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I've been searching the forums and the Internet in general, today, as I have gotten my first notice from Comcast that, lo, I am over my 1 Terabyte limit, this month. It has been inching toward that mark for a bit, and last month was around 944 Gig. What can I say: We are a connected, gaming, streaming family and our Comcast link is a vital utility. I have seen suggestions on this forum to "just disconnect everything and reconnect until you find the hog." With 30ish devices on the network, 4 kids, 2 renters, and countless visitors, this is simply not a possibility. What I could do is set up a different router (preferably one with this feature) and move the connections over to it one-by-one until I find the offender. If I have to go that route, I highly doubt the Orbi would get reconnected. Which is a shame because it is a pretty decent solution for everything else.
I would like for Netgear to seriously consider giving customers an option for this data. There are many ways to do it, but ANY of them would be acceptable to me. I'm a long-time networking pro, so even if these are scary for some people, at least it would be an option.
- Do the metering in the device with display of the statistics in the interface and in the app. