Just wanted to share my experience so far with the new RBK852. I have two devices that have WiFi-6, so thought I'd take the plunge and see how things went.

I went through the app installation process and had a couple of hiccups, but the software recovered and allowed me to continue the setup process until after the router updated its firmware. Once it rebooted, DHCP wasn't working and it wasn't assigning addresses to any devices. I restarted the router again and this time all was working correctly.

I had to manually update the firmware on the satellite, but that went smoothly. After this, I made all my settings changes and I was off and running. I then started running my speed tests and that's where things kinda fell apart. Under the RBK852 system, I was only getting 150-175 Mbps speeds where the previous RBK53 was giving me 250-300 Mbps. Next, I tried my iPhone 11 Pro Max, thinking that it would do better, but it got the same 150-175 Mbps speeds. Following that, I tried my new laptop and it got the same slower speeds as well.

I think the main reason for this is that there is only 1 satellite. It has a good connection to the router, but with only two devices, the system just doesn't have enough power for higher throughputs. With my Orbi RBK53 system, I added 1 satellite for a total of four devices at various points throughout the house to provide a strong signal everywhere and thus I get pretty much the full speed of my Internet connection which is 300 Mbps AT&T fiber.

I was actually going to upgrade my connection to 1000 Mbps to take full advantage of the WiFi-6's improved throughput, but after testing everything with the RBK852, I clearly won't be getting enough throughput generally to make the upgrade worthwhile. Color me disappointed. 🙁

So, I'll play around a bit more, but am not expecting any significant speed improvements now with the RBK852. Likely it will be going back to Bestbuy in a couple of weeks. Makes me wonder if and when Netgear will sell standalone satellites for the system, but I don't know if I really want to invest another $700 for two more satellites. That would mean the total system cost would be $1,400, which is pretty steep for home WiFi in my opinion. Oh well.

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Orbi RBK852 Experience