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Orbi (RBR50) DNS keeps failing.
Hi, I'm have an RBR50 running Firmware V2.7.2.104 that has been working fine for a couple years now. Very recently, devices connected to the Orbi have started getting failed DNS queries, causing th...
Ran into this issue as well. This Reddit thread has the best workaround I've found for the bug(s) that Netgear pushed out with its most recent release for this model.
https://www.reddit.com/r/orbi/comments/m5l3vk/orbi_dropping_dns/
There are several options. I think the best one is to use the debug.htm page to enable telnet, log in, and modify the DHCP settings to tell clients to contact external DNS servers directly thus bypassing the failing proxy on the router. This change sticks until the router is rebooted which is rare for me. All devices will renew theri DHCP lease within 24 hours (or less) to get the new setting. I recommend forcing devices to renew their DHCP lease to get the new settings sooner. You can unplug the LAN connection, toggle wifi on/off, reboot a device, or issue the command to renew specific to your device/OS. However if you have one computer plugged directly into a LAN port, one simpler way to reset all the wifi attached device's DNS config is to change the wifi name configured on the Orbi, wait a few minutes, and then change it back. I judged "a few minutes" by monitoring my phone to see when it decided the wifi connection was lost. Once back to the original name, my (Android) phone took a couple of minutes to accept the wifi was stable.
There are also reports that the bug is an interaction issue between the DNS process (dnsmasq) and the traffic measuring/metering feature, and that disabling the traffic measuring feature will avoid the bug. Since I don't *need* the measuring feature, I disabled it just in case a thunderstorm glitches the power, there's a chance the Orbi will remain reliable afterwards without the effort/distraction of the reconfiguration workaround.
I'm having the same issues. Every day thereabouts for a week or so my RBR50 has been disconnecting from the Internet with a DNS server error. I've tried contacting Netgear, but, of course, I do not have pay for support service and so no dice. Strikes me that this is their issue to fix since everything was working fine until a week ago. I am the user of their product, not their technician nor someone who desires to be. From my perspective they produce the product, and it should work reliably as advertised.
Since I use this router to service multiple computers and NAS drives, I cannot have it malfunctioning with this frequency, in fact, not at all. If I cannot find a solution soon, I will have to find another router system to cover. Given the Netgear response to this problem, I will likely find another piece of equipment, one with a more user-friendly service policy.
In the meantime, if anyone knows of a fix for this issue, please let me know.
Thanks,
Wil
simplest solution i think is to download the previous release of firmware for now. that seems to work for me. sure - not the best idea long-term as the previous release probably lacks some bug fixes and security updates - but at least for now it seems to keep things working - so i'll keep an eye out and try the next firmware release once this issue is resolved.
Thanks for the suggestion. I will give it a try and see how it goes.
One might think that Netgear would be a little more responsive, but hey, it's the 21st century.
Wil