Just downloaded the latest release V1.9.1.12 and noticed in the official release notes from Netgear it states as fix 'Continious Improvement in wireless connection stability'..Dosent spefically makre reference to discconections but that sounds like a promising fix. Wonder if and when people update if they post if they have had discconnections (ios or Andriod) since installing V1.9.1.12 then we may know if its been fixed permanently

Netgear Moderators, I would like to attempt one last method to fix these multiple problems with the Orbi product. Rather than complaining, and throwing away my $600 investment, perhaps the Netgear engineers and developers would be perceptive to suggestions which I am sure can resolve some (if not all) of these problems. First, let me say Thank You! Thank you for your attempts to create an appealing looking product. It doesn’t look like a science project gone wrong with 6 antennas and 10 LED lights. It doesn’t cause my guest to ask me, “What is that weird looking thing”. Thank you for your attempts to innovate and solve the large home WIFI coverage problem. Thank you for the speed. Yes, its fast! With all that you made right, some portions of the Orbi product are missing the mark. I believe I may know what you are overlooking. You tried to create an EASY, SIMPLE, and high tech product that could be used by anyone, especially non-technical consumers. Unfortunately, what you “may” be missing is the reality that no one solution for WIFI exist for everyone. Therefore, other WIFI OEMs allow access to advance settings enabling consumer to tweak and tune the product to their specific use case and environment. Homes, buildings come in a large variety of sizes, floor plans, building materials and other variables which can cause interference from other locations. Possibly home appliances and other devices which may not “play friendly” with Orbi, despite your best attempts to find the one configuration that works for everyone. It’s just not possible! Hence, I ask of you. I plead with you. Beg of you! Stop trying to make Orbi work for everyone using your locked-in configurations. Allow some flexibility! Here are my suggestions which have proven to be affective for all of you competitors. Many of these suggestions have been posted in your” ideas” area forum. We must assume you are too busy, or have somehow over looked these suggestions. Allow the 2.4G and 5G radio SSIDs to be separated. All other OEMs which use any type of “smartconnect” ability allow that feature to be disabled. Because it doesn’t always work for EVERYONE. There are too many client devices in this world. 2 devices may work, and 2 may not. Allow this separation and it further removes the burden of band-steering. I can lock in my devices to a specific 2.4G or 5G band, and Orbi doesn’t need to worry about moving my devices to the other 2.4G radio. This should help with disconnects. It also allows Netgear to sell more Orbi Satellites. I would be inclined to buy an additional satellite so I have large 5G coverage, rather than moving to 2.4G. Let the user decide, as all your competition allows. Allow Orbi node/device-steering to be completely disabled. The Orbi is Fast. VERY FAST! It should not be required to force client devices back to the main Orbi router. If my client device has a good connection to the satellite, then let it stay there, or move on its own if the RSSI drops beyond 75. Most modern devices handle roaming VERY WELL, and do not need your help. Don’t risk a client disconnect by forcing the device to move to the router. Please provide the option to disable all band-steering. Please expose the client device, and Orbi Satellite device, RSSI, MCS Data Rate, connected radio, and which Orbi node its connected to. This will allow your users to have troubleshooting ability…AND it will allow better placements of the Satellites if you can show the “REAL” RSSI and MCS of the satellite connections. When a Satellite powers up and gives that white light showing a good connection. What it doesn’t tell you is how stable that connection is. I have two locations in my home that can cause random fluctuations in my signal strength. It will be good one moment, and not good 60 seconds later. I have been FORCED to use a Samsung Android Smartphone with WIFI Analyzer to determine the TRUE quality of a Satellite location because your product refuses to show any detailed information. Please allow automatic updates to be DISABLED. Netgear suffers the same problem all manufactures experience. Sometimes you get it WRONG. Sometimes a code update causes more problems. Your customers should be allowed to choose if they want to update, or NOT. This can be resolved via Orbi light illuminations telling the user something needs to be performed. It can also be notified via the Orbi App. But it should be “notify first, then allow the user to accept or decline the update”. Your recent 1.9.x update has caused more problems than it solved. Further making the Orbi NOT SIMPLE. And there are other “nice to have” features such as vLAN support for guest network. And others…But I would be happy see the above changes made. These requests are ALREADY part of the command line, but using them is difficult, requires research, and should the user make any changes in the Web GUI, the command line changes are lost. Please read this, and please make Orbi work. These changes should take no more than 2-4 weeks. Thank You

