of which the 10G electrical port and the leftmost 2.5G network port support WAN/LAN flipping. In addition, there is a USB3.0 interface for external hard drives, printers and other devices.
On the far left side of the backplane are one 10 GHz electrical port and one 10 GHz optical port, which can be connected to commercially available consumer-grade 10 Gigabit switches through SFP+ direct cables, which provides better compatibility and lower cost for users with intranet 10 Gigabit coverage. Of course, most users do not need a large number of 10 Gigabit devices to access, and if only one 10 Gigabit NAS is connected, the 10G electrical port can be set as the LAN port and the 2.5G network port can be set as the WAN port.
The front appearance of BE88U is not ostentatious at all, with four black and gold antennas, and a black body with a gold LOGO. Of course, the size is still very large, and it can be seen through the comparison of ASUS's standard SMA antennas that the size of this machine is quite amazing.
The back of the router is fully hollowed out, and the internal motherboard is covered with a large amount of thermal armor, and the motherboard basically occupies the internal space. The maximum power consumption of the original power supply is 45W, compared with the power consumption of 12V1.5A of the entry-level router, the actual performance of this machine should be counted.
1. Test environment setup
It is still used for throughput testing with iPerf, which is simple, easy to use, and trouble-free. You can use it by downloading the installation file of the corresponding platform directly from the official website, which is really simple compared to other services that need to be deployed on different platforms. Plug and play under gigabit broadband, but if you are testing at a higher bandwidth and want to run full, you have to
It is recommended to link the server with the router through wired mode to test the transmission rate of one arm to the greatest extent. If both the server and the client are connected wirelessly, it is very likely that the router will not be able to run full due to the number of antenna groups. There is no difficulty in setting up the server, Win+R opens the CMD control page, drags the executable file back and enters -s to knock down the enter service and you can run. Of course, remember to confirm the IP address of the server, and use the execution code of the client below.
The first test end is to use the OnePlus Ace2 in the author's hand, from the current link given above, download and install the Magic iPerf. Refer to the following test code analysis, after completing the input, select iPerf3 in the upper left corner, and then click Stopped in the upper right corner to run the test.
I found some problems during the test, so I specially turned out this notebook equipped with AX211 network card, and slightly modified the parameters to run the settings. In the future, the author wants to replace the network card of this machine with BE200, and then explore how far the terminal limit of 2T2R can go, of course, this limit is still far from the limit of BE88U.
2. Test performance
Once the test environment is deployed, we can start running the tests. The test site is an ordinary residential building rented by a unit, which is exactly the same as the previous test arrangement, and the test was carried out in a simulated real use state as much as possible, and the transmission speed, signal strength and link speed under different test conditions were summarized and compared.
The first test point is set at 1m next to the router, and the test terminal is OnePlus Ace2. The ASUS RT-BE88U has an average transmission speed of 1.52Gbps, a signal strength of -9dB, and a link speed of 2401Mbps. This should be limited by the performance of the server-side processor and the mobile phone, and can only run to the current speed.
The second test point was set as a three-bedroom behind a partition wall, and the test terminal was a OnePlus Ace2. The ASUS RT-BE88U has an average transmission speed of 1.42Gbps, a signal strength of -24dB, and a link speed of 2401Mbps. Compared with the transmission speed next to the router, it is about 6.7% lower, which is completely normal.
The third test point was in the bathroom separated by a load-bearing wall, and the test terminal was the OnePlus Ace2. The ASUS RT-BE88U has an average transmission speed of 1.16Gbps, a signal strength of -42dB, and a link speed of 1729Mbps. Here, the transfer speed is 24% lower than that next to the router, but it still breaks through Gigabit.
The fourth test point is located in the master bedroom behind two partition walls, and the test terminal is OnePlus Ace2. The ASUS RT-BE88U has an average transmission speed of 840Mbps, a signal strength of -48dB, and a link speed of 1441Mbps. Compared with the transmission speed next to the router, the transmission speed is reduced by 45%, which can simulate the most extreme state in the networking state.
Limited by the phone's antenna and network card, the above test should be far from the limit of BE88U. So we replaced the Acer Acer Extraordinary Go Pro equipped with AX211 network card for testing, and the transmission speed next to the router directly ran to 1.7Gbps. This data should be the processor performance bottleneck of the small host, and it will definitely be able to run full in the future.
Too many screenshots will not be put away, and they will be directly summarized into the following standard gold for comparison. It can be seen that in the same position, the notebook has a 10-20% lead in transfer speed compared to the OnePlus Ace2. If you are networked, connecting to a subordinate node should also amplify this gap.
3. About Mesh networking
ASUS routers that are not pre-paired can be searched directly through the ASUS Router app or the web background, and will be automatically added after clicking, and the recognition speed is also okay. After all, it is a veteran manufacturer, and the consistency of APP and web is no problem, and after configuration, you can quickly synchronize the settings using that way of management. However, because there are no test conditions during this time of business travel, you can use the cross-generation networking of BE88U and ROG Rubik's Cube Magic in the future, and then conduct the corresponding tests. The wireless transmission speed of AX and BE is far more than Gigabit, and it is estimated that there is no problem with the use experience of this cross-generation networking, and the difference should only be analyzed by the test data under extreme working conditions.
4. Summary
As the main series of ASUS routers, the 88U/86U has iterated three wireless versions from Wi-Fi 5 to Wi-Fi 7, and the flagship features and performance have always been at the forefront. This time, the performance of BE88U was briefly tested, and the top-of-the-line configuration of home-grade equipment was fully able to meet the needs of the previous replacement master node. When the author goes home and updates, a more detailed test will be conducted on the intranet in the new state, so stay tuned.
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