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RBK40 and Nighthawk for 2 wireless networks
I know this sounds crazy but I'm wondering if I can use an old Nighthawk router to provide one wireless network for a specific area but connect it to an Orbi for a second network to continue to serve...
Biigdaddio wrote:Is that possible? What will be the downsides? (I know, make sure the two networks are on widely separated channels...) But will this work at all?
Certainly it will work. Thousands of customers purchase Orbi's and neglect to disable their ISP WiFi. The key thing to remember is that devices will not "roam" from the Nighthawk WiFi to/from the Orbi WiFi. As long as he gets a good signal from the Nighthawk, there should be no problem.
Biigdaddio wrote:Is that possible? What will be the downsides? (I know, make sure the two networks are on widely separated channels...) But will this work at all?
Certainly it will work. Thousands of customers purchase Orbi's and neglect to disable their ISP WiFi. The key thing to remember is that devices will not "roam" from the Nighthawk WiFi to/from the Orbi WiFi. As long as he gets a good signal from the Nighthawk, there should be no problem.
Great news. I will wait a day to see if anyone else chimes in with any further recommendations before I mark this as solved. But thanks so much for the quick feedback.
If you run into specific issues, there are many people on the forum with Orbi/Nighthawk experience.
Yes you can of course as CrimpOn suggested. Be sure you use far separated manual channels on 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz between the two systems, i.e. channel 1 on the NH router and channel 11 on the RBR. Similar with 5Ghz.
Be sure the NH router is placed far away from the RBR and RBS if possible.
Biigdaddio wrote:Great news. I will wait a day to see if anyone else chimes in with any further recommendations before I mark this as solved. But thanks so much for the quick feedback.
Thanks to all who chimed in. The trusty old Nighthawk is delivering a solid, dedicated connection with zero drops for the competitive gamer and the Orbi is delivering the range for media room and everything else. I just wish Netgear could solve the Orbi dropping problem. It has gotten better since the last firmware update (and a factory default reset). But drops still happen. They are brief and only a real issue when my vpn drops with it. But overall I can live with the current solution.
Funny and FWIW and if anyone is even interested and still reading... until I started moving routers around I completely forgot I already had a second wireless network! An old Airport Extreme is wired to the Nighthawk as well but delivers wireless just for to the garage and some ethernet over powerline just for the solar panels to report back to the mothership.
Between my custom networking setup the Caavo remote control and Siig wireless HDMI extender it is a wonder any of it works at all.
