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Salem711's avatar
Salem711
Follower
Jul 09, 2018

Nighthawk® M1 Mobile Router

HI 

I am about to buy a Nighthawk® M1 Mobile Router MR1100 and I want to make sure that it is unlock since I am living in Kuwait. The internet sim card from a local company ( Zain ) and I may request the router from nearest country has netgear stores like (UAE).

 

I appreciating your quick response 

 

 

reagrds 

Salem 

Firmware

4 Replies

  • JSchnee21's avatar
    JSchnee21
    Virtuoso
    Jul 11, 2018

    Hi Salem,

    I believe the European version is unlocked at purchase.  The United States version (which I have) is locked to AT&T.  You can call and have them unlock it (takes a few days) -- they did this for me.  But I am an AT&T account holder.  I'm not sure how helpful they will be to a non-account holder.  I'm not sure about the Telstra version (Australia)

    -Jonathan

  • Albo3li's avatar
    Albo3li
    Guide
    Jul 12, 2018

    I bought the european version and returned it the next day..

    that thing was very bad the firmware is broken the router is restating every 1-10 seconds

    it doesn't let you even try to setup the router.. from my experience i won't recommened it.

    • JSchnee21's avatar
      JSchnee21
      Virtuoso
      Jul 12, 2018

      Hi Albo3li,

       

      Yes, early firmwares for the MR1100 in the USA and Europe have been pretty buggy -- which I wasn't expecting given that the Telstra version had already been out for more than year so I would have thought these early issues should have been addressed already.

       

      But the firmware versions which have been released in the past month or two have been significantly better.  If your interested in trying it again, be sure to update the firmware first.  There are a few European users on this board that seem to be doing okay.

       

      Additionally you may need to disable the 2.4Ghz Wifi and just use the 5.8Ghz as the power envelope of the device is pretty limited and under heavy load, with both Wifi operating, it used to panic.  Perhaps this is better in newer firmware versions as well -- haven't tried.

       

      If you are out of country from where you purchased, and on a different carrier, you might need to set the APN back to the original so the device detects the firmware update.  Or have them do it for you while you are in the store.  Since the firmware is carrier specific -- Netgear doesn't offer it for download from their website (which is dumb).

       

      So far, in the USA, the MR1100 has been okay.  Slightly faster than my two ZTE devices (one on AT&T and one on Tmo).  But the ZTE devices have much better wifi range, are much more reliable, and my newer one (on AT&T) can easily run both Wifi bands without crashing.  And it (Velocity 2) has a touch screen and was only $80.

       

      I have to agree that overall, I'm not that impressed with the MR1100.  I bought it hoping for top of the line speed, and Ethernet out, but I probably should have gone with one of the more commercial solutions.  I used to have Netgear Wifi Router (non cellular -- R7000) which had great hardware at the time.  But every successive version of firmware just kept getting worse and worse.  And support was equally abysmal.

       

      Given the premium price of $200, it's far from being a premium product in my opinion.

       

      -Jonathan

      • Albo3li's avatar
        Albo3li
        Guide
        Jul 13, 2018

        Hello again..

         

        I was very excited when i got it and paying $350+ for the unlocked Europe version you will expect it to work perfectly as the product has been release a year ago but it doesn't as you said there was a firmware problem with this specific model and it is pretty bad and made the mobile router useless.

         

        I was using my local Zain (Kuwait) sim card on it and before i returning it i tried updating the frimware to the lastest one (i don't know the firmware version because i returned it + it's not even on the product page! but i remember the updated frimware version was in march)

         

        I tried

        - Disabling the 2.4Ghz and using the 5.0Ghz only

        - Resting it to the default factory 

        - Lowering the LCD light + turing the LED off

        - Checking the router temperature (27c-35c)

         

        I appreciate if they trying to fix that problem but after my experience i won't gamble again and paying that much money for a product was released a year ago and still having the same rebooting problems..