ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 gaming router

The manufacturer ASUS has launched a new family of routers specifically oriented to gaming, this new family is the ASUS ROG STRIX, a family that currently has graphics cards, monitors, motherboards and even laptops, all these components specifically oriented to gaming. Now ASUS has wanted to get fully involved with a gaming router, the ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400, however, soon we will also see other routers within this new family that is aimed at the most demanding gamers. This new model belongs to the upper-middle range of routers with WiFi 6, as it has a simultaneous dual band AX5400 and a three-core processor at a speed of 1.5GHz.

Main features of this gaming router

This router belongs to the ROG STRIX family, a family of ASUS components specifically aimed at online gamers, therefore, not only will we have a really incredible design with the Aura RGB LEDs, but we will also have great performance to have the best user experience. In addition, something that we must highlight is that the Asuswrt firmware is the same as always, they have only changed the background of the firmware to give it the ROG STRIX touch, but the configuration options are exactly the same as always.

Soon, the manufacturer ASUS is expected to launch more routers that are incorporated into this family, both somewhat lower-end routers, as well as higher-end routers than this particular model. This new family of ROG STRIX routers is characterized by a truly incredible design, outstanding performance and firmware that is as configurable as ever.

ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400

Wireless features

This new gaming-oriented wireless router incorporates all the features we need to get the best WiFi performance. We have simultaneous dual band with WiFi 6 and it is AX5400 class, this means that we can achieve a speed of up to 574Mbps in the 2.4GHz band and a speed of up to 4804Mbps in the 5GHz band. In the 2.4GHz band we have two external antennas in MU-MIMO 2T2R configuration, 40MHz channel width and the WiFi 6 standard with 1024QAM. In the 5GHz band we have four external antennas in MU-MIMO 4T4R configuration, support for 160MHz channel width and the WiFi 6 standard with 1024QAM. If you have a WiFi card with support for 160MHz channel width, you can get twice the speed (theoretical) in the wireless network, for example,

Other very important wireless features that this router also supports are the following:

• Explicit Beamforming and Implicit Beamforming : The router can focus the wireless signal on the wireless clients, to provide them with better coverage and faster wireless speed. We will notice this improvement in environments far from the main router, because it will be where the signal reaches the weakest.
• Bidirectional MU-MIMO : up to WiFi 5 MU-MIMO was only available in the download direction (from the AP to the clients), ASUS allows MU-MIMO in download and upload. In this way, we can transfer data from several wireless clients to the router simultaneously, saving time and optimizing the wireless network globally.
• OFDMA : it is the star technology of the WiFi 6 standard, it allows us to divide the channel into subcarriers, with the aim that all wireless clients transmit as soon as possible without the need to “wait”. This allows to increase the global capacity of the wireless network up to four times, in addition, we will also notice a lower latency in the wireless connection.
• TWT (Target Wake Time) : this technology allows different wireless clients to be put on hold, in order to save energy. This is ideal for clients such as smartphones and tablets, or battery-powered IoT devices.
• WiFi Agile Multiband : this router supports WiFi mesh with ASUS AiMesh, this technology uses the WiFi Alliance standard to optimize WiFi roaming between nodes. Of course, it makes use of the 802.11k / v standards. Another important feature is that we have band-steering or also known as Smart Connect, this allows us to create a single WiFi network and that the router places us in the 2.4GHz or 5GHz band automatically, based on a series of rules that they are configurable in the firmware.

This model also has a WPS (Wi-Fi Protected Setup) button on the back, this button allows us to connect wireless clients without entering the typical WPA2-Personal password. The Asuswrt firmware allows you to configure the wireless network with the new WPA3-Personal protocol, this new protocol allows us to protect the wireless network as best as possible, the negative part is that, if we have an AiMesh WiFi system, we will not be able to use it only because it is not compatible for the interconnection of the nodes. We will have to configure the WPA2 / WPA3-Personal protocol to provide compatibility with older wireless clients, or for the WiFi Mesh system.

Wired and USB 3.0 Features

This wireless router has a Gigabit Ethernet port for the Internet WAN , we could also use the LAN 1 port as a secondary WAN enabling the Dual-WAN functionality that this router has, thanks to this, we can have two Internet connections and make a WAN Aggregation, a load balancing on the connections or a connection failover. Of course, this router supports the 802.1Q VLAN Tagging standard, VLAN per port to provide IPTV services, and we can even configure the Movistar Triple VLAN FTTH profile to have all the operator’s services. The main CPU supports NAT acceleration to provide the best wired and wireless performance for the Internet, we could achieve speeds higher than 800Mbps without problems.

This router has 4 Gigabit Ethernet ports for the LAN , at the firmware level, we have the possibility of configuring the Jumbo Frames at 9K and Link Aggregation for the LAN 1 and LAN 2 ports, this is ideal for connecting NAS servers that have two NICs. Another possibility is to configure the LAN port 1 as “Gaming Port” and that it has the highest priority, the latter is ideal for gamers with consoles or gaming PCs who want to have the highest data priority with respect to other wired or wireless devices.