Gentlemen, and ladies, if there are some, Orbi needs to work as designed. That means any “fix” that requires; a. Disabling MU-MINO, b. Disable Beamforming, c. Reduce your power, d. Unplug you Satellites, etc, etc. This is NOT a “fix”. If my car is not operating properly and the dealer or manufacture instructs me to disable half my cylinders, never use my AC, radio, or cruise control, etc, keep your RPMs under 3K and never drive faster than 40MPH. Well, I think you would all agree that I would be “complaining”. And asking for a refund. What “I believe” is happening is the Orbi Algorithm is not working for “SOME”. Of course, it will work for some, and not others. WHY? Because there is no single magic Algorithm that works for every environment and client device. Cisco, and many other commercial grade wireless systems usually have a central control station that manages all APs in a multiple AP environment. This control station monitors all connections and status of all APs. It will change channels of some APs depending on the APs location and nearby interference, it will steer clients to other APs based on that devices capability and the overall status of the APs grid. And it will do MANY other things to insure a proper, healthy, functional and stable WIFI experience. It does this dynamically because WIFI conditions are never the same though the day, week, month, etc. One minute it has 10 clients, and one hour later it has 40. One hour the client is close to AP node 1, then it shows its closer to AP node 2. If the device does not move itself to the better AP node, the control station will move it. If I have an Algorithm that instructs; “If” client connects to Orbi Sat using 5G radio, “and” its RSSI is -65 or better, “then” DO NOT STEER to 2G, or Orbi Router. “If” client RSSI drops below -65 using 5G radio, “then” steer to Sat 2G radio. “If” client RSSI is -65 or lower using Sat 2G radio, “then” steer to Orbi Router 2G radio, “only” if RSSI is -65 or greater using Router 2G radio. If client RSSI is -40 or greater using router 2G radio, “then” steer to router 5G radio. The above is a VERY simple Algorithm for example purposes. I think Netgears’ Algorithm is broken, and they are “trying” to find the one Algorithm that works for EVERYONE. I think Netgear is trying to prevent the Sat backhaul from becoming too congested. Hence, the Algorithm is bias to the router and attempts to steer clients to the router as much as possible. The problem with any “bias” to the router, is modern devices that are not STUPID and can see the Sat having a much greater signal (-50 or better, compared to the current -70 it may have), and it switches to the Sat. But then, the Orbi Algorithm runs again and kicks the client back to the router. And the circle starts again. The client devices will “argue” and switch back to the Sat and Orbi will repeat this process again. But, after a few bounces between the router and Sat. the client drops its connection. And this can be due to several reasons. Example; 1. The client MAC is now showing on both Sat and Router and the L2 switching doesn’t know what path to reach the device. 2. The Apple client code realizes it cannot maintain a consistent connection to the WIFI network and hence it gives up and DROPS because its tired of being kicked several times to different AP nodes. It wants to choose the AP node itself, so it says screw you Orbi. Some devices are STUPID, and once they lock onto a BSSID AP Node, they stay. And if steering moves that device to another AP node, then it stays there. Some devices with bad and lazy code are perfect candidates for steering because they lack the intelligence to move to a better AP node. But newer devices with good code DO NOT like steering. They will go to WAR with it. But, the WIFI gods know this, so they created flags that APs can send to clients with “suggestions”. “Hey iPhone, I have this wonderful AP node with a much better signal, so why not try that.” The iPhone can choose to ignore it. If the iPhone has an existing data connection that must be maintained, it may choose to stay on the AP node it is using, and perhaps switch AP nodes once it goes back to idle. Example, Flash is on a WIFI Call. So, NO. I want to stay where I am at because switching may break the connection. I will move later. But if Orbi forces the move and STP and other network features are not used...Guess what...DROP... Again, this is what I believe could be causing the problem, but it’s hard to prove because unlike EVERYONE else who makes Multi-AP platforms with steering and other advanced features. They let you see the Algorithm and change it. They let you disable and enable features that may, or may not, work for YOU. WHY? Because they know there is no one size, no single Algorithm, that WORKS FOR EVERYONE.

