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Forum Discussion
Enable Mu-Mimo on RAX200
Just a heads up if you're using a RAX200: Mu-Mimo is NOT enabled by default. You have to manually switch this on by going to ADVANCED > Advanced Setup > Wireless Settings > Enable Mu-Mimo Wi...
Well I was getting worse wifi performance on the RAX200 with Mu-Mimo turned off compared to my Linksys EA9500v2 (which has Mu-Mimo enabled by default). Now with Mu-Mimo enabled on the RAX200, wifi performance on both is identical, ie excellent.
I still say placebo, I suggest you read how MU actually works. Just because you enabled it doesn’t mean it’s doing anything unless it can form an MU group of two or more MU clients. And you also need a decent separation of at least like 5ft between two MU capable client devices for it to even work properly.
I have an RAX80. The RAX80 is practically the same as the RAX200 as it uses the same WiFi chipset and CPU minus the extra 5Ghz band, I actually have 5 MU capable clients (3x laptops with an Intel AX200 WiFi card and 2x laptops with an Intel 8265 AC WiFi card and as expected it didn’t do much on the RAX80 and at times performance was much worse when doing parallel WiFi based LAN transfers to and from my NAS.
Now with the Qualcomm based R7800 and RAX120 there was a tangible notice in certain conditions with MU enabled, but it wouldn’t say cal it a night and day difference.
I have an RAX80. The RAX80 is practically the same as the RAX200 as it uses the same WiFi chipset and CPU minus the extra 5Ghz band, I actually have 5 MU capable clients (3x laptops with an Intel AX200 WiFi card and 2x laptops with an Intel 8265 AC WiFi card and as expected it didn’t do much on the RAX80 and at times performance was much worse when doing parallel WiFi based LAN transfers to and from my NAS.
Now with the Qualcomm based R7800 and RAX120 there was a tangible notice in certain conditions with MU enabled, but it wouldn’t say cal it a night and day difference.
"The RAX80 is practically the same as the RAX200 as it uses the same WiFi chipset and CPU minus the extra 5Ghz band"
Isn't that a bit like saying a BMW 1 series is the same as a BMW 7 series minus xxx? Yes, I'm well aware that the RAX 80 uses the same chipset as the RAX200 and if I needed a dual-band router then i would have gone for the RAX80 or RAX120. But I didn't. I wanted a tri-band router due to shed load of wifi devices connected simultaneously (~50). My previous routers (Linksys EA9500v2 & Asus RT-AC5300) have all been tri-band so i find it hugely beneficial to manually allocate clients to each of the 3 bands. I don't think I will ever go back to a dual-band router ever again :)
- I mentioned the RAX80 for purposes of comparable MU testing as it’s the same chipset as your router.
But as for dual vs tri since you brought it up, in a home environment for most people it makes little difference as at most maybe only 4-5 devices are truly actively using any considerable amount of bandwidth constantly at any time with the rest just intermittently syncing/updating data or just idling.
Also you are still limited by the WAN so yeah if you have gigabit and are in like an office like environment yeah it can make a difference with many “active” users, but in a standard home environment especially for those with like 10-300 Mbps connections it won’t make much of a difference. On the other hand it is good for mesh though with a 2nd band for back haul.- FYI I’m not judging your purchase decision regarding Tri-Band or whatever your use case may be, just pointing the above mentioned points as I’ve seen a lot people upsold to tri bands at stores with misleading information.