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Forum Discussion
RAXE300 horrible performance in 6 GHz band
Connected to an at&t fiber gateway (1 Gbps U/D) Bought this router to be able to use it with my Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra in the 6GHz band as no one uses that band in our condo complex. However, p...
I have a RAXE300 using channel 37 (PSC) on 6 GHz with 160 MHz bandwidth connected to a laptop with a Netgear A8000 6E USB adapter, which only supports 80 MHz bandwidth. I have 1 Gbps up/down fiber service from Frontier. Using Speedtest.net app on laptop to a Frontier server 150 miles away, line-of-site 25 ft from router, I typically see 650-700 Mbps up and down on 6 GHz. In contrast, on 5 GHz, 80 MHz bandwidth, and the same setup, results are typically 750-800 Mbps up/down.
The 6GHz band is still problematic, especially if you are not in the same room as the AP. While it can offer very good performance, the throughput over distance is not very good. These issues will be experienced with all major brands, as it is due to draconian FCC restrictions on the 6GHz band which leads to very low transmit power.
The issue is that while not many WiFi users are using the 6GHz band, it is a band that is actively used commercially for other activities.
The standard power outputs require the use of AFC (Automatic Frequency Coordination) to ensure that you are not using normal transmit power closer to what is allowed on the 5GHz band, in a block of spectrum that is being commercially used in your area. But even then they may not always be the best option compared to the low power indoor mode since standard power requires a range of other restrictions that users may not like.
Beyond that, many smartphones do not have good implementations of the 6GHz band with restrictions far more strict than even the draconian FCC limits. for example, the Galaxy S23 ultra has a lower transmit power on the 6GHz band than the its Bluetooth low energy radio.
To make matters worse, the antennas are not tuned for 6GHz, likely because it would require too many compromises on other frequencies unless they add 2 additional antennas to the device, which many device makers are unwilling to make space for.
In the US, WiFi 6GHz channels start at 6105 MHz and end at 7125MHz, thus on the Galaxy S23 ultra, you are getting at best 16mW transmit power on a small number of the channels, for perspective, the Galaxy S23 ultra uses a transmit power of 88mW for Bluetooth devices. Overall, even if the AP ends up using around 200mW transmit power, rather than the more typical 998mW on the 5Ghz and 2.4GHz band, the client device on the 6GHz band is sending out such a weak signal that the effective range will be greatly limited.
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