This router also has a high-performance USB 3.0 port (at 5Gbps), taking into account the Tri-Core processor at 1.5GHz, it is very likely that we will achieve speeds greater than 50MB / s read and write, but we will see this in detail in our test lab. One aspect that we must take into account is that we will have the same services as always in ASUS routers, such as Samba, FTP and FTPES servers, iTunes, DLNA media server, ASUS AiDisk etc.

Firmware and more

The firmware of this ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 router is exactly the same as always, the only thing that has changed is the background of the firmware adapting it to the new ROG STRIX family, the rest of the configuration and customization options are the same as always. Although ROG STRIX is a new family like the TUF Gaming or ROG Rapture, in this case the firmware has not undergone a complete redesign at the graphical user interface level, but it does not matter either because the visual aspect of the Asuswrt firmware is perfect for us.

The firmware that we have in this router has all the usual services, including the most advanced configurations, nothing has changed in this regard. We have guest WiFi networks, Amazon Alexa, AiProtection Pro with bidirectional IPS, adaptive QoS, traditional QoS, bandwidth limiter, specific gaming menu with Gaming Port and Open NAT, we have different VPN servers with OpenVPN, IPsec VPN and also Instant Guard, as well as full support for IPv6 networks, advanced WAN, LAN and WiFi configurations and much more.

This router has an LED that runs through the entire front of the router, it is governed by ASUS Aura RGB, so we can customize both the type of lighting and the color of the status LEDs. We will be able to synchronize Aura RGB with other ASUS devices such as motherboards, monitors, boxes and more.

Once we know the main characteristics of this ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 router, we go with the technical characteristics:

ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 router technical characteristics

• Wireless: Compatible with 802.11a / b / g / n / ac / ax standards. In the 2.4GHz band we will achieve a speed of up to 574Mbps thanks to Wi-Fi 6, in the 5GHz band a speed of up to 4804Mbps thanks to Wi-Fi 6 and 160MHz of channel width. We will have a total of up to 5400Mbps of wireless bandwidth, the antennas are external, dual and not removable.
• CPU and switch : Broadcom BCM6750 with three cores at 1.5GHz speed
• RAM : 512MB capacity.
• Flash: 256MB capacity.
• 2.4GHz Wireless Controller: Broadcom BCM6750 with Wi-Fi 6 MU-MIMO 2T2R at 574Mbps.
• Wireless 5GHz controller: Broadcom BCM43684KFEB with Wi-Fi 6 MU-MIMO 4T4R at 4.804Mbps thanks to 160MHz.
• Power supply: It needs a current voltage of 19V and an intensity of 1.75A, therefore, it needs a maximum of 33W of power.

In the following video you can see the ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 in detail:

Once we know its technical characteristics, we go with the external analysis of the equipment.

External analysis

This new gaming router comes in a black and rainbow box, as it belongs to the new ASUS ROG STRIX family. On the front of the box we can see that this router is simultaneous dual band with WiFi 6, AX5400 class as indicated by the model name. In the lower right we can see that this router has a games mode for smartphones, ideal for achieving the best possible user experience on these clients. We also have a gaming port that will have priority over the rest of the wired ports of the LAN and over the clients of the WiFi wireless network, in addition, we will also have the Open NAT to open the ports easily and quickly with the step-by-step wizard. ASUS pass. Finally, we have the Aura RGB logo, and this router has a large LED with different types of lighting and colors that we can configure directly through the firmware.

On the back of the box we will find that this available dual-band WiFi 6 router is twice as fast as a WiFi 5 router with similar characteristics, this is thanks to the fact that it supports 160MHz of channel width in the bandwidth. 5GHz, a very important feature as we have already explained before. This model allows a capacity up to four times greater thanks to OFDMA and MU-MIMO technologies, both of which will allow us to optimize the wireless network as best as possible so that the user experience is excellent. We can also find information about the ASUS game acceleratorIf we install the ASUS Router app, we can accelerate the performance of our smartphone in online games, be it Android or iOS, as it will tell the router that we want to have the highest priority. Other features that we have present in this back of the box are the prioritization of games thanks to the Gaming Port, and also the AiProtection Pro that incorporates the Bidirectional IPS to protect the local network against external threats.

On the left side of the box we will find the entire list of technical specifications that we have already explained to you earlier in the introduction, the most remarkable thing is the speed of the WiFi, and that it supports WPA3-Personal to have the maximum possible security. We can also see the content of the package, two QR codes with information from ASUS, and the serial number, MAC, hardware version, default firmware version and also the exact model of the equipment.

On the right side of the box we will find the model of the router that we are analyzing, the ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400. Finally, at the bottom we will find the most notable features of this router in different languages, these features were also present on the front of the box.

