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Orbi RBR40 WiFi drops out
I have a base and satellite on one floor in suburban home. I use Cox cable modem for internet. I got this system July 2019 and has worked great until maybe two weeks ago. We are getting random interm...
michaelkenward wrote:The .img thing has baffled many people. There are only so many three character extensions available. Another one that Netgear likes is .chk.
The orbi router itself uses .img files and the satellites use the .chk file. In the orbi dashboard there are two separate spots. The top spot is to upgrade the router which will always be a .img file and then below that you check which satellites you want to update and use the bottom update button under the satellite listing and you select the .chk file for those and click update.
Sean
I have the RBR 40 also, and it just got upgraded to 2.6.2.104. None of my mobile devices can connect, or at least can only connect intermittently right after a reboot of the router.
I noticed that the downloads page for RBR40 show the latest version as 2.6.1.36 (https://www.netgear.com/support/product/rbr40.aspx#RBR40%20Firmware%20Version%202.6.1.36?cid=us-best-wifi6-srch-cpc) and that version 2.6.2.104 is listed for device RBR20, so I'm kind of wondering if it's possible that they didn't properly limit the available versions for the router when I told it to upgrade.
I also have the RBR40 and last night updated to the 2.6.2.104 FW and have not had stable internet through my router since then. I've gone through the suggestions above, even "downgrading" FW to v2.3.5.32 for RBR40 and to 2.5.1.16 for RBS20s but have mostly had to rely on mobile hotspots for any internet usage today. Any other suggestions anyone can think of?
burntfrosty wrote:I also have the RBR40 and last night updated to the 2.6.2.104 FW and have not had stable internet through my router since then. I've gone through the suggestions above, even "downgrading" FW to v2.3.5.32 for RBR40 and to 2.5.1.16 for RBS20s but have mostly had to rely on mobile hotspots for any internet usage today. Any other suggestions anyone can think of?
I would downgrade the satellites to 2.3.5.30 and see how that works.
Sean
So I have been watching this issue for awhile. So after I downgraded I have not had any issues with any of my computers or tablets dropping out or any of my smart appliances or tvs.
One thing I am seeing is on the Samsung S20 Ultra and possibly other Samsung variants. It has even been reported on the Samsung threads. Two updates ago and around the same time the router started going crazy. The Samsung phones are dropping the internet connection and saying stuff like "cannot authenticate" when trying to connect or no wifi hosts to connect even though the wifi is on and looking. This is happening on both of my Samsung phones s20 ultras so it is not a bad phone. I have even tried turning off the wifi and turning it back on the phone and still giving the same error.
Last night it happened again and I was able to setup another router for my phone to connect that it has never seen and gave the authentication error and everything was correct. Soon after that it was like the wifi radio went out on the phone as it showed nothing. It came back about 5 minutes later after turning on and off the wifi but would not connect to anything and gave the same error with authentication.
I rebooted the phone and it came up and immediately connected to my normal wifi network and it was fine. I have determined that there is definitely an issue with the Samsung firmware but it also coincided with my upgrading my orbi but there were definitely two separate problems going on at my house. It is good to know I am not crazy and I have reported this to Samsung support and they confirmed they are seeing this issue.
I have also seen the latest version of other orbi hardware versions are having issues with the wifi connectivity and drop out. Hope this helps anyone pulling their hair out.
Sean
Storm180 wrote:I would downgrade the satellites to 2.3.5.30 and see how that works.
Thank you for the suggestion. I've gone ahead and downgraded them to 2.3.5.30 as well. I also unplugged everything (Satellites, Router, Modem) to do a fresh start after downgrading the satellites. After starting the Modem and Router I seemed to have pretty stable internet connection. I've since started one of the satellites as well, but after doing so it has gotten a bit spotty with the internet dropping for a few minutes at a time maybe 3 or times now. About to start the second satellite to see if that causes any issues either. Wish me luck.
Downgrading didn't seem to work for me -- I ended up hard resetting both my router and satellite, and skipped the upgrade by going through the web interface on my laptop. Now everything is working great, albeit old firmware. It's frustrating that it's difficult (or impossible?) to notify Netgear about the issues with their firmware, as it seems like only customers within the 90 day warranty period are allowed to issue tickets. I get that they can't support everyone for all time, but there really needs to be a feedback loop, since they are pushing these updates out to all customers, most of whom will be outside the 90 day window. I will be switching to another vendor for my mesh routers immediately - I'm assuming that Google's product actually works and that there are better feedback mechanisms in case updates go awry.