Just a heads up if you are having wifi performance issues on these cheap little babies. Flashing this unit with LEDE RC2 makes wifi perform super fast! I done a comparison with 2 units at the same location with the same wifi channels, 1 routeros 6.38.1 and 1 LEDE RC2.

1 device connected, 1 meter away from the router (RouterOS) 67mbits/sec
1 device connected, 1 meter away from the router = (LEDE) 85mbits/sec

1 device connected, 20 meter away from the router (RouterOS) 12mbits/sec
1 device connected, 20 meter away from the router = (LEDE) 55mbits/sec

The second test also had some obstructions in the path of the wifi signal. Before testing, i tried many setting combinations in routeros to get the best performance possible (distance settings, etc)
I also noticed that devices which have problems staying connected to the router with routeros do not have these problems with LEDE.

It is also good to note that Airtime Fairness with FQCODEL will be coming to LEDE in the next couple of months.
https://blog.tohojo.dk/2016/06/fixing-t ... ath9k.html

This is strange. Even your faster result is still very slow. What signal do you have in the client? Have you tried any other client?

Hi Normis, at 20 meters with the obstructions, the tx was much lower with routeros. My phone was showing the same signal strength (3 out of 5 bars) for both 20m tests

Possibly in RouterOS some local laws are observed, and TX power is reduced. You can overcome this by setting "no country", removing antenna gain value, and making sure the tx-power-mode is default in the advanced menu. You can also experiment by changing the frequency in the RouterBOARD, maybe the other OS chose a better one

I think those settings are default, i just checked and it is set like so. Both routers are on channel 11. I also made sure only 1 device was connected at a time. I repeated the speed test many times on each unit.

The defaults are actually to follow local regulations, so to get max power, you do have to adjust some things.

For some reason those settings were already applied. I forgot to mention that my tests were performed with 20mhz bandwidth, dual chain.

I just checked and the defaults set to "no country set" antenna gain=0 and tx power "default". Also, how can the router default to local regulation if nothing asks you to set a country on first login?

no-country is the same as USA, so there are limits applied, even if you set antenna-gain=0
You should check the wireless menu, set the wireless mode to "superchannel" to work at max power. Default there is "regulatory domain".

how can the router default to local regulation if nothing asks you to set a country

The distributors often set it before selling, also, your first launch opens QuickSet, where the Country is one of the few wireless settings. Many people set it there. I had to ask.

no-country is the same as USA, so there are limits applied, even if you set antenna-gain=0
You should check the wireless menu, set the wireless mode to "superchannel" to work at max power. Default there is "regulatory domain".

how can the router default to local regulation if nothing asks you to set a country

The distributors often set it before selling, also, your first launch opens QuickSet, where the Country is one of the few wireless settings. Many people set it there. I had to ask.

Hi Normis, The default wireless mode is manual-txpower. When i set it to superchannel, the signal strengths remain the same. I am assuming USA which has a max eirp of 30dbm on the 2.4ghz spectrum is higher than the max tx power of the unit so no change in strength.

*EDIT*

I just found out that LEDE RC2 does include airtime fairness which might explain the increase in wifi performance but im not sure because i tested it with only 1 device. Airtime fairness shouldn't make a difference in this case. Maybe there are other 802.11 optimizations included.

I was looking for "airtime fairness" and found this topic. Has the mentioned patch (https://kau.toke.dk/git/lede/plain/pack ... time.patch?) been included in RouterOS?

We don't use those drivers, so the patch doesn't apply.

We don't use those drivers, so the patch doesn't apply.

Ok, thanks! What about that "airtime fairness" feature in RouterOS. Is it already implemented or is there a plan to support it?