NETGEAR is aware of a growing number of phone and online scams. To learn how to stay safe click here.
Forum Discussion
Re: Latest firmware for RBR860
I subscribed to a new ISP back in Nov to get an RBR860 upgrade. It came with a non public firmware version way higher than currently listed one. As I had to buy my own satellites and these updated to ...
Ya, next you'll need to factory reset and setup from scratch with newer FW loaded. Mine was solid on v.15.
Here's the screen recordings of the Speedtest performed from a MacBook Pro M1 connected via ethernet cable directly into the RBR860 on each version of firmware.
v7.2.7.15 with the issue:
v7.2.6.31 without issue:
Ya, next you'll need to factory reset and setup from scratch with newer FW loaded. Mine was solid on v.15.
- Ok I had a day where I wasn't mandated upon penalty of death to provide 100% SLA on the internet/WiFi and could try the factory reset approach. Here's the steps taken and their results:1) Initial Speedtest from MacBook connected to RBR's Ethernet on v7.2.6.31_5.0.24: solid 900+mbps down and up. The system is rock solid on this firmware.2) Trying a straight upgrade to v7.2.7.15_5.1.16 with no factory reset for the third time, just out of curiosity. You never know... two sats and RBR updated fine: immediately fails Speedtest with the down rate rapidly dropping to near zero and the up looking confused and stuck at the same rate until the test ends. As before, WiFi is solid but certain wired endpoints don't like the unreliable throughput. Reboot of entire system and MacBook did not resolve.3) I tried restoring a recent backup config: same issue once RBR boots up.Now the factory reset fun...4) Performed a factory reset of the RBR. Followed the initial setup wizard but only entered the bare minimum to establish Internet and WiFi connectivity: same issue with Speedtest.5) I tried restoring a backup. Once booted, all my previous config is there: same issue with Speedtest. This proved the factory reset is not a factor here and is somewhat an unnecessary step to take when updating. You should not need to setup from scratch and worse case is if you do then you should be able to restore a backup config file.6) The above testing was actually quick and easy and done in under an hour. But this is when things got frustrating as no sats were synced after the backup was restored. I tired all manner of sat sync methods and none would work. I resorted to factory resetting the sats but they would still not sync. I deleted them on the RBR and reset the backhaul but they would still not sync. I rebooted them both and the RBR numerous times but no sync. I even went for a bike ride and left the sats to try and sort themselves out in case they needed a little time alone to ponder over their existentialism. I then brought the sats down to right next to the RBR within 1 foot and repeated all the above and no sync. Reset numerous times, with only one sat powered on at a time to avoid WiFi contention and they never got a solid white LED which is according to the process a requirement before pressing sync on the sat and at best the sat just flashed white even if left 15 mins. As a final action I connected one sat via Ethernet, still no sync, so I factory reset again and I finally got a solid white light, so then pressed sync on it and it finally synced. The above wasted 4 hours in total (excluding the hour's bike ride).Repeated Speedtest from Mac on the RBR - same issue. All these numerous reboots did not resolve.7) I then reverted the synced sat to v7.2.6.31 and then tried to sync the other sat and again the only way was via Ethernet and resetting again. Once synced, I downgraded this to v31 then downgraded the RBR to v31 so the whole system was on v31.Re ran Speedtest and it was rock solid 900+ down and up. Repeated many times and solid.đ I moved both sats back to their locations on WiFi backhaul and they wouldn't sync despite numerous sat reboots - both magenta and had to revert to powering down the RBR and sats and powering up, then running the backhaul reset and sync process again!Finally the sats synced and became stable after initially reporting poor backhaul (it's always been reported as good from their locations). Left the system alone for an hour to resolve any DHCP reservations or whatever shenanigans were latent given the sats were now on different IPs and possibly upset with my many DHCP reservations.Repeated Speedtests numerous times and solid results. Finally proved all endpoints (67 in total, mixed wired, WiFi, 2G and 5G) connected and working fine.So I've proved a factory resetting of the RBR with v15 does not fix the issue.
This was worthwhile trying as a last resort.This appears to be throughput issue on the RBR on Ethernet for some types of endpoints, my MacBook and the LG G3. Not sure if this is actually the Ethernet port code, chipset or an MTU thing.It also proves how fickle the whole sat sync process is still after what must be 10 years of the Orbi mesh being around - it's not a reliable mechanism and there's too much mystery and ambiguity about how it works and what peculiar sequence of steps and wait times are required to sync. But once finally established, it seems to recover through power cuts. So the initial backhaul sync and negotiation process is fickle and frankly appallingly poor. Also I have noticed in the Orbi app map that my sats are now daisy chained over WiFi and not with their own direct backhaul to the RBR. Dare I reboot to fix - no way as I just want to enjoy a reliable internet and not risk any more shenanigans.I won't be trying an upgrade again unless I see positive confirmation from Netgear that there is an issue with wired endpoints on the RBR860 on v15 and this has been resolved. I have been on v31 for a year and it's been solid. Sats now back to a better star mesh to the RBR after a remote reboot from the Orbi app while I was out, rather than daisy chained through each other. This seemed like a painless reboot with no other impact.