Mikrotik hAP AX2 quick router review and electronics

I just received my router about 3 months ahead of my estimated ship date so I'm pretty excited. I only use this as a home wireless access point and a few ethernet cables to my game system and cell spot. It's a nice upgrade from my original hAP AC model. Someone on an online forum got me into Mikrotik many years ago, starting with their RB951G-2HnD model, then my hAP AC and now finally the hAP AX2. My first two have been rock solid stable which is why I love this brand so much for home routers. Big box routers need constant reboots which is crazy! Some models even have a "reboot nightly" option, and to me, this is insane. With these, you never need to reboot, the internet stays up, and I hope the AX2 will follow the same path.
As a home user, I don't know many of the advance settings, but I would love to learn how to update the firewall better. There are countless settings though, and out of the box works great with quickset and a few small tweaks such as frequency settings. It runs wifiwave2 out of the box. I know it can do IPv6, but I don't have this set up because it needs better firewall rules also from what I understand, and I don't want anything open where I can be easily hacked. The wireless signal is really good for such a small box, it's the same as my hAP AC as far I can tell, reaches everywhere I need it to around the house and to my outside wireless cameras. The inside seems to be built really well, the PCB and heatsink are solid and sturdy. There is now a hAP AX3 which is releasing, but I'll stick to this one since it works for everything I need it to. Love having wifi6 finally after all this time, but waiting for a Mikrotik version was worth it and I wouldn't have really benefited from it before anyways.

[iamthearmul]

Thanks. This is probably the only english lang review of this device on YT, appreciate it.

I just put my order in, just looking for an wifi 6 AP to living room for my router board that sits with cable modem in metal cabinet. This will replace my old Asus. There are many wifi 6 AP options, but prefer Mikrotik for the familiar interface and it's made in EU. Not going to configure much just separate vlan for IOT devices and a guest network. Just have been loving stability of my routerboard after horrible router perf in Sagemcom cable modem.

[Quettesh]

As a family IT support, I deploy Mikrotik routers if I want something that will work for the next decade without any issues. It took me some time to get deeper into deeper options. but it was worth it. Also the community is pretty big, and there are always good guides.

[manny_f]

I love the black case however I kinda preferred the older boxier design, I certainly prefer opposite faces to be parallel as it makes stacking of devices easier. Nevertheless, a great piece of kit this little router.

[FinlayDaGk]

3:42 "Skip DFS channels" basically means that it will *not* use DFS-enabled channels (UNII-2 5250-5720MHz) when selecting channels.
This causes your AP to not temporarily turn off its radio (or move to a different channel, interrupting wifi for a small moment) when something like a weather radar becomes active.
Generally, I don't recommend the use of UNII-2 for this exact reason.

[MaxUgly]

I agree, Mikrotik is rock solid, they also have enough features to easily break stuff if you dont know what you are doing, dont ask how i know.... i have learned so much about networking just messing with my CRS306-1G-4S+IN. It was a happy mistake when i bought it. I just wanted local 10GbE and it was cheap on amazon. Since then I have really gotten into learning about networking. I probably have spent 100 hours playing with routerOS and Swos. So much cheaper than equivalent cisco or juniper and so much more feature rich than any other equipment at same price.

[zidgjkh]

I'm still using the HAP AC router and thinking of moving to AX. The temp seems a bit high compared to AC which is understandable. Couldn't make up my mind yet though.

[givenoxygenbarez]

May i ask how did you disable the poe in/out in port 1?

[mariusmotea]

My router has a thermal adhesive that i don't see in your video. Under the white label are the pads of a USB 3.0 port that i identified to be Amphenol GSB31D12021HHR. I installed that USB port but it is still not working, probably some filters are still missing or the USB tracks where cut to avoid users having this enabled. I also replaced the U900 that is the 128MB EMMC flash with Kioxia TH58BYG3S0HBAI6 to upgrade it to 1GB of storage. It required lot of heat to swap that chip and the radiator need to be removed.

[closetoutsider]

Appreciate the video. I just set up my hAP ax2 as well.

Also, thanks for showing the Health section. My hAP ax2 is running around 55 C as well in a room with ambient temperature of about 70 F. 55 C translates to 131 F, which to me seems pretty darn hot for a little router running with such a low load.

Do you remember if your hAP ac 2 run that hot? This is my first Mikrotik device so I'm not sure if that's normal or not for them. It doesn't seem normal compared to most networking hardware limitations.

[RenatoAmes]

Hola, soy de Perú, gracias por compartir el video, mi consulta porfavor es hasta cuantos dispositivos wifi soporta el dispositivo? Lo comento porque tengo un domicilio con 40 dispositivos entre cámaras, luces, interruptores, celulares, televisores, me pueda servir el dispositivo que estas revisando? Gracias totales

[medastopalallos]

Hi sir, confused about poe in/out in ethernet1 port can you explain to me please. Is there any switch to turn the power on a poe port? Thanks 🙏

[hmt]

Can this be used as a mesh with wired back haul using maybe 3-4 units? I need to cover approx 2200 sqft across 4 bedrooms and a large living room/kitchen.

[yuRFt]

If this had an SFP+ cage so I could connect my GPON directly to it it would be perfect.

[floriangrill]

Hello, is your hAP ax2 also that loud?
Under load, I hear noises like coil whine.

[Xiefux]

too bad it doesnt have a usb port like the ac2.