I have an RAX78 (they wouldnt let me select that so i picked teh RAX80 on teh dropdown) and that im trying to connect to a Seagate Backup Plus 5TB portable HD. whenever I do so, it drops the internet signal from the wifi signal after about 2 minutes. I previously had a 5 year old WD 3TB that was used on my old AC1750 Nighthawk router without issues. When I plugged it in to the RAX78, it would drop the internet (wifi still working, just no internet on it). So I got a new harddrive after reading it might be "incompatible". The new Seagate was formatted to ExFAT so I redid it in NTFS. I added a singlevideo file to it and tested it. it worked fine. I could see the file via readyshare and the internet was stable. I thought problem solved. So I plugged it in to my PC and uploaded several GB of music and video files to it. Now, I plug it back in to the router, and poof- it kills the internet signal in about 2 minutes. I spent two hours online chat and tried all kinds of things. We updated the 2GHZ channel to 11, 5GHz1 to 36, and 5GHz2 to 161. I turned the MTU to 1492 instead of 1500. I turned off Smart Connect. QoS is off. Did a fresh firmware re-install. Nothing. They recommend I do a hard factory reset, but that is a pain in the rear and I know its not gonna fix it. Any ideas from anyone? Im considering trying to reformat the HD and try updloading everything via the readyshare connection. But that will take weeks. Not sure what to do. It worked so easy before. Any help is appreciated. Thank you.

EZK2517 wrote: ....im trying to connect to a Seagate Backup Plus 5TB portable HD. 5 TB is bigger than most people have successfully deployed with ReadySHARE. 4TB seems to be top whack for most routers. This list will give you some clues, although it is far from comprehensive: ReadySHARE USB Drives Compatibility List | Answer | NETGEAR Support EZK2517 wrote: I have an RAX78 (they wouldnt let me select that so i picked teh RAX80 on teh dropdown) In some cases this is because people are posting in the wrong section of this place. You have posted your message in the section of this community given over to Nighthawk WiFi Routers. (This is easily done, given Netgear's complicated community structure.) Many questions apply to different types of device, so you might get responses here, but you might get more help, and find earlier questions and answers specific to your hardware, in the appropriate section for your device. That's probably here: Nighthawk Routers with WiFi 6 (AX) - NETGEAR Communities In the meantime you could visit the support pages:Support | NETGEARFeed in your model number and check the documentation for your hardware.You may have done this already. I can't tell from your message. I mention it because Netgear gave up on supplying paper manuals years ago and people sometimes miss the downloads.

Thanks. I have less than 3TB on it now. I wonder if I formatted it into smaller drives if it would see them or just see the first on or just not work at all. The latter seems to be the go to answer for this thing

I have no idea what ReadySHARE would make of a USB formatted drive like that, or even if that would case any of the "internet signal" drops that you experience. I just wanted to warn that larger drives can cause problems. Looking at the latest list of USB drives, I see that it now has one larger drive (Seagate USB3.0 8TB Model:SRD0PV1) in there, but the list is so thin that it is anyone's guess as to what will work. Will my USB drive work with ReadySHARE | Answer | NETGEAR Support

Agreed. They have very little data and even less data on AX routers.

> [...] Did a fresh firmware re-install. Nothing. [...] Which version? Same or different? Have you tried different? Does"Nothing" mean "no change", or "no trouble", or "no LEDs", or what? > [...] They recommend I do a hard factory reset, but that is a pain in> the rear and I know its not gonna fix it. [...] You "know" more than I do. I wouldn't bet on a settings reset, but Iwouldn't rule it out. And you can be confident that Netgear will donothing until they believe that you've tried it. > [...] Im considering trying to reformat the HD and try updloading> everything via the readyshare connection. [...] That would be an interesting experiment. > [...] But that will take weeks. [...] Only if it succeeds. If it fails, you could know much sooner. Butwhy would your first such experiment involve "everything"? My impression (from very limited testing in a much differentenvironment) was that ReadySHARE was dancing-bear software, and Iwouldn't trust my valuable data with it. Clearly, a USB-attached storage device should have no effect on thewireless-network stuff. Knowing nothing, I can _imagine_ that when faced with a large diskwhich was populated using more reliable software, the ReadySHARE stuffmight become confused, and overwork a CPU enough to cause overheatingwhich might affect one of the wireless-network radios. Purespeculation, but pointing a fan at the RAX78 might be anotherinteresting experiment.

RAX78 drops internet signal with USB connected

12 Replies

michaelkenward
Guru
Jun 06, 2021
EZK2517 wrote:

....im trying to connect to a Seagate Backup Plus 5TB portable HD.

5 TB is bigger than most people have successfully deployed with ReadySHARE. 4TB seems to be top whack for most routers.

This list will give you some clues, although it is far from comprehensive:

ReadySHARE USB Drives Compatibility List | Answer | NETGEAR Support

EZK2517 wrote:

I have an RAX78 (they wouldnt let me select that so i picked teh RAX80 on teh dropdown)

In some cases this is because people are posting in the wrong section of this place.

You have posted your message in the section of this community given over to Nighthawk WiFi Routers. (This is easily done, given Netgear's complicated community structure.)

Many questions apply to different types of device, so you might get responses here, but you might get more help, and find earlier questions and answers specific to your hardware, in the appropriate section for your device. That's probably here:

Nighthawk Routers with WiFi 6 (AX) - NETGEAR Communities

In the meantime you could visit the support pages:

Support | NETGEAR

Feed in your model number and check the documentation for your hardware.

You may have done this already. I can't tell from your message.

I mention it because Netgear gave up on supplying paper manuals years ago and people sometimes miss the downloads.
- Ezekiel2517
  Aspirant
  Jun 06, 2021
  Thanks. I have less than 3TB on it now. I wonder if I formatted it into smaller drives if it would see them or just see the first on or just not work at all. The latter seems to be the go to answer for this thing
  - michaelkenward
    Guru
    Jun 06, 2021
    I have no idea what ReadySHARE would make of a USB formatted drive like that, or even if that would case any of the "internet signal" drops that you experience. I just wanted to warn that larger drives can cause problems.
    
    Looking at the latest list of USB drives, I see that it now has one larger drive (Seagate USB3.0 8TB Model:SRD0PV1) in there, but the list is so thin that it is anyone's guess as to what will work.
    
    Will my USB drive work with ReadySHARE | Answer | NETGEAR Support

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RAX78 drops internet signal with USB connected