We've been putting in significant work on these disconnect issues and wireless stability and every new release typically has improvements in it. The challenge is that there are literally thousands of devices running multiple versions of software that a router or WiFi System needs to work with, and occassionally interoperability issues arise as the two systems try to talk to each other. When that happens, rest assured that we're working very hard to stay on top of these issues and solve them. When we come up with a proposed fix, we always want to test out our fixes in a real-world environment, before rolling it out for everyone and we use the beta program for that. At this stage, we think we have a solution for some of them but we want to test it out in a smaller environment. If you're interested in helping us, please feel free to contact Support. Thanks, Orbi Product Management

Good luck to you all. I have given up and sold my orbi at a substantial financial loss, but with a net gain. I gain back my time and lack of frustration in purchasing another product that just works. Unfortunately, Netgear has a great idea but only a half baked product, hoping that we/you will stick it out until it is fully baked. My fear in that is that with a 1.OMG release, there will be a condition in which the hardware will not be able to support the necessary changes in code to run properly, hence making an Orbi 2.(0H.. this is what it should have been from the start). I am personally not willing to beta any further. Too many issues for something that should just work. Good luck all. Tom

Flash008 wrote:LOL It's called denial, brother. Let me enjoy my denial a little while longer. :smileysad: I want them to work really bad too but I had to cut the ties. Even if I don't stick with the Ubiquiti setup I will not go back to the Orbi's. I will find something else.

Update V1.9.1.12 Netgear officially announcing 'Improvement in wireless connection Stability'

265 Replies

Chadhetlet
Guide
Apr 28, 2017
Can you link to the release notes? Not seeing it on the downloads page yet.
- jmbarbs
  Apprentice
  Apr 28, 2017
  Don't think i can now as it came up in a popup box when clicking hyperlink of the version number beore i clicked the update button. As you say its not been updated on the netgear downloads page. From previous versions this is usually updated on the website 24 hours after its available on the router
  - tubastank
    Apprentice
    Apr 28, 2017
    Netgear,
    
    When you release a new verion of firmware it would be nice to include release notes. I have nothing but issues with Parental Controls and devices keeping them persistently. I have to reboot the Orbi every couple of days. For example, I have "None" set up for my laptops (MacBook & Dell) but sometimes when I launch IPVanish to create a VPN connection, the VPN client errors. After I reboot the Orbi all is good for a couple days.
    
    Anyone know if firmware version v1.9.1.12 includes fixes to the Parental Controls to keep them persistent....as it should be design?
rivets
Apprentice
Apr 29, 2017
Still dropping connections on the household iPads, so that's not fixed.
- Ts937km
  Apprentice
  Apr 29, 2017
  So far no drops on my iPad Pro or iPhone. Historically in the morning I would have issues or anytime I left the iPad alone . Updated router and 2 satellites to 1.9.1.12 yesterday. I also moved my satellites to the end of my house on the main level and the router is in the middle of the basement seems like they are supposed to be 40-70 feet from each other correct?
  - Ts937km
    Apprentice
    Apr 29, 2017
    Oh and
    
    Enable Implicit BEAMFORMING - Boosts WiFi speed, reliability, & range for all mobile devices
    Enable MU-MIMO
    
    Are disabled under avanced - wireless settings.
AMarket42
Star
Apr 29, 2017
About how far were you able to place them from each other? Mine are currently about 40 feet, considering trying to move them further.
- Ts937km
  Apprentice
  Apr 29, 2017
  I would guess about 40 ft from the router to each satellite. Hard to measure with being on a different level plus going through multiple walls and a floor.
  
  With a couple of different tools my whole house is solid green on a wifi heat map.
  - Ts937km
    Apprentice
    Apr 29, 2017
    Btw. Still stable. No iPad or iPhone drops today. Was gone for several hours today and iPad hasn't had any issues. Historically it would have complained about no wifi already.
Ts937km
Apprentice
Apr 29, 2017
Couple things I would try.

Do you have any other wifi on? Like uverse, etc. If uverse how is your network configured? Just hanging off the uverse router or is it a different network bridged (and Different IP range). I'm on at&t gigapower or at&t fiber I think it's called now.

I had reset my network settings on my iPad and iPhone and then rebooted them. And then reconnected. Trying to troubleshoot. As it used to be on a different router with same name.

I would fully reboot the orbis. Turn them off. Boot up the router. And then the satellites.

Make sure beam forming and mmu are turned off before the reboot. Last two options on the advanced wireless settings pages.

Is your orbi satellite at least 40 ft away from the orbi router.
- rivets
  Apprentice
  Apr 29, 2017
  No idea what uverse is, so I don't have it :-) (I'm in the U.K.)
  
  beam forming and MIMO are off. I have Sonos. But it is on channel 11 and Orbi is on 1. Power on 2.4 set to 25%.
  
  router and satellite may not be 40 ft apart. I will probably try moving it up a floor tomorrow. Everything has been rebooted and reset multiple times. I'm constrained by where the copper enters the building and the depth of the house.
  - peteytesting
    Hero
    Apr 29, 2017
    yup correct location is the key here , too close and the clients will get confused , too far apart and the clients may disconnect in the middle
Ts937km
Apprentice
Apr 30, 2017
Curious why you care which one the device is attached to? As long as performance is good? What are you trying to troubleshoot?