Inside the box, the first thing we are going to find is a brochure with Intel’s recommendations to update the drivers, it is absolutely necessary to update the drivers to version 20.70.0 or higher if we want to connect to the network that generates with it. WiFi 6 standard, otherwise we will not be able to connect to the wireless network. The content of the box of this router is the following:

• ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 Router.
• Current transformer 19V and 1.75A.
• Cat5e Ethernet network cable.
• Quick installation guide in different languages.
• Installation guide with the app.
• Intel brochure to update drivers if you use manufacturer’s cards.
• Product warranty and safety recommendations.

In the following gallery you can see both the inside of the box and its content:

The Intel brochure is absolutely necessary to inform users that if they do not update to version 20.70.0 or higher on their Intel WiFi network cards, they will not be able to connect to the wireless network of this router if we have enabled the standard 802.11ax. This router supports the new standard with the new frames, therefore, if we try to connect old wireless clients that do not “understand” these new frames, we will not be able to see the wireless network or connect to it manually.

We are also going to find a quick installation guide, we can see a QR code to download the ASUS Router app, and basic instructions to install the modem or ONT to the router, and proceed with the configuration through the application. We must remember that this application is compatible with Android and iOS smartphones and tablets. In the complete quick installation guide, we can access the contents of the box, the legend of the status LEDs, the different ports and buttons of the router, where we should locate the router, and also how we can install the router by connecting a device via WiFi or cable, to run the setup wizard.

In this box we will also find the typical Cat5e Ethernet network cable with four pairs of wires, so we can achieve a speed of 1Gbps without any problem. Finally, we have the current transformer that will provide us with a current voltage of 19V and a current intensity of 1.75A, so it can provide us with 33W of power to power the router and also the hard drive that we connect to its USB port. 3.0.

This ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 router has a really elegant design, it is clear that it is a gaming-oriented router because on the front we find the popular ASUS ROG logo. The construction materials of this router are premium, the first thing that catches our attention is the touch that the casing of this router has. On the left side is where we will find the status LEDs of the equipment, the status of the Internet, WiFi 2.4GHz, WiFi 5GHz and also the “information” status. On the right side we can see the ROG logo that has a really spectacular design with different colors, although it does not light up.

In the lower area is where we will have an LED that runs through the entire router, we can modify its behavior through the ASUS Aura RGB firmware, and even synchronize it with other ASUS components such as motherboards, boxes or monitors among others.

On the right and left side of this GS-AX5400 router we will not find any button or port, we will only have small ventilation grills to allow air to pass through and internally not get too hot.

At the back of this router is where we will have all the ports and buttons, from left to right we find the following: power connector, router on and off button, USB 3.0 port, Gigabit Ethernet ports for the LAN, Gigabit Ethernet port for Internet WAN, WPS button (which can be configured to perform other functions) and also the RESET button to reset the router to factory settings.

In this rear area is where we will find the four non-removable external antennas, we can orient them as we want, that we can do.

At the bottom of this router we can see a large ventilation grill to adequately cool the internal components, we also have two non-slip pads, two holes to place the router on the wall, and in the central part a sticker with a lot of information.

This sticker is where we can see the exact model of the router, the working frequency, the electrical input characteristics (19V and 1.75A), the hardware version of the router, the default firmware version, the MAC address and the number of series, as well as a QR code that we can scan with our smartphone to proceed with the configuration through the ASUS Router app. Finally, we can see the IP address of the default router, and it is that simply by entering the domain router.asus.com we will be able to access the router administration, either to the configuration assistant (if it is the first time you enter or it is reset ) or firmware.

Once we have seen the external analysis of this router, we are going to see the internal components of this new model that is very similar at the hardware level with other routers from the manufacturer. Below, you can see all the components that make up this new model.

Internal analisis

This new ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 router has well-known hardware, since it shares a platform with other models from the manufacturer ASUS, such as the ASUS TUF Gaming TUF-AX5400, the RT-AX82U and the RT-AX58U. Depending on the model you buy, you will have a router design or another, but internally the hardware is the same, yes, the firmware could be different incorporating more or less functionalities depending on which audience it is aimed at.

The main processor of this router is the Broadcom BCM6750 , a 1.5GHz Tri-Core CPU with 64-bit architecture. This processor should provide a great performance in reading and writing in USB 3.0 and also in VPN, of course, we have NAT acceleration by hardware, so we will not have LAN-WAN performance problems. Lastly, it supports Jumbo Frames, Link Aggregation, WAN Aggregaetion and the Gaming Port. The RAM memory of this router has 512MB capacity, and the FLASH memory is 256MB.

