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Forum Discussion
Nighthawk App Limitations - Will it be improved to match Genie someday?
So I unfortunately allowed my phone to update the Genie app, which has now apparently been disabled by Netgear as being no longer compatible with my router. This is, of course, complete and total bu...
The control to enable/disable the Access Control (which exists in the Genie App and the Genie Program network map!) isn't available in the Nighthawk App - this is it.
Trouble is the App designers and marketeers apparently don't understand the subtile differences in the feature set, make a big mess with wording and naming of the features in the router Web UI vs the App.
The point is that disabling the Access Control would as well disable the Paused device blocking - they are mixing features, one often mistakenly defined to disable/enable the Internet access for a device, by a control named Paused/Resume ... what in fact does enable the Access Control in the background (Allow all new devices to connect), and add the device to the Access Control as a blocked device.
They are mixing what is "Access Control" with "Block" vs. "Allow" in the router Web UI with a "Device Manager" with "Pause" and "Resume".
It's a huge mess, and I din't wonder that even long term Netgear people and active community members are more than confused.
That's more a Nightmare App then anything seriously designed an integrated - I'm fully with the users complaining!
To be fair, I was under the impression that Access Control would prevent a device from accessing *anything* on the network. According the the KB article I just linked to, that's not the case. Really, without Internet access, we don't do a lot of device-to-device interaction. I assumed Access Control was preventing devices from doing *anything* on the network, so I think I stand corrected here. (I don't like using a guest network.)
So I guess now, the procedure is to give a guest the password, they connect, but if Access Control is turned on in the router do they start out Paused? So then I just have to un-pause them?
I still have Genie on my unused android phone, and hopefully that old android tablet that I haven't touched in a while. I'm really upset that Netgear summairly disabled Genie, and have slowly been disabling features in the router during "security firmware upgrades". Very frustrating and I'm quite soured on the brand now.
MattMatt wrote:
To be fair, I was under the impression that Access Control would prevent a device from accessing *anything* on the network.
Fair enough! That's what happens if you Block a device in Access Control, perfectly correct, and as documented in the Nighthawk routers fine documentation as well as the Nighthawk Routers online documentation:
===
Access Control Help
You can use Access Control to allow or block computer or electronic devices from accessing your network. When a device is blocked, it would only be able to get an IP address from your router, but it won't be able to communicate with other devices, nor it would be able to connect to the Internet.
To enable Access Control:
Select Turn on Access Control check box. Selecting this check box lets you block or allow computers or electronic devices from accessing your network. You have to select this check box before you can specify an Access Rule and use the Allow and Block buttons. When this check box is cleared, all devices are allowed to connect, even if the device is in the blocked list.
Access Rule radio buttons. Select the radio button for the Access Rule that you want for new devices attempting to connect to your network. The Access Rule does not affect previously blocked or allowed devices. It applies only to future devices joining your network after you apply these settings.
By default, “Allow all new devices to connect” is selected, so if you or your family buy a new device, it will be able to access your network without configuring its MAC address in this page.
NETGEAR recommends that you keep this option selected. If you change this to “Block all new devices from connecting”, then your new device won't be able to access your network until you specifically add its MAC address into the allowed list. For example, if a new computer has both wireless and Ethernet network connections, each connection has its own MAC address, you'll need to add specifically both MAC addresses to the allowed list.
Allow and Block buttons. To allow or block access for a specific device, select its check box and then click the Allow or Block button to change its status.
Click Apply when you finish changing the settings.
===This is what the logs show when associating with a Nighthawk router using a Blocked device:
[Access Control] Device Unknown with MAC address 40:4E:36:xx:xx:xx is blocked to access the network, Thursday, May 16, 2019 21:0
MattMatt wrote:
According the the KB article I just linked to, that's not the case. Really, without Internet access, we don't do a lot of device-to-device interaction. I assumed Access Control was preventing devices from doing *anything* on the network, so I think I stand corrected here. (I don't like using a guest network.)
The KB is somewhere between vague and wrong. Of course, putting a device to Pause on the Nighthawk App does block it from the Internet access - this is obviously not the full truth.
Now read my previous reply again 8-)