I'm just happy they are making real progress on the disconnect issue.
- tubastank
  Apprentice
  May 01, 2017
  
  Ts937km wrote:
  Curious why you care which one the device is attached to? As long as performance is good? What are you trying to troubleshoot?
  
  I'm just happy they are making real progress on the disconnect issue.
  
  Because knowing which unit (sat or router) your devices are connected to will help in troubleshooting. I think you answered your own question. :) I personally haven't been having disconnects but I am having other issues. Parental Controls & Airprint not staying persistent. The more you know about your network the better position one is in troubleshooting.
  
  This is basic information Netgear could be providing and it shouldn't take much to fix.
  
  My Orbi system was purchased at Costco and consists of 1 Router and 2 Sattelites. The Router is in my unfinished basement, connect to my cable modem (Cox Internet). My main floor Orbi is probably 25 feet from the router (up next level and across the family room). My Second floor Orbi is on the other side of the house and probably 40 feet away. I could be wrong on the distance as I haven't measured but am estimating. Transmit Power Control on the 2.4Ghz signal is set at 25%, 5Ghz 100%. Implicit Beamforming & MU-MIMO are disabled.
  - Cafetom
    Star
    May 01, 2017
    Hello all,
    
    First time post,
    
    I am a systems and network engineer, and pretty much a technology nerd. I purchased my orbi in January 2017 to see what all the bells and whistles were about.
    
    To address the original question in this post and not hijack it, your wireless connection stability issues are shared by me. I have been running several out-of-band tests and can reliably say that there are issues with connections and overall usability and functionality of the product. I am running the 1.9.1.12 version on the RBS50
    
    I had one engagement with tech support and when I provided some technical insight into the problem, they were having me jump through the flowchart to keep me busy. "Have you turned it off and on again? Did you wait the 35.2 seconds? Let's reflash the firmware....and now again."
    
    I personally do wireless security cameras and weather stations. The weather station reporting and the security cameras don't have a reliable or fast enough wireless connection to be useful. I can barely do 1 fps with one camera.
    
    I have since added a $49 router outside of the orbi (in front of my orbi system) so that I can see if there is a difference. The $49 router was limited in features but was able to get 10 fps on the camera and kept a 30 second connection update to the NWS and NOAH.
    
    The lack of any documentation in the releases is disturbing. As a previous person mentioned....Where are these mystery documents? I would expect that if it automatically downloads and installs, they could at least present a "What's new and fixed" section in the web interface.
    
    Enable Implicit BEAMFORMING - Boosts WiFi speed, reliability, & range for all mobile devices
    Enable MU-MIMO
    
    While I appreicate what this says, I can with some certainty say that the first option is not needed in most newer setups. Sounds impressive, isn't all that useful anymore.
    
    Having used some of the nighthawk routers in the past, I must say that the orbi is a huge feature and functionality disappointment. The only thing that is impressive with this is the simplicity and coverage area.
    
    For all the others saying stuff about the firmware version, you are probably running into a lot of problems that we all are. I'd suggest that you start another post/thread and file the bug.
fstockel
Star
Apr 30, 2017
I'm still having WAN disconnects after upgrading to Firmware V1.9.1.12.

It's actually even worse than before (I think). Today alone I've had about 10 WAN disconnects (~15min each). I have sent debug logs to netgear and they are going to remote access the router to take a closer look at it (I've been having trouble for +4 months).

One can say that I'm not that far from replacing it with something else as it obviously doesn't work on Mondays, the Month of February, Thursday's before 9 o'clock or during happy hours on Fridays if my favorite team is on TV (or just with my ISP).
- Ts937km
  Apprentice
  Apr 30, 2017
  That sucks. I have not had one disconnect since the upgrade.
  
  All of my apple stuff is currently running the latest firmware except for my watch which is on a beta built.
  No other wifi on in my house. Disabled att uverse/gigabit wifi on their router.
  
  I have the the orbi router and 2 satellites running 1.9.1.12. Router in the middle of the basement. Satellites about 40 ft away from the router. At each end of the house on the main level. Only have about 20 devices connected to wifi. Also have a ton of zigbee, zwave and Arlo camera wireless running.
  