The chipset of the 2.4GHz band is the Broadcom BCM6750 compatible with Wi-Fi 6. In the 5GHz band we have the Broadcom BCM43684 compatible with Wi-Fi 6. We have technologies such as Beamforming, OFDMA, MU-MIMO and full compatibility with the standard in both frequency bands. A very important characteristic of the 5GHz band is that we have 160MHz of channel width with ZeroWait DFS, so we don’t have to wait 10 minutes for the wireless network to come out, all due to the current regulation for DFS channels.

So far we have arrived with our internal analysis, as you have seen, at the hardware level we are at the latest in the upper-middle range. Will we get good wireless performance? We’ll see you in the test lab.

Test laboratory

In these LAN tests we will use JPerf to see how it behaves with multiple threads on the local network. This test is very important because it guarantees that the router will behave perfectly when we are transferring a large amount of information through the local home network. Nowadays it is very normal to have NAS servers or a PC to share files on a local network.

LAN tests

With 100 concurrent TCP threads we get a transfer speed of 113MB / s, an excellent result. We can see how the threads transfer at the same speed, this is synonymous with stability in the transfer.

With 250 TCP threads we get a speed of 113MB / s, an excellent performance. We have 2.5 times more traffic on concurrent TCP threads, so we will have no problems transferring multiple files over the local network at high speed.

With 500 TCP threads we get a speed of 113MB / s, one of the best routers we have tested to date, we have excellent performance, as expected if we consider its hardware.

With 750 TCP threads we get a speed of 113MB / s, a perfect speed.

With 1,000 TCP threads we get a speed of 80MB / s, a very good speed, but we expected to go up to 100MB / s as has happened with other ASUS routers.

In the following table you can see the values ​​that we have obtained with different number of threads:

LAN-LAN conclusions

The LAN-LAN performance of this ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 router is excellent, we will have no problems when transferring data at maximum speed through the Gigabit Ethernet ports. A very important detail is that we have passed the test of 750 concurrent TCP threads above 100MB / s, ideal to have the best possible performance. It is true that in the test of 1000 TCP threads we have only reached 80MB / s, however, in domestic conditions it is very difficult or almost impossible to reach this high traffic on the local network.

LAN-WAN tests

In this test we will simulate how it will behave with P2P since we will connect multiple threads from the LAN to the WAN. As we told you before, this router has hardware NAT, and its firmware implements this feature, so we expect a great performance in this test.

With 100 threads we get a speed of 113MB / s, an excellent performance. With this router we will not have problems if we use P2P programs and we have a large Internet bandwidth, it will be able to do everything.

With 250 threads we get a speed of 113MB / s, we still have an outstanding performance, even though we have doubled the number of TCP threads.

With 500 threads we get a speed of 113MB / s, a performance that is still perfect, this router is one of the best in this test.

With 750 threads we get a speed of 101MB / s, an outstanding performance, easily surpassing 100MB / s as a barrier.

With 1000 threads we obtain a speed of 102MB / s, an excellent performance considering the number of concurrent TCP threads, easily exceeding 100MB / s as a barrier.

In the following table you can see the values ​​that we have obtained with different number of threads:

LAN-WAN conclusions

The performance of this wireless router in LAN-WAN tests has been excellent. At all times we have exceeded 100MB / s throughput, including the 1000 concurrent TCP threads test which is the most difficult. With this router we will not have any problem when it comes to making the most of our Internet connection, even if we use P2P programs intensively. Everything has worked perfectly on this router with the LAN-WAN test, we are very impressed because it is not a top-of-the-range router, but a mid-high-end router and it has performed fantastic.

LAN-WLAN (Wireless) tests

The time has come to check if the coverage and wireless speed of this ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 router is up to the best, we anticipate that we have been pleasantly surprised when performing the speed tests, because the speed that is able to provide us with this router is excellent. The physical stage of the tests is the same as always, as you can see here:

The iperf3 server is located on the local network on a NAS server connected via LAN, in this case the maximum speed that we can achieve is 1Gbps, it is possible that in certain circumstances we have a bottleneck in this wired network. Of course, we will use the Lenovo X1 Carbon laptop making use of the Intel AX200 card which is AX3000 class. We must bear in mind that in the market we do not have WiFi 6 cards via USB yet, they are about to arrive.

ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400: Test on the 2.4GHz band

In this 2.4GHz frequency band we can get up to 574Mbps theoretical with this wireless router, as long as we use a Wi-Fi card compatible with Wi-Fi 6 and 2-streams. Here are the results obtained with the iperf3 client-server with 20 concurrent TCP threads, and the Intel AX200 Wi-Fi card that we have tested with this ASUS GS-AX5400 router

As can be seen from the performance tests, this router is capable of providing excellent performance in this frequency band. When we are in places close to the router we have achieved a speed of 230Mbps, an outstanding speed. It has also performed really well when we are very far from the router, such as in the attic where we have managed to connect and pass the test.

ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400: Test on the 5GHz band

Now we are going to check the wireless performance that we achieve in the 5GHz band with low channels , we must remember that this router supports WiFi 6 and 160MHz of channel width, to make the most of the wireless connection. Here are the results with the iperf3 client-server with 20 concurrent TCP threads, and using the Intel AX200 card.

As can be seen from the table, this router provides excellent coverage and speed in all scenarios. Thanks to the Intel AX200 card we have been able to squeeze the maximum speed of the 5GHz band in nearby places, reaching a speed of more than 808Mbps real. In addition, something that we must highlight is the great speed we have achieved in the kitchen (600Mbps) and also in the main room (470Mbps).

Wireless Conclusions

In the 2.4GHz band this ASUS GS-AX5400 router has performed outstandingly in all the locations where we have performed the tests. The maximum speed we have achieved is 230Mbps in the closest place to the router, but the most remarkable thing is that we have also been able to connect from the attic, which is the vertically furthest location. The firmware allows us to always configure the 40MHz channel width, so we will achieve great wireless performance in any circumstance.

On the 5GHz band it has performed excellently, providing a speed of 808Mbps at best, but the wireless speed remains stable both in the kitchen and in the main room, with 600Mbps and almost 500Mbps respectively, a few figures. really good that they have impressed us. In this frequency band we have 160MHz of channel width, and that is especially noticeable in nearby places, where we will achieve very high figures. Finally, in remote places like the attic it has also behaved perfectly, even managing to exceed the speed achieved in the 2.4GHz band.

USB 3.0 testing

The USB tests are like the ones we usually do to all routers. We will use a Kingston USB 3.0 pendrive, because the ASUS ROG Strix Arion case is not compatible with this router model, the firmware does not handle the transfer correctly and it is slower than it should be. Of course, we will use the NTFS format, since we will copy very large files to check the read and write speed via SMB, FTP and FTPES. The highlight of the firmware of this router is the incorporation of the FTPES protocol, a protocol that guarantees the confidentiality, authenticity and integrity of the transmitted data, since it uses the TLS 1.3 protocol and AES-256-GCM for data transfer.

Thanks to the incorporation of this protocol in ASUS routers, we will be able to transfer data via FTPES in a secure way.

Samba on USB 3.2 Gen 1 port

• NTFS-> Read: 92MB / s; Write: 62 MB / s.

FTP on USB 3.2 Gen 1 port

• NTFS-> Read: 112MB / s; Write: 62 MB / s.

FTPES on USB 3.2 Gen 1 port

• NTFS-> Read: 14.8MB / s; Write: 14.8 MB / s.

DLNA on USB 3.2 Gen 1 port

The operation of the DLNA media server has been perfect, the detection, playback and fast forward have worked correctly, just as we expected due to the hardware of this wireless router. Below, you can see a comparative table:

USB conclusions

This ASUS GS-AX5400 router has performed outstandingly in these USB 3.0 tests, furthermore, we believe it is capable of more in writing speed. Due to incompatibility with the ASUS ROG STRIX Arion case and this router’s firmware, we were unable to use an SSD to rule out bottleneck issues. Although the pendrive used is high-end (up to 200MB / s in reading and 60MB / s in writing), in the writing speed we are at the limit of the maximum speed that it is capable of providing. This 1.5GHz Tri-Core processor has performed excellently, in fact, if we use a good SSD via USB we could achieve higher speeds both in reading and writing.

The incorporation of the FTPES protocol and its performance is excellent, we will finally be able to transfer files and folders over the Internet with end-to-end data encryption. ASUS is one of the few manufacturers that supports FTPES, so this is great news and a new feature from Asuswrt.

Setup Wizard

The configuration assistant of this new ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400 router is the same as that of any ASUS router, in other cases such as the TUF-AX5400 the graphical user interface does change, however, in this model the configuration assistant it is visually exactly the same, with the same configuration options as the rest of ASUS routers.

In the first menu of the configuration wizard we must click on the “Advanced configuration” option, it will guide us through the different menus to configure the Internet connection, WiFi, the administrator password and it will show us the summary of all the configuration.

In the second menu we have to choose the router configuration mode, or load a previously saved configuration. The most common is to choose “Choose operation mode” and then we will choose “Wireless Router (Default)”, but we also have other configuration modes available. In the third menu, it will ask us if our Internet connection requires a username and password for PPPoE authentication, if it does not require it (for DHCP) we must select “No”, and it will take us to the next menu. In the fourth menu we can choose between automatic or static IP, in addition, we can also activate the «Special ISP requirement» to configure the VLANs, and even to load the Movistar triple VLAN FTTH profile.

Simultaneous dual-band routers allow to have “Smart Connect” activated, that is, we will have a single SSID and key to authenticate ourselves in the router, and the router will automatically place us in a frequency band of 2.4GHz or 5GHz, depending on different aspects of the network such as the number of connected wireless clients, saturation of a certain band, coverage received by the client, link synchronization speed, etc. If we want to deactivate this option, click on “Separate 2.4GHz and 5GHz” and we must indicate two SSIDs with their corresponding WPA2-Personal access passwords.

Next, ASUS will ask us if we want to activate the 802.11ax frames or not, if you have an old client and whose drivers are not updated, you will have problems when activating this functionality, it is something that you must take into account. In the case of having all compatible clients, we enable it to enjoy all the functionalities and technologies of the new wireless standard. A configuration that we must do manually is to activate the 160MHz channel width, something totally recommended to achieve the best possible speed in the wireless network, to do this, we must go to ” Advanced Configuration / Wireless ” and activate it.

Once we have configured the WiFi network, we must enter the username “admin” and the new password of the administrator user to enter the router configuration and start managing and administering it as we wish. Finally, we can see the summary of the WiFi configuration that will be applied in a few moments.

After waiting about 60 seconds, we will have our router ready with all the settings made, and we can enter its complete configuration firmware to adjust all the settings that we want.

Firmware

The Asuswrt firmware in this new gaming-oriented WiFi router is exactly the same as always, the only thing that has changed is the background of the firmware itself with the typical colors of ROG STRIX products, the rest of the Asuswrt firmware is exactly the same, all and each of the menus are designed exactly the same as always. A very important detail is that we will have Aura RGB available to configure it from the main menu, so we can modify the type of lighting and the color of the different LEDs of the gaming router.

As you can see, the change made by ASUS in the firmware has been minimal, we will only have the background changed, the rest of the menus maintain exactly the same graphical user interface, and, of course, the configuration options are exactly as same as always.

General – Network Map

In the «Network Map» menu we can see the complete status of the Internet connection, the status of the WiFi networks of both frequency bands, the status of CPU and RAM, and we can even modify Aura RGB easily from this menu, to change the type of lighting and color. Of course, we can make certain basic settings from this menu, such as changing the SSID, security and password of the WiFi network

The most interesting novelty of this router compared to other routers that are not gaming, is that we have Aura RGB, the ASUS technology that allows us to modify the type of lighting and also the RGB color of the router LEDs that we have in The front part. Something we really like is how easy it is to set up, plus it automatically syncs with other ASUS components like motherboards, boxes, and more.

In the clients section we can see all the wireless clients with their host name, IP address and also MAC address, in addition, we can see if they are connected via cable or via WiFi. Other information that we can see is the specific list of wireless clients, in addition, if we click on any of them we can block them easily and quickly.

In the “AiMesh Node” section is where we can search for other AiMesh nodes, click on “Search” and it will automatically scan the surrounding WiFi networks, it will detect the routers and we can add them easily and quickly.

General – AiMesh

ASUS AiMesh 2.0 is already in all the manufacturer’s WiFi Mesh routers and systems, this technology allows us to have the best WiFi Mesh network management system today. This administration is much more advanced than the previous one, we will be able to choose the uplink nodes, reconnect nodes, restart them, remove them, force the interconnection to be via cable and many more advanced administration options.

One of the parts that we like the most is that it will show us the status of the Mesh network in real time, and not only that, but we also have an «Optimization» button to reconnect the nodes in the best possible way, and provide us with the best wireless performance on the mesh network.

General – Guest Network and AiProtection

All ASUS WiFi mesh routers and systems allow us the possibility of creating several guest WiFi networks with different configurations, we can have up to three WiFi networks separate from the main network. We have the possibility to enable communication between them, we could also configure these guest WiFi networks with Amazon Alexa almost automatically.

The guest WiFi network options are as always, we can create a total of 3 WiFi networks separate from the main network, although we have the possibility of enabling routing between them so that there is communication. Another possibility is to configure these guest WiFi networks with Amazon Alexa almost automatically.

Regarding AiProtection Pro, we have the same configurations as always, including the Bidirectional IPS that is only present in high-end equipment, because we could suffer a small bottleneck. We also have some very interesting technologies such as detection and blocking of infected devices, advanced parental control based on time and content thanks to Yandex DNS etc.

General – QoS and Traffic Analyzer

A gaming router necessarily needs a powerful QoS to prioritize network traffic, and that we have the minimum latency in the wired connection. This router has adaptive QoS to easily prioritize applications, be it games, video streaming or web browsing, in addition, we will also have a traditional QoS where we will enter our real bandwidth and we can configure it in an advanced way, finally, we have the limiter of bandwidth so that a wireless client does not saturate the entire network.

Other possibilities are to be able to see the web history of the wireless clients, and even to carry out a speed test with the integrated system, to obtain the real speed of our Internet connection.

In this router we also have the traffic analyzer analyzer that will indicate the consumption of data in the network, and even which applications have consumed a certain traffic, and we can also monitor the traffic in real time and will show us the bandwidth consumed in a certain moment.

With QoS we can prioritize games efficiently, ideal to have the best user experience.

