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Forum Discussion
Netgear Genie Software
I have a Smoothwall firewall set up as DHCP server in a rack with a fresh FreeNAS box. My network is primarily gigabit with Cat 5e and Cat 6 cabling. The leg with the WNR 2000 is connected to one end of the powerline adapters to deliver WiFi to a more distant from the server area.
Since putting the NAS together, I have been moving files all across my LAN to it for storage and backup. I have noticed that one machine, connected to the FreeNAS box has an interesting interaction with the Netgear Genie program.
It is connected: Xeon---GS-108---GS-108---FreeNAS. There is about 30 feet of Cat 5e connecting the GS-108 switches.
I am moving 4TB of data from that Xeon machine to the FreeNAS box. It is running Windows 10, and has the Netgear Genie software installed on it.
When I am making the transfers without the Genie software running, I get around 9 MB/s transfer rate. As soon as I start the Genie software, it jumps to 70 MB/s. If I stop and close the software in mid-transfer, my rate climbs to 90 MB/s, until that specific file is completed, then it drops back to 9 MB/s unless I restart the Genie software.
I tried uninstalling the software, but all that does is limit me to 9 MB/s for my transfer speeds.
I am going to read the fine details of the Genie software, but this activity has made me very suspicious that it has done something to my drivers or my Windows registry.
Here are the main questions.
1. Why are my transfers limited to 10/100 speeds unless Genie is running?
2. Why does the speed last until the next file when I close Genie?
3. Why does Genie seem to cut 20 MB/s off my top transfer speed all by itself?
I have stacks of Netgear hardware I have been collecting since the 90's. Please tell me this Genie software hasn't written itself into dependence.
4 Replies
Hi Tim_E,
This is a very strange occurrence.
1. What version of the Genie do you have installed?
2. Does the issue persists on a machine where Genie has never been installed?
3. Does the issue persist on another machine (mobile devices included) where Genie is also installed?
Regards,
Dexter
Community Team
Have you timed your transfers manually? I suspect the software is reporting the speeds incorrectly.
I transferred about 21 TB of data across the connection, the time difference was very noticible, as many of the transfers were done in 300gb to 1tb sections. I wasn't using synthetic benchmarks.
My version is 2.4.38. Whenever it asks for an update, I let it update. I have a few gigabit machines on my network, but none have the storage to move that much data around on it for thorough testing. I understand why you would ask the second two questions, but I don't regularly move that much data around my network. I monitored the transfers closely, and the effect was 100% repeatable.
For my normal day-to-day conditions it should never be an issue. My only other bigger data machine had Genie installed on it as well, and it's not worth my time to flatten so I can test with a never-Genie'd system. I had Genie installed as a quick way to look at my connected devices without logging into my smoothwall to see them. It ended up on pretty much every laptop I own.
(FVX-538 v2, 2xWNDR 3700, 3xWNR 2000, 3xGS108, 3xGS605, 4xAV500)
