Feedback for R7000 New firmware 1.0.9.18

Apprentice

Dec 28, 2017

I'm on the cusp of ditching Netgear and returning some Netgear EX6120 extenders I recently bought. It's a race between Netgear's ability to fix this problem completely in the coming days, the availability of sale prices on alternative solutions from competing companies, and my patience with this problem even if sales don't come. I'm not betting on Netgear. in this race. Why should I? Have they shown any competence or willingness to support their products?

If Netgear doesn't start communicating soon - they act as if this problem doesn't exist - I'll just move on. So will any others that I can influence, and I do so regularly. If Netgear can't be bothered to even reply with some coherent acknowledgement of the problem, they don't deserve our business again.

I'm researching mesh network options. Netgear Orbi seems highly rated, but of course I'll dismiss it out of hand. Netgear simply doesn't support it's products, so buying Orbi is like gambling on flushing that money down the toilet. Does anyone have any opinion or experience with Eero? If I get by with an R7000 and one EX6120 extender today, can I expect the Eero coverage to be better, worse, or about the same?

Now, a little more info to satisfy the small sliver of hope that this problem might yet get solved and save us from having to all spend more money immediately....

I've been running 1.0.9.18 since a day or two after its release. Plenty of 2.4 GHz drops, even after I disabled the guest network.

Without rebooting the router, I've been stable for at least 24 hours after having done nothing in particular. It may have been longer - I was not home and simply didn't check often. I still think there's a chance this issue is not purely a firmware problem, and may have an environmental component.

It looks like the jury is out with 1.0.9.20. If instability of the 2.4GHz connections resurfaces, and I think it likely will, I'll upgrade to that firmware immediately.

Stale
Aspirant
Dec 28, 2017
The worst part of all of this is that Netgear recently implemented the auto-update firmware feature, which likely pushed down the affected firmware to countless devices worldwide. I haven't seen anything from Netgear acknowledging an issue, nor have I seen anything indicating that some firmwares have been pulled from the website (meaning that Netgear is continuing to push affected firmwares down to customers even today).

The only reason I haven't bought a new router is that CES-2018 is in two weeks, and I'm hoping I can limp my R7000 along until then. I suspect this year will see vendors releasing routers/switches supporting Nbase-T (2.5 & 5Gbps ethernet!), and if so I'll ditch the broken R7000 & move to one of those immediately.
AtoZ
Apprentice
Dec 28, 2017
mzguy...earlier post from someone said he did a complete overhaul and used advanced tomato. The problem persisted. Honestly, .18 lasted 5 days for me and im on day 3 of hotfix. And im not hopeful. I feel, at this point, netgear broke their own gear. I truly dont know what else anyone can do. I, being a soho user, am out of patience and time. If the hotfix fails, i already picked out the next router. Something in a nice triband sounds good.
- mzguy
  Apprentice
  Dec 28, 2017
  AtoZ wrote:
  mzguy...earlier post from someone said he did a complete overhaul and used advanced tomato. The problem persisted. Honestly, .18 lasted 5 days for me and im on day 3 of hotfix. And im not hopeful. I feel, at this point, netgear broke their own gear. I truly dont know what else anyone can do. I, being a soho user, am out of patience and time. If the hotfix fails, i already picked out the next router. Something in a nice triband sounds good.
  Thanks for the nice summary. Version .18 lasted less than a few hours for me, so that was an easy one to dismiss. In the absence of complete stability or a clear statement from Netgear, one would be insane to be hopeful, and insane to ever buy a Netgear product again! Based on reports here, it appears that Netgear indeed broke its own gear, or is completely susceptible to some type of environmental factor where other brands aren't. I'm out of patience and time too. I'm doing only easy fixes at this point, and waiting for the problem to get worse, or a sale to come for a competitor. For me to stay with Netgear, they have to really fall on the sword and issue a clear statement indicating they screwed up, they understand the problem, including why it persisted across firmware that was otherwise fine for months, and offer an immediate working solution.
  
  If Netgear permanently broke thousands of devices through an error, they should immediately reach out and offer compensation. That's what a good company would do. Some companies only respond to public or legal pressure though. If they keep this up, I'm confident that one or both of those will arrive at their doorstep before too long. I wrote a long post almost 2 weeks ago, urging Netgear to step up and start communicating. Instead we just get firmware updates every few days for "security issues".
  - AtoZ
    Apprentice
    Dec 28, 2017
    Just was reading up on a company with touchscreen routers. Also see they have good customer service. I like the idea of going to the router directly and it has alexa support as well for home automation setups. This may work better for most of my clients anyway.

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Feedback for R7000 New firmware 1.0.9.18