General – Game Boost and Open NAT

This router has a «Game» menu that will allow us to prioritize the game device that we want, in this way, this specific device will have the highest priority, above any other equipment. We also have the possibility of downloading the ASUS Router app to speed up games on mobile devices, and we can even go directly to the Open NAT menu to open ports easily and quickly in three steps.

This Open NAT utility is basically a small port configuration wizard, this will allow us to forward ports to a certain computer so that it does not have problems with games. We will have a list of popular games with their corresponding ports, ideal for not having to know if a certain game needs to open a TCP or UDP port, but we will have it directly in a small database.

General – USB and AiCloud 2.0 application

ASUS routers are the ones that have a greater number of services to make the most of the USB 3.0 port, in this case, we have the following services:

• ASUS AiDisk
• Samba server
• FTP server and also FTPES server (secure)
• DLNA media server
• Print server
• Ability to connect a 3G / 4G modem to use it as a secondary WAN
• Download Master to download by BitTorrent
• Time Machine for backups of Apple computers.
• AiCloud 2.0

As you can see, we have many services to squeeze this port to the fullest, other manufacturers only incorporate one or two services, ASUS incorporates all those that we consider necessary in a medium-high-end home router.

ASUS routers are very advanced at the USB level, but to be able to squeeze it to the maximum we will need a powerful router processor that is Tri-Core or Quad-Core, in this way, we will achieve speeds close to or greater than 100MB / s in reading and writing.

Advanced Settings – Wireless

In the wireless part we can configure the WiFi wireless networks in detail, in the case of ASUS, we can enable Smart Connect to enable band-steering, we can also configure the SSID, authentication, key, channel, channel width, hide the SSID, activate WiFi agile Multiband and TWT among other advanced options that you can see below. The most important thing in this menu is to enable WPA3-Personal if you don’t have an AiMesh WiFi system, and enable the 160MHz channel width.

Other functionalities that we can carry out in this router are to configure the WPS, WDS, MAC WiFi filtering, external RADIUS server to authenticate clients with WPA2-Enterprise, configure the WiFi network at an advanced level in the “Professional” section and also a roaming block list so that we do not roam with these devices that we register.

Remember that, if you have an AiMesh WiFi system configured, you will not be able to use WPA3-Personal, you must use WPA2-Personal for this, because it is not yet compatible for the wireless interconnection network.

Advanced Settings – LAN

In the LAN section we can change the subnet of the router, including the IP address and the subnet mask, we can also change the host name, the DHCP server and Static DHCP settings, configure the VLANs with the different profiles or do it. manually, and even enable the 9K Jumbo Frames and the Link Aggregation that we have in this router.

As you can see, we have extensive configuration options in the LAN, a very important detail is that the LAN1 port can only have one of these three functions: Link Aggregation, Gaming Port or WAN Aggregation. All of these options are mutually exclusive.

Advanced Configuration – WAN

In the WAN section we can enable the WAN and NAT, we can configure the type of NAT, disable UPnP for security, configure PPPoE and other parameters of the Internet connection. Here we can also configure the Dual WAN to put a secondary WAN as connection failover or for load balancing, and we can even configure the port trigger, virtual server, DMZ, DDNS and NAT Passthrough.

As you can see, we have the same configuration options as always, nothing has changed in this case, not even the graphical user interface.

Advanced Settings – Alexa, IPv6, VPN and Firewall

This router also has Alexa compatibility, we can integrate it into our account to send voice commands and perform certain basic actions, if you buy the Lyra Voice you will not need an Amazon Echo or similar because it already integrates it, and you can form a Mesh network. As for IPv6, we have full support, including 6in4 and 6to4 tunnels among other typical configuration options (automatic configuration with SLAAC, fixed or native IPv6).

Regarding VPNs, we still have the PPTP server that is not recommended to use, better to use the OpenVPN or IPsec server to connect to the local network remotely, in addition, we have Instant Guard, the new IPsec-based ASUS VPN protocol that It will allow us to connect our smartphone with the ASUS Router app quickly and easily, ideal for not needing to configure the server in an advanced way, any user at a basic level could configure it without many problems.

In the firewall of this router we can activate or deactivate it, we can also mitigate DoS attacks, block URLs and keywords, as well as block traffic from the LAN to the Internet WAN, at a certain time or always.

Advanced Settings – Administration

In the administration section we can change the operating mode of the router, we can configure it in several ways:

1. Router mode
2. Access point mode
3. WiFi repeater mode
4. Media bridge mode
5. AiMesh node

In this menu we can also configure the login captcha, the hibernation of the hard drives, time and NTP settings, the WPS button, enable the SSH server to configure the router remotely and securely, enable the HTTPS protocol to enter in administration and many other advanced configuration options.

In these menus we can also configure the automatic updates of the router, perform an automatic or manual update, in addition to saving and restoring the configuration, restoring it to factory settings and more.

