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Forum Discussion
Nighthawk RAX80 AX8 Terrible 5 GHz
I just purchased a Netgear Nighthawk AX8 (RAX80), and after an hour, I'm nearly ready to return it.
My previous router was a TP-Link AC1750, and I've also used a Velop Mesh.
For the purposes of my test, I'm using a Intel AX200 wifi card. This is my first experience with 802.11ax (WIFI 6)
I live in a fairly rural area. The nearest houses are at least 200 ft from my access point. 5 GHz is pretty clean.
Immediately after receiving the Nighthawk, I upgraded the firmware to the most recent version.
I tested the 2.4 GHz band, and I got great performance.. around 250-300 Mbps link rate and pings were fast and stable. It worked well with both AX turned on and off.
The 5 GHz band on the other hand is just awful.
AX + 160 MHz -- Never connects or connects but never gets routable internet. Totally unusable
AX + 80 MHz -- Connects but only gets routable internet at a few channels, like 48 or 44. However, ping will fluctate awfully... from 22 to over 3 seconds. Not only that, but the link rate is usually 400-800 Mbps... worse than the AC router it replaced. Lost a bar on the signal strength meter
NO AX + 160 MHz -- connects on channels 48/44 and gets routable internet. Link rate usually 400-800 Mbps. Lost a bar on signal strength. Ping times better but still fluctuate occasionally to 1s or more
NO AX + 160 MHz -- connects and gets routable internet. Link rate usually 400-600 Mbps. Lost a bar on signal strength. Ping times better but still fluctuate occasionally to 1s or more
Ideas? I got this primarily for AX / 160 MHz channels. I can give up one but not both and certainly won't accept worse performance than the old TP Link AC1750.
5 Replies
I must add that I really wish Netgear would restrict the channel options for the 80 and 160 GHz channel widths to only the valid channels. I feel like the current state just results in lots of hunting for good channels. I used this to help guide me, but Netgear doesn't have a channel 50.
- It’s been about as good as the R7800 in terms of AC/N performance and I’ve had no issues with AX on 5 GHz with HT160. I get about 10-20% boost on AX over AC which was my realistic expectation. My test was also with a AX200. I just tested transfers back and forth from my laptop to the router’s USB storage (Samsung T5 SSD in my case) and also tested transfers to a NAS connected to the router but NAS (~880-912 Mbps reads) is limited by gigabit connection to router unlike USB storage (1,200-1,250 Mbps reads).
Do you have the latest drivers for the AX200? One or two driver versions were kinda terrible leading to disconnects can’t recall which one/ones though.Thanks, avtella!
What channel are you using for HT160?
The AX200 driver is 21.20.0.5 which is the latest that the Intel Driver & Support Assistant recommended.
I haven't tried connecting any AC clients yet... if AX/160 doesn't work, there's no point.
My goal is near gigabit wireless speeds using a 2x2 card, and I was expecting better range than the TP Link AC1750.
- For HT160 you need to use the Lowe channels ie 36-40. As there is no continuous 160Mhz of spectrum near the 149-165 channels. Only way to get HT160 using upper channels is to use split bonding as in 2 sets of separate 80 Mhz channels and the Intel AX200 does not support 80+80 mode.
