NETGEAR is aware of a growing number of phone and online scams. To learn how to stay safe click here.

Forum Discussion

keeper88's avatar
keeper88
Guide
May 01, 2018

RBK40 (RBR40& RBS40) DISCONNECTS - fixed before but auto firmware upgrades BREAK!!!

I had experienced TONS of disconnects, primarily iOS devices (they're pretty popular, you think?), and helped Netgear techs troubleshoot and tested beta firmware. Finally in August last year FW version v1.12.020 fixed these issues, and ran fine (nearly flawless) for months... Then, in December 2017, the auto upgrades started coming in and it has been worse than it originally was (nice testing guys)! And the geniuses at Netgear FORCE you to download that poorly tested garbage by not giving you the auto upgrade opt out. So, once again I (and my family) were dealing with the constant disconnects, unreliable, garbage. Then, even though I've already spent countless hours of my valuable personal time troubleshooting the prior issue, I figured out how to downgrade back to v1.12.020 -- which once again worked FINE. I also read posts on how to disable the Netgear genius auto upgrade design (low level telnet into each device and execute the NVRAM commands, etc.), but even with that they just recently auto "upgraded" to the garbage firmware again. I can't log this in an actual support case because Netgear would now have the stones to charge me for "Premium" support since I'm out of the original 90-day window. Netgear, this is absolutely ridiculous!
rbk40 ios disconnects auto upgrade
Troubleshooting

3 Replies

  • FURRYe38's avatar
    FURRYe38
    Guru - Experienced User
    May 01, 2018

    I'm using v2.3.1.x beta FW on my 40 series unit. I experience zero issues with apple devices.

    I have factory reset my system after the FW and and set up from scratch.

    Beamforming enabled, MIMO disabled. Manual channel 1 and 48.

     

     

    • keeper88's avatar
      keeper88
      Guide
      May 01, 2018

      Thanks, maybe I'll give v2.3.1 a try, if I can get my hands on it.  Even if that works, I still worry that the auto-update will bring out another poorly tested release thereafter to break it (as it did before), and I still see that as a big shortcoming by Netgear.  I presume you had disconnect issues with Apple devices prior to installing v2.3.1.x beta, correct?  They were hard to miss, if using iOS devices with any regularity...