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Forum Discussion
We've unlocked the potential of our WiFi Extenders by adding WiFi Mesh!
Our latest firmware update allows users of our EX6400 and EX7300 extenders to enjoy the benefits of WiFi Mesh! With a single WiFi Network Name and Smart Roaming, you can create a whole hom...
By adding the new mesh functionality to EX7300 extender, you have introduced new bugs and taken away some of the opriginal features of the extender/access point EX7300. For example, after the upgrade to a new firmware (going from 1.0.1.78 to 1.0.2.140 or to 1.0.2.136), the status page incorrectly reports EX7300 has no internet access. To clarify, I use EX7300 as an access point with a wired internet connection and with ony a single band (5GHz) Wi-Fi radio enabled. This bug may seem innocent, because the EX7300 is nonetheless functioning as an access point. However, starting with firmware 1.0.2.140 the option to adjust Wi-Fi transmit power was taken away, i.e. "WiFi Coverage" option in the configuration utility has disappeared. For an access point the ability to adjust transmit power is basic, and at the same time essential, and eliminating that ability brings down the quality of the product substantially. I would not have purchased this EX7300 device if the option to adjust transmit power were not awailable. Of course, I can keep the older firmware 1.0.1.78 for now, but that also means no more security updates as new vulnerabilities are discovered. Perhaps, it would be fair to balance that trumpeting of the new mesh features with a little bit of the bitter truth that some functionality and/or an ongoing support is being taken away from the original product.
Does anybody know why the option of changing Wi-Fi transmit power is conflicting with the mesh functionality? Netgear's newer devices, such as EX8000, do not have Wi-Fi transmit power feature available, even though the previous and much more basic generations of extenders used to support it.
A user buys a product as it has the functions that the user is after, but then the manufacturer (Netgear) in this case, intoduces new firmware to improve its security, plus try and turn a router into the latest thing on the market "WiFi Mesh", which the router was not originally designed for. But overall, stuffs up most peoples routers along with taking away functions which was the users reason for purchasing the product.
Maybe Netgear thought the User had too much power (excuse the pun) and decided to take away functions that were useful to the user.
Too much power, huh? :smileyfrustrated: You may be right.
But to continue your pun line, in this case Netgear is locking the EX7300 device at the highest radio output power allowed by the regulations in your country. Too much transmit power can actually be bad for your wireless network performance, but it is a whole new topic of ducussion. Ironically, I was adjusting the transmit power DOWN from the max setting to 25%, which happens to be just right for my small apartment. So, whether the user has too much power or too little is truly a matter of perspective - you can argue that Netgear merely substituted user's customization power with overwhelming radio transmit power.
My guess is that Netgear had to disable transmit power option because in the original design both radio bands (2.4GHz and 5Ghz) shared the same transmit power setting. That is a deficient design even for an ordinary access point, but in a mesh system one would probably want to use high transmit power setting for the backhaul band, but low transmit power setting for the band to which wireless clients connect. And because most consumers naively believe that the highest transmit power setting is best, why not just lock the device at the highest setting and have no headache?
BTW, Verizon Fios router, which is also a consumer oriented product, still allows changing transmit power individually for each Wi-Fi radio band. One would think that Netgear, which is a more specialized networking equipment company, would be able to offer more sophistication to its customers. Somehow, that is not the case.
WhyPhyJunkie wrote:
but in a mesh system one would probably want to use high transmit power setting for the backhaul band, but low transmit power setting for the band to which wireless clients connect.
I think this is the issue here. With a triband mesh extender you can get a higher transmit power for the backhaul, since it has a dedicated radio. But you can't get that if the same radio is used for the client and backhaul connections.
One aspect here also is that it is useful to be able to switch over to a 2.4 ghz backhaul if needed, so even in the triband case the backhaul might not always be on the dedicated radio. I'm not sure if the extenders are doing this, but Orbi certainly does.