  Hopefully they will figure out something for you soon
rivets
Apprentice
May 01, 2017
Moved the satellite to almost as far as is physically possible in the house from the router. No drop outs, so fingers crossed. Will try re-enabling beam forming etc.
Ts937km
Apprentice
May 01, 2017
Hope so.

I read somewhere that beam forming was disabled last forming because of drop out issues. So I am going to leave it off for a bit.

I wonder if there is a way to tell optimal placement of the devices. To make sure the satellite has good connectivity. Would be a nice feature.
ricblue
Tutor
May 01, 2017
My Orbi Base Station is upgraded to v1.9.1.12 BUT my two Satellites are both stuck on v1.8.0.6. The "Check for Updates" button on the Orbi web UI (at 192.168.1.1) lists the two Satellites with the old v1.8.0.6 BUT shows "Please wait a moment' next to each and never offers the ability to upgrade them.

If I log into each Satellite (for me at 192.168.1.3 and .4) then I can only do a firmware update IF I can upload a file from my computer - BUT the v1.9.1.12 upgrade files aren't available on the Orbi Support website/downloads area.

Any thoughts? My system seems reasonably stable but surely this isn't ideal, running different firmware versions on the Base vs Satellites. v1.9.1.12 upgrade glitch if it didn't do the Satellites as well when the Base was updated??

Any thoughts? Suggestions?

Thanks!
Richard
- jxrxme
  Star
  May 01, 2017
  Wifi disconnects not fixed here with V1.9.1.12. Running Orbi in AP Mode. Turned down 2.4GHz transmit power to 25%. Implicit beamforming and mu mimo disabled. Today 3 non-moving iOS devices got disconnected in 10 minutes, each 3 times! The devices were 1-3 meters from satellite away (in visual range).
  
  I did some RSSI analysis: Seems that the devices get kicked out from 5GHz band while the signal is strong, but the 2.4GHz signal from identical Orbi is equal or slightly stronger. It seems not to be a steering problem between router and satellite since my signals are well separated (satellite client signals are strong while router client signals are very weak and vice versa). Turning down the transmit power of the 2.4GHz band to 25% helps for medium/long distance to the router/satellite as workaround, but not for narrow distances. Playing with the 2.4GHz transmit power "controls" at which distance the disconnects are typically happening.
  
  So the root cause is a band steering bug between the 5 and 2.4GHz bands. Which is very disappointing for such expensive hardware, especially if you consider that client side band steering (without expensive hardware) works more reliable and Netgear didn't fix this bug for months (while very aware of the problem).
  
  Slowly but surely I conclude that Netgear can't fix that problem and I should return the defective by design devices...
  
  If all your devices support the 5GHz band I recommend disabling the 2.4GHz completely as a workaround (and if you don't need to cover the very far distance which 5GHz can't reach). I have some legacy devices so I can't turn it off.
jxrxme
Star
May 01, 2017
Wifi disconnects not fixed here with V1.9.1.12. Running Orbi in AP Mode. Turned down 2.4GHz transmit power to 25%. Implicit beamforming and mu mimo disabled.

Today 3 non-moving iOS devices got disconnected in 10 minutes, each 3 times! The devices were 1-3 meters from satellite away (in visual range).

I did some RSSI analysis: Seems that the devices get kicked out from 5GHz band while the signal is strong, but the 2.4GHz signal from identical Orbi is equal or slightly stronger. It seems not to be a steering problem between router and satellite since my signals are well separated (satellite client signals are strong while router client signals are very weak and vice versa).
Turning down the transmit power of the 2.4GHz band to 25% helps for medium/long distance to the router/satellite as workaround, but not for narrow distances. Playing with the 2.4GHz transmit power "controls" at which distance the disconnects are typically happening.

So the root cause is a band steering bug between the 5 and 2.4GHz bands. Which is very disappointing for such expensive hardware, especially if you consider that client side band steering (without expensive hardware) works more reliable and Netgear didn't fix this bug for months (while very aware of the problem).

Slowly but surely I conclude that Netgear can't fix that problem and I should return the defective by design devices...

If all your devices support the 5GHz band I recommend disabling the 2.4GHz completely as a workaround (and if you don't need to cover the very far distance which 5GHz can't reach). I have some legacy devices so I can't turn it off.

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Update V1.9.1.12 Netgear officially announcing 'Improvement in wireless connection Stability'