I had been forced to do an overhaul after my daughter told me that she did not have wireless access upstairs anymore. The last wireless extension adapter upstairs went down.
While trying to fix it, I had to get into the router setup page using the IP 192.168.1.1
Whilst I was doing the settings, I noticed a message asking me to update the router firmware. I clicked the update because of security updates. That's where it all went downhill.
The router was an Asus RT-AC87U with four antennas. The wifi it provided reached all the way to the top floor of the house. Now that the home network was down, I scrambled to recover it to no avail.
Fortunately, I had a newer unused router from the telco. I was able to restore the home network but the wifi from this router was restricted.
Fortunately, the comex show was on and I got myself a new set of home plugs to extend the wifi throughout the house.
I called Asus support but after hearing that I had I had tried using the recovery software and that they do not have any further solution to suggest, I gave up on Asus support.
I had done all the necessary steps for the firmware recovery but somehow, the wifi LED s weren't lighting up, not to mention accessing the router through its default gateway. I knew it had to be residual configuration not fully wiped out by the recommended factory reset. Finally, someone on a site mentioned the WPS button as an alternative to clearing the NVRAM. When I tried that, lo and behold, it worked!
So now, I can squeeze more extra years out of this older router. The next project is probably to find a way to reuse the older home plugs which are of a different brand. Hopefully they use the same home plug standards. I will probably use an even older router as a wireless extension with those old power line adapters.
