1) 5ghz devices are NOT currently functioning on 5Mhz channel width. This is across the board on tp-link, ubiquiti, and mikrotik. This is upstream from the openwrt community that we'll need to work with to resolve. 10Mhz and 20Mhz channel widths function as expected.
2) All 32Mb RAM devices (this includes all the ubiqiuti 'XM' older cpu models) are NOT stable. Changes in the pipeline will reduce RAM usage by removing ipv6 and some packages that are not core to a node's function. We'll be chipping away at what we can in hopes of making 32Mb devices stable on latest builds. Eric KG6WXC has recently been contributing and submitted changes into github for this issue, thanks Eric!
3) please monitor https://github.com/aredn/aredn_ar71xx for open issues and "pull requests" (PRs) of changes working their way through the process to be aware of any developing issues.
4) If you have recently purchased a Nanostation Loco device (both M5 and M2). Please note, these devices have a hardware REV and now take the "rocket-m-xw" image. The model number is the same as older devices and the only known way to identify these devices is a "test date" as early as Nov 2017 or later. The Ethernet port will not be functional if you load the "loco-m-xw" images. It appears that the XW (AR934x chipset) devices from ubiquiti are all consolidating to have common architecture. In this case all moving to the AR8035 Ethernet chip.
5) For the 64Mb RAM devices, we are starting to see groups put the nightly builds on tower sites. We are beginning to have confidence in the core functionality.
6) The builds are based on openwrt, but currently this is a branch or moving target of latest changes. Openwrt started their release process in June. They are on the 2nd release candidate and have targeted to create their final binaries, today. Once Openwrt locks in this 18.06.0 release, we will lock the nightly builds to this release and go through a period of time (~2 months or so) to have further confidence, then target a timeframe to do an AREDN release.
AREDN will continue to support these devices as long as possible under the 3.16.x.x code branch. That means that they will still be supported and will receive security patches and such. They may not get all the new features/bug fixes added, but, will continue to be available and supported.
For higher memory devices ( > 64MB), these will be the target for new features, enhancements, etc. under the 3.18.x.x (and higher) code branches.
To reiterate, the team realizes both the investment the community has made in hardware, and the pace of technology and improvements in hardware design. We are NOT dropping support for 32MB devices at this time.
Thanks,
K5DLQ - Darryl