I was informed that this device is not recommended at the moment.
Is it hardware related?
You can read about the experience in this thread for example:
Mikrotik HAP AX s WiFi issues - RouterOS / Wireless Networking - MikroTik community forum
And @holvoetn also did some benchmark, and the WiFi numbers are not great:
hAP AX S under capsman - RouterOS / General - MikroTik community forum
Biggest problem with this device right now is for me following:
1- advertised wifi speeds in marketing material are not reached using normal usage. Not by a long shot.
I would like to know exactly how they measured it, in a way a normal user can replicate that setup.
2- Wifi driver is so new, things are being found now which never appeared before during development / testing prior to release.
For me this device was released too early given current SW state.
Someone has suggested in the context of device mode debacle some users could be involved to do pre-release testing, both on SW and HW side. Heavy NDA controlled and whatnot.
This is a typical example where this could have given golden feedback for development.
I hope hAP be3 won't have the same problems as hAP ax S…
I think there really isn't much to be surprised about. The entire new hEx (Refresh / S 2025 / ax S) series is a new platform. Mikrotik doesn't really have experience (until now) with MediaTek wifi, so this is a while new world. Also, I think that when one looks at expected performance, instead of looking at the brochures and videos, one can just look at the price point to see the positioning. And let's not forget that the hEx series was always the least expensive "proper" router of the line-up; this is just extending the concept to wifi.
I think it hurt Mikrotik that their "baseline" (i.e. cheapest) dual-band wifi all-in-one became the ax2, and they wanted something cheaper. It's totally legit to look at MediaTek to fill this gap.
I'm sure that after a couple of rounds of fixes it will be fine.
My two original hex devices and RB450G board device are stellar work horses (reliable) and cost effective. There should be no reason to expect the same from more recent hex type offerings. If true, its sad that the quality has diminished.
I don't think it has. But those original devices have been around forever.
All of these SoC's have a rich personality (full of bugs, incomplete/half-assed drivers, idiosyncrasies, lock-ups, random behaviors). They will probably get ironed out. Probably slowly.
BTW, I have been using the hEx Refresh and the S in various deployments for some time, and I find them solid.
There is also an issue with the sfp1 port, says 1G full duplex on the hex ax s but my fiberbox, crs112 and others get 1G half duplex on auto negotiate, had to set it manually on them (v7 on both sides) to get the link working.
Also make sure you update it to 7.20.x, 7.19.4 factory might have some wifi issues. No complaints after update but can't be sure.
I fully agree with you. Also indicated as such in another thread.
They will fix it, I am sure they will.
Just a pity it could have been done differently.
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For now wifi speed is 600 Mbps.
Hope next firmwares will increase it, but for real life it’s enough.
So, imho hap ax s have no problems.
I have one that is currently sitting in my lab waiting to be installed but I can’t because it’s a paperweight.
Can’t test because more than half of devices I connect to it doesn't pass traffic and disconnects. Most of devices that do connect to it are old devices with much lower performance.
Waiting for software updates that makes this device usable.
Testing the hAP ax S on v7.22beta6. So far wifi on 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz AX is solid with HP and ASUS laptops + Samsung phones and tablets. On 5Ghz ax the phone bandwidth tests at WAN fibre speed limit of 200mbps. 2.4Ghz ax connection is 130mbps.
We are hoping the hAP ax S will also be upgradeable to arm64 as the is the case for the L009 so that 64bit containers can be used.
After adjusting device mode we checked the setting /system/routerboard/settings set preferred-architecture= and it offers arm or arm64. It was set to arm64 and accepted.
Will not be testing the netinstall upgrade as per the L009 until Mikrotik officially announces it is supported.
Our potential use case is to fit a USB drive and have docker compatible container with Netprobe based on Grafana. The idea is to be able to graphically check a clients internet connection quality directly on the router.
As a switch/router there is no issue, I also have Hex Refresh and Hex S 2025 so I knew what to expect there.
My biggest "problem" is that using 160MHz channel, it should go way over 700-800 Mbps (which wAP AX can do easily, even hovering around 900).
Just tested again as router/AP:
Samsung S25: 400-450 both ways using iperf3
PC: baseline using wire to hAP AX s: just below 900Mbps
Wifi: the same 400-450 as with S25.
For access to external services, I don't care. I only have 500/30 from my ISP.
But I do expect quite a bit more from the wifi part.
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WiFi is disaster even from physical link budget. Maximum 18 dBm in 2.4 GHz and 19 dBm in 5 GHz bands. You can reach with antennas gain maximum 23.5 dBm and 25.5 dBm. Far away from 30 dBm (1W) especially in 5 GHz band.
I have returned device back. Even my old hAP ac^2 is better. I wanted soemthing with integrated SFP, but no way this device.
Have anyone had any luck getting the HAP AX S connected to a Realtek RTL8852BE device? No matter what my settings is, device connects and passes data for a few seconds and then no data can pass through anymore.
#edit: So from testing I have found that the client works just fine if the HAP AX S is configured as a router - but if configured as an AP then certain clients stop passing data after a few seconds. Must be a bridging issue. Just very wierd that it only affects certain clients.
Interesting. Would have to see your config as a router and as an AP to diagnose any misconfiguration.