Inconsistency with Orbi Speed

Hello Johnnyk5679

Does this happen on wired devices? or is it just over the wireless? Have you checked to modem itself see if you see this change in speeds?

DarrenM

Wanted to chime in on this as well, as I've done extensive and tedious testing over the past 2 days to try to figure this out. First of all, I'm testing on an iPad Air 2 running iperf connecting to a hardwired computer on the LAN, so internet speed is eliminated as a factor. Secondly, I ensured before each test that I was indeed connected to the 5ghz band of the router or the satellite (whichever I was testing at the time), as the iPad will cling to the current connection even if you get closer to the other unit as long as the signal is good. Lastly, A LAN - LAN test from a different hardwired computer to the one running iperf in server mode was a consistent ~940Mbs (gigabit ethernet). The test as I configured it simply downloads as much data as it can during 2 seconds, and repeats this 5 times.

Now, on to the Orbi. My router and sat are (I think) around 20-25ft apart (hard to tell exactly), router upstairs and sat downstairs (so there are obstructions... floor, walls, cabinets). Standing in a position from the router that yields a signal of about -40, I get a reasonably consistent ~375Mbs (sometimes even reaching in the the lower 400Mbs range), comparable speeds to my Nighthawk R7800.

When positioned near the sat (and, again, confirming that I am indeed connected through it), sometimes I can run several test cycles back to back and get 200-250Mbs. But more often than not, it gets dicey, sometimes showing drastically flucutating speeds within the 10 second test cycle, other times just being solidly bad.

My first reaction was to assume there was a problem with the backhaul link. So, I plugged a laptop (WiFi off) into an ethernet port on the sat, and determined that the backhaul speed was in the neighborhood of 500Mbs, ruling that out... this is a problem between the client and the sat.  And bear in mind, it's not a torture test, as I'm sitting only about 12ft. from the sat with no obstructions, and have a solid signal of around -37 to -40.

Now, I originally did these tests on a system running the latest v1.4.0.34 firmware. I exchanged that for another Orbi, and tested with the firmware that came on it, v1.1.0.16 (initial release). It SEEMED to be better with that firmware, as I ran several test cycles and got speeds in the expected 200-250Mbs range, but after updating to v1.4.0.34, I started seeing the poor sat speeds again, which also occurred after downgrading to v1.4.0.16 as was suggested here.

It's possible that maybe the problem existed even with v1.1.0.16, and that I just wasn't patient enough to allow it to be revealed. Have not tried downgrading all the way back to that version yet, but will try to do so this evening.

I'm really considering jumping ship... when I went to exchange the Orbi, I saw that our Best Buy has the Linksys Velop in stock, which has received favorable speed ratings in reviews (then again, so has the Orbi!). I stood there for a while, contemplating whether or not to just go with the Linksys right then instead of trying another Orbi, but what sealed that decision was a quick perusal of the Velop's features in a review, which mentioned that this product has very little configurability, including the inability to even set a DHCP range, and it MUST be configured from the app... no web interface.

So I really want the Orbi to work, but I'm at a loss here.

UGGGGGHHHHH!!! Ok, the bad news is that my sporadic speed problem is back... I don't think the wire shelving in the closet was the main factor.  The good news is that I am getting closer, but this demon is still proving difficult to exorcise.

Trying to figure out what was different between yesterday when my speed was good, to today when it is suddenly inconsistent again, I noticed that sometimes the Velop connects clients to channel 36, and other times to channel 153.  Yesterday, I observed that my devices were connecting to a particular node on channel 153 (and speed was good), but right now it's using channel 36 (and speed is intermittent).  That sparked a memory from when I got my first AC router a year ago.  I recall that for some reason, I got poor throughput when using the lower 5ghz channels (36 - 48).  The high channels (149 - 161) were fine, much faster.

While I can't directly control which channels the Velop selects, some trial and error this evening has revealed that when the client happens to connect to a node on channel 36, I get intermittently bad speed, while if the client is connected to channel 153, speed is excellent and consistent.  That mostly corroborates with my Orbi experience, since the Orbi always uses the high channels for satellite communication and the low channels for clients... a laptop wired to the satellite gave good speed because that wireless link from the sat to the router was on channel 153, while a wireless client would be on 36 and would get intermittent speed.  What doesn't totally add up is why I got good speed connected wirelessly directly to the router (again, on channel 36), the only explanation for which I can come up with was perhaps I was just lucky and happened to test during a good period.

Another aspect of this theory that is difficult to explain is, with the Velop, if I happen to end up in the "good" configuration where the client is communicating with the wireless node on the channel 153 radio, my assumption is that the backhaul to the wired node would then be on channel 36.  Yet in this configuration, I get consistently good speed.  Perhaps the nodes are better able to cope with interference than the presumably weaker radios in the client devices?

Here's a screen shot that shows the channels in use.  The 2.4ghz channels occasionally register a little noise, 153 is clean, but 36 is showing considerably more noise (varies from -90 to -80, occasionally as high as -74).

I don't know if that's enough noise to cause problems, but still, it's hard to ignore as a potential factor.  There are 2 other weak networks in my vicinity on channel 36, which maybe could be the source of the interference reading, but on the other hand, there are 3 other networks on channel 153 that are not causing an issue.

Does anyone know of any other potential sources of household non-WiFi intereference on the 5ghz band besides certain cordless phones?  peteytesting, help!

Will certainly try moving things around.

Another thing I have noticed...it's just the download that is being effected.  The upload is always at 100% of what it should be.  I have a 15Mbps up speed and the speedtest always gives 15+Mbps all throught the house.  Anyone experiencing this?

Thanks