Other actions are to report to ASUS a failure in the router, where we will have to fill out a questionnaire and send all the logs, we can also see the privacy clause that is activated when using services such as AiProtection Pro.

Advanced Settings – System Registry and Network Tools

In the logs section we can have access to all the router logs at the debug level, we can also see the internal data of the WiFi wireless network and which wireless clients are connected, the DHCP assignment table can also be seen here, along with the IPv6, routing table, configured port forwarding and all current and real-time connection table of the router.

In network tools we can use the typical ping, traceroute, nslookup, and also netstat to detect possible problems in the network. This router also incorporates WoL functionality, and finally, we have a specific “Smart connection rule” menu to configure the band-steering of the router.

As you have seen, we have the same Asuswrt firmware as always, the only thing that changes is the background of the firmware itself to adapt to the new ASUS ROG STRIX family, but it does not change completely as it happens with the TUF-AX5400 or with the routers ROG Rapture that we have previously tested in RedesZone.

So far we have come with the analysis of the firmware, and also with the review of the ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400. Now we are going to see a list of strong points, weak points and the final conclusions.

Strengths

1. Excellent LAN-LAN performance in all measurements, it has managed to pass all tests with perfect performance.
2. Excellent LAN-WAN performance in all measurements, it has achieved speeds of over 100MB / s in all tests.
3. Outstanding 2.4GHz Wi-Fi performance, we’ve hit 230Mbps. The coverage is outstanding, reaching up to the attic with enough coverage to pass the tests.
4. Wi-Fi performance in the excellent 5GHz band, we have reached up to 101MB / s with the Intel AX200 card. Coverage is also excellent, reaching all the way to the penthouse and beating the 2.4GHz band in speed.
5. Outstanding USB 3.0 performance, we have achieved up to 112MB / s read and 62MB / s write on FTP. If we use an SSD we could reach higher transfer rates.
6. Asuswrt configuration wizard with the same configuration options as always, including the possibility to configure the router in different compatible modes such as AP, Repeater, Bridge, AiMesh Router and AiMesh Node. However, the most normal thing is to always have it in router mode.
7. The Asuswrt firmware remains the same as always, with the same services in USB 3.0 and with the same advanced configuration options as always. Being a gaming router, we must highlight the Adaptive QoS, the Gaming Port and also the acceleration of games on the smartphone.
8. Application for mobile devices ASUS Router, allows us to connect to the VPN Instant Guard server and also speed up games on the smartphone.
9. WPS button.
10. Router on and off button.

Weak points

1. Price: above expectations, this router is worth approximately 250 euros, well above the TUF-AX5400 which has the same hardware and the same performance.

Last conclusions

This new family of ASUS ROG STRIX routers has been released in style with the GS-AX5400 model, this model has a mid-high-end hardware but a very well optimized firmware that has provided us with a very good performance globally ( except for the USB 3.0 port). This model is aimed at a gamer audience that does not want to spend too much money on a router, but wants to have great wired and wireless performance.

The performance that we have achieved LAN-LAN and LAN-WAN with this router has been excellent , it has been able to pass all the tests we have carried out, including the test of 1,000 concurrent TCP threads, where we have achieved high wired speeds, ideal for get the best performance in the home local network if we have NAS servers, and also for the Internet connection if we have 1Gbps Internet connections.

The WiFi coverage and speed has also been excellent globally. In the 2.4GHz band we have achieved a maximum speed of 230Mbps and in the 5GHz band we have achieved up to 808Mbps, excellent performance. The coverage in both cases is also really good, we were able to get to the attic without any problems and perform the performance tests.

The performance of the USB 3.0 port has been outstanding , the reading and writing speed is very good, we must bear in mind that we have used a pendrive and not an SSD as in other cases due to an incompatibility with the case used. This router has the same hardware as other models such as the TUF-AX5400 or the RT-AX82U, therefore, it is logical that it also achieves the same transfer rates.

This ASUS GS-AX5400 router has the same Asuswrt firmware as always, the only thing that changes is the background of the firmware, but all the functionalities, services, advanced configuration options, QoS, VPN and everything else, is exactly the same as always, nothing has changed. Of course, this router is geared towards gaming, so we have the star features to have the best possible user experience such as adaptive QoS, traditional QoS, bandwidth limiter and the Gaming Port, in addition, we also have the Open NAT to open ports easily and quickly, and we even have the game accelerator on the smartphone.

Finally, the current price of this router is around 250 euros , a somewhat high price compared to the TUF-AX5400 that incorporates exactly the same hardware, the only different thing is the design of the router and that it belongs to the ROG STRIX range.

If we take into account the characteristics, the excellent performance achieved by this router, and its price, the RedesZone rating is 8.5 / 10:

We hope you liked the analysis, if you have any questions you can put a comment and we will respond delightedly.

ASUS ROG STRIX GS-AX5400