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Forum Discussion

alokeprasad's avatar
alokeprasad
Mentor
Nov 30, 2020

Which way to orient the antennae of the R9000 for lateral beamforming?

I have my R9000 X10 in the front of the house. Thats where the cable outlet and cable modem is.  The house isn't wired up for ethernet or coax. So re-positioning the R9000 is not practical at this time.

 

Which way should I orient the R9000 and position its antenne for stronger signal strength towards one side of the router (laterally, on the same floor as the R9000)?  I want to be sending more signal towards the house, and less towards the road in front of the house.  If that is possible.

 

I recall a Netgear KB article on antenne positioning ... but can't find it now.

Hardware
Installation

9 Replies

  • plemans's avatar
    plemans
    Guru - Experienced User
    Nov 30, 2020

    there's not a whole lot of difference in my testing.

    most say that for single level homes, the antenna should be straight up/down.

    for multilevel homes, have them at 45 degrees. 

     

    But in reality and testing, no 2 situations are ever equal. Go to the area you need better coverage. Then have someone at the router put them in different orientations while you speedtest where you need the coverage. Thats probably going to get you the best results. 

     

    If it doesn't hit satisfactory speeds, then you might want to check out range extenders. I'd recommend the tri-band versions for their dedicated backhaul. 

    • alokeprasad's avatar
      alokeprasad
      Mentor
      Nov 30, 2020

      Thx for the suggestion.  I'll try that late PM or early AM when traffic from my and neighbors is low.

       

      I have been eyeing the RBK50 Orbi this season.  Thats about the same as a high quality tri-band range extender.  My R9000 is feature rich but a mesh network designed form the ground up: like the Orbi or Eero would be $ better spent, IMO.  Lots of posts on problems with their firmware is scaring me away from taking the leap.

      • plemans's avatar
        plemans
        Guru - Experienced User
        Nov 30, 2020

        The posts with issues?

        Its mainly because this is a support forum where people come with issues. 

        yes theres been on occasional bad firmware. 
        But I've used the RBK53 and RBK43 system without any issues. So has my neighbor, in-laws, plus many more. 

        Its one of the fastest and highest rated mesh systems out there. But because it sells so many, you see many people with issues. 

        I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to anyone 

         

        Nice thing about it, is if you wanted to keep the R9000 for its features (like plex) you could always disable the wifi on it and use the orbi in access point mode. Then you have the best of both worlds. Plus a backup wifi should you choose to leave it enabled. just make sure to have it on a seperate channel from the orbi.