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No trace of Wifi6 networks on Nighthawk RAXE500
I just bought a new NETGEAR Nighthawk RAXE500, set it up, 6G Wifi networks (regular and guest) are enabled and SSID broadcasting, and there's no trace of these Wifi 6 networks anywhere. I've got an i...
The RAXE500 supports Wifi6, which used to be called 802.11ax, as well as earlier flavors of Wifi like 802.11g, 802.11n (now called Wifi4) 802.11ac (now called Wifi5). All of these earlier versions run on the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands.
On my Samsung S20FE, my wifi icon has a "6" next to it. As is typical, Apple doesn't want you to be "bothered" by anything technical like that so they don't tell you. Run some speedtests and then go into the router's UI and navigate to Advanced, Setup, Wireless Setup and uncheck the Enable AX.... box.
If your speedtests now are appreciably slower, you will know that the devices were connecting with Wifi6.
Tested both with AX enabled and disabled -- no difference in speed whatsoever. As for the iPhone displaying "6" or not with its connection speed -- Apple has never hesitated to display anything which implies faster performance. They were displaying the "5" in 5G on the iPhone before that was even a known thing.
Believe what you want but Apple does not display an indicator for a Wifi6 connection.
What does the speedtest show when you're connected to the 5GHz Wifi band?
What is the download speed for your Internet plan? If it's not higher than what an 802.11ac connection can go, then the 802.11ax speed test won't be any different.
330 Mbps down, 30 Mbps up. That's what my plan with my ISP provides, that's what I'm receiving over the 5G network, with AX enabled or disabled.
Ok, so that's easily attainable under 802.11ac (Wifi 5), which is why when AX is enabled the speeds don't change.
And again, Apple hides "techie" info like what the actual connection rate is to your router. On my S20FE I can see that the connection rate to the RAXE500 is 1.2Gbps. If I disable AX, it then shows a connection rate of 866Mpbs. Note, these are max connection rates to the router, not actual speed test numbers through the Internet connection.
Bottom line, there's no reason that your Wifi6-capable phone isn't making a Wifi6 connection to the RAXE500 but since your Internet plan isn't capable of delivering Wifi6-level speeds it really doesn't matter anyway.
You are absolutely right Apple does not show the 6 I have a 2020 iPad and the RAXE500 an it does not show anything but the wifi symbol now on the other hand my Samsung note 20 shows the 6 next to the WiFi symbol.
Ok, I am a little afraid to jump in here... I have the issue but nothing to do with Apple. When I scan for APs I see the SSIDs for both the 2.4g and 5g bands but not the 6g.
My laptop was upgraded with a Intel(R) Wi-Fi 6E AX210 160MHz. One of the posts in this thread said Windows does not support WPA3 yet but would that prevent the modem from simply seeing the 6g broadcasted SSID? For a moment I change the 6g from WPA3 to Enhanced Open but I still was unable to detect the signal.
It seems reasonable, especially at the cost and effort to connect at 6E, that I try to deterine if it is 1. Not supported by Windows 10 regardless of the 6E wifi card. 2. A configuration issue on the laptop, OS or WIFI driver. 3. My RAXE500 is not either working properly or not ready for prime time.
Anyone else able to detect the SSID for 6g using Win10 and a Intel(R) Wi-Fi 6E AX210 160MHz? Thanks.
