YIKES!!! 5GHz Wireless speed has dropped 90%!

I tested with the Guest network - 5Ghz works! I got 800 Mbps on my iPad. I got 800 Mbps on my iPhone too. But I went back to my regular networks, 50 Mbps.

So we know it isn't a hardware failure. 

Did you try a factory reset? It might be the fastest option

Your using Google IPv6 DNS right? 
Can you try a different IPv6 DNS service? Cloudfare and Quad9? 

Ya, something is happening on the 5ghz radio. 

I suppose you don't have any 6Ghz devices hanging around do you? 

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donawalt wrote:

LOL "HI, PV six" - That'a what Siri think IPv6 is!

 

Speeds are still bad on 5GHz only - 30-50Mbps, 6GHz gets 1200-1400Mbps at the same position very close to RBSs or RBR - all three.

 

So I am going in to turn on the Guest network - and I noticed this for my existing network. What is this? Man things are getting weirder and weirder...

 

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OK here's an update. The only way I could get the normal WiFi speeds back was to do a factory reset.

Of course, I had the usual problems when having to power cyclel/reboot RBRs and RBSs when there are 2 satellites on Ethernet - the RBSs came up with hop count blank, so nothing could connect to them. Eventually I fixed that by over cycling one of them a second time, but the other I had to take down next to the router and let it sync wirelessly. Then I put it in place wired, and it came up fine.

But at some point in the first 2 hours, when I was out, the router restarted. Then I went through the whole issue of hop count blank again - fixed it the same way.

However, it was funny this all started 24 hours after setting up a XS 508M multi-gig switch, replacing a gigabit switch GS105. So I went back to the GS 105, to ensure it's stable. Everything has been running fine for about 15 hours.

Next I will move the RBS cables off the GS105 to my other switch, a GS348. Once I am sure it's stable, then I will replace the 105 with the XS again - but I will plug the XS into the 1G port on the RBR, not the 2.5G. Then i will move the RBS cables to the XS, and see if it's stable at 1G.

If that is stable (test for a day or two), the next step will be to move the XS cable from the RBR 1G port to the 2,5G port. This may indicate if NG Orbi has a problem with 2,5G ports.

Stay tuned!

Next update -

- Moved the RBS satellites to the GS348 gigabit switch

- Took the GS 105 gigabit switch offline

- After verifying it was stable for about 20 minutes, powered up the XS508 multi-gig switch

- Connected the XS508 to the RBR960 router using port 7 on the XS508, and the middle of the 3 1G RBR router ports. So the XS and RBR are communicating on 1GB not 2.5GB.

- After verifying it was stable for about 20 minutes, I moved the cable going into the RBR from the XS - from a 1G port to the 2,5G port.

So far that's working - no hop count issues (which drops WiFi connections), stable memory and CPU on RBR and RBSs, no phantom restarts. And, WiFi speeds are good.

After testing for a bit longer, move the RBS with there 1Gb ports connected to the XS switch. 

Oooh sorry I missed the last step on my notes - I did move the RBS cables to the XS switch. But I verified they are on 1G speed by the XS lights. So the only connections that are > 1G are modem to router (which has never changed), and now the XS is using the RBR's 2.5G port. RBSs are all 1G.

CM modem to RBR is 2.5 on the modem or 1Gb on the Modem port to the RBR? 

CM modem is using its 2.5G yellow port, It goes into the 10G port on the RBR960.

👍

All is still working today, 24 hours later. I changed the cable from the XS multi-gig switch to the RBR960 router to be a Cat 6a cable - I left a Cat 6 cable in place by omission.

Then, I just switched the 2 RBSs' input cable from 1G to 2.5G - so far for 90 minutes all is working well - WiFi 5GHx speeds are fine (in fact slightly better since the satellites are 2,5G connected to the router now), CPU and memory are stable without any "creep", no restarts, IPv6 is still fine, hop cont for the RBSs is 1 as it should be.

So now we watch and see if it self-destructs, or if it keeps running. 

It's great to hear that your adjustments seem to have improved the situation! By upgrading the cable to Cat 6a and switching the RBSs' input cable to 2.5G, you've potentially addressed the issue causing the 5GHz wireless speed drop. With stable WiFi speeds, CPU and memory performance, and IPv6 functionality, it seems like the adjustments may have resolved the problem. Keep monitoring the system to ensure it continues running smoothly without any further issues. If everything remains stable, it suggests that the changes you made successfully resolved the problem.

Thanks for the reply nomijack . Actually, when this started the RBSs were using the 2,5G ports. The only thing that's new is the Cat 6a cable vs Cat 6, and from what I have read Cat 6 is acceptable for shorter length runs @ 2.5G. I thought it would be good to upgrade the cable anyway. I have Cat 6 running through the walls from a former owner about 12 years ago, and it can't be changed. But they seem to work fine.

I think this is just another example of Orbi being very fragile on power cycles, reboots, restarts, etc. What probably made this work (so far!) is just doing one step at a time, almost like the system can't handle a bunch of changes at once (swap cables, new switch, power cycles). I have learned that the system does not handle restarts with 2 RBSs on Ethernet backhaul very well, if I power cycle the system I am prepared that one of the two RBSs will have hop count of 0/blank, which means no wifi connections; I'll just take it down next to the router, let it sync wirelessly, then take it back to its spot and it will sync fine via Ethernet from that point on. The curious thing is, other than hop count being blank, the router reports the sync status as "Good" and the LED light will be blue. Go figure.

donawalt Interesting that you had these issues.  Glad they are resolved for you now.  Actually, CAT 5e is also capable of 2.5Gbps speeds for runs under 100m, so I don't think the CAT 6 cable was the cause of your issue but more likely a software issue with the Orbi that you encountered.  One thing I found when testing the issues I've been having with my cable modem (Xfinity XB8) and the 2.5mGig WAN port on my RBR850 is that disabling WMM (under advanced settings) caused WiFi speeds to significantly drop like you were describing.  For some reason disabling this setting corrected the issue with reduced LAN speeds that I had using the mGig port, but obviously the significantly reduced WiFi speeds is unacceptable.  Thankfully, re-enabling this setting fixed the issue for me w/out the need of a factory reset.  

musicman0725 yes I remember you writing that. On the 960 series, WMM is no longer exposed as a setting!

How's this working? 

from last update in Message 33 here, it's been almost 3 days now - and all is working fine! WiFi 5 speeds are fine, no other issues at all. I am going to not touch anything and see how long it runs!

Any updates or progress on this one? 

No other failures losing 5GHz speeds across the network! Another one-off?