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RAX45 Slow Wired and WiFi Speeds
Hello,
I tried posting this question a few minutes ago, but it came out as all one long paragraph which is awful. Here is my attempt at a redo.
Hello, I recently bought the RAX45 Nighthawk router from Costco. Setup was easy and straightforward, even with my lack of experience with routers. Currently, I get 500/500 Mbps Up/Down from my ISP (FiOS). When the nighthawk app checks my internet speeds, it shows roughly 500/500. When I plug my computer into the ethernet cable straight from the ONT and run multiple speed tests, it averages close to 500/500. However, when I connect the ONT to my Nighthawk router and then connect my computer via ethernet cable to the router, I get about 200/400 Mbps Up/Down. When I connect my phone or computer via Wifi, I max out at about 210/180 Mbps Up/Down.
While I understand that Wifi speeds will always be slower than wired speeds, I find it to be an issue that the wired speeds through this router are so low. I am also concerned about the router since the ISP provided router had basically 500/500 wired speed and 350/200 Wifi speed. So to me, there seems to be something wrong with the Nighthawk router (I made the switch since the ISP provided router costs $10/month and has worse range).
- I am running firmware version: v1.0.2.20_2.0.31 I have QoS off.
- I have split the bands and am connected to 5GHz on both my MacBook Pro and S10+. Smart Connect is OFF.
- AX is enabled, but OFDMA is not enabled on either 2.4 GHz or 5 GHz.
- I am on an uncrowded channel, and have the 5 GHz mode set to "Up to 3840 Mbps" with Transmit Power Control set to 100%.
- For 5 GHz, the Fragmentation Length is set to 2346 and the CTS/RTS Threshold is set to 2347.
- Traffic Meter is Off
- I tried downgrading the firmware to the previous version, but that had no effect. I have factory reset the router and set it up again, but there was no change.
Perhaps there is nothing wrong with this router, but I find it suspicious that even the wired ethernet connection through the router gives me much slower speeds than a direct connection to the ONT. I also am bummed that the wireless speed of this router is so much slower than the wireless speed of the cheapo router provided by Frontier. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!
I initially tried to change all the settings to what you recommended. Given that the settings are in multiple menus, all I actulaly changed were
"Enable OFDMA" for both 2.4 and 5GHz. I now have the max speed I had before.
20 Replies
Disable traffic meter in advanced, advanced setup.. I was limited to around 500-600Mbps on my gigabit internet, I turned off QOS and traffic meter and now I can max it out.
I just picked up this router from Costco as well. I had just upgraded my bandwidth to 400+ with Spectrum. I've been having issues with consistent wifi speeds with their provided wifi router... so I tried an Eeros system and although the range and coverage was better, the wifi speed was consistent but far lower than desired... so I picked up this router and so far the Netgear appears to be the worst option.
The wired connection to my desktop is testing at only about 230Mbps on the RA45... plugged directly to the modem, it was getting speeds of like 460Mbps. A wired connection to 1 of the Eero APs provided a similar speed. The Netgear Speedtest to test the Internet bandwidth shows 460Mpbs... so something is slowing it down.
Qos and traffic meter are both disabled.
Hello matt131 & AlleninLA,
As you recently purchased the device, I would recommend contacting our support team to look into this further for you both. You may contact our support team by registering your device using the link below.
https://www.netgear.com/support/default.aspx
Christian
I have the same problems with the Nighthawk RAX45.
When i connect my laptop to the modem, I get 932/37. When i connect the router to the modem and then the laptop to the router i get a 276/16.
Why is the router slowing my wired connection? Looks like other pplhave the same problem. I have traffic meter off too.
I too am having this problem with the Nighthawk RAX45 I recently purchased.
When I connect my desktop computer directly to my Xfinity Xb7 Gateway and run it in combined mode, I get a consistant 720/24 on a 600 Mbps plan. If i put the Xb7 in bridge mode and connect the RAX45 router, and run a speed test from any computer on the network I get 280/24.
If I run a speed test through the Nighthawk app, which says it tests between the router and the internet, I get anywhere between 375 and 600 Mbps.
I do not have traffic metering or QoS on, have tried using different cat 5e and 6 cables, and I have the most recent firmware for both the the Xb7 and the RAX45.
So the router seems to be cutting speed at the LAN by half. Obviously this is a common issue judging by this and other threads. I've read different potential workarounds such as putting the router in AP mode but I dont want to have to do that.
So what is going on here?
I was seeing the same issues decscribed in the thread, but nothing worked.
Recently upgraded ISP speed to 600 down & was seeing hard wired & wireless cap out around 250. Contacted ISP to ensure my account was properly configured which it was. Ruled out the Modem & wiring by going directly into the modem & seeing speeds of 700down. Back to the router I'm back to 250. QOS & Traffic Meter are all off. I manually updated the existing firmware of V1.0.2.64_2.0.41 to the same. No success. Tried to contact support, but my 90-day complimentary support ended and so on.
Anyone have any suggestions in addition to what was mentioned above? I'm trying to avoid returning the modem to Costco.
Thanks everyone in advance!
My 2.4 GHZ also is randomly going down with QoSoff and traffic meter off.
This little gem goes back to Costco tomorrow!
- I also purchased the RAX45 from Costco, and am experiencing horrible WiFi performance. I purchased this router to have a dedicated 5ghz channel for my Oculus Quest 2 using virtual desktop, but the performance is atrocious. Running test speeds on the router itself, I get the full 500 mbps up and down. But connecting to the router with just a single device on my network, and running speed tests from my phone, I get about 90 mbps max up and down, even in the same room. Compare this to my Orbi mesh router, where I can easily get about 425mbps down and 225mbps up, even with about 15-20 other WiFi devices connected to the mesh network.
Something seems wrong with the RAX45 to have such bad WiFi performance. I’ve updated the firmware, and have tested using the RAX45 as a standalone router (after disconnecting the Orbi) and as a wireless AP (connected to the Orbi), but experience the same really bad throughput. The nighthawk is going straight back to Costco. Really terrible product, firmware, or a combination of the two.- I also had a nightmare of a time with the RAX45 at first. I kept wanting to blame myself for screwing something up, while my wife was straight up blaming me. How could such a trusted industry name be the problem?
Well fortunately, I stumbled upon a Reddit article that gave me the fix. I tried to find it again, but couldn’t.
To summarize, it is the router. The latest firmware does nothing to fix. There’s something odd happening that doesn’t allow the settings to actually apply.
Here’s the settings I’m using that’s providing the speeds I’d expect. (See screenshots)
Everything that you see unchecked will stay disabled. The WiFi settings that are currently enabled will need to first be disabled, the router reset, and then enabled/applied after the reset.
...ugh. Only one attachment per post, and jpeg file type not allowed 😆
https://share.icloud.com/photos/0D-pyziHGqjr61fBxvDZWUrTQFor what it is worth, after 2 days when i noticed my speeds have dropped dramatically, and checking things, i turned ofdma, on, i'm guessing the router decided to turn it off at some point, i noticed my speeds going mostly back up, still not getting the 800's i saw before but back into the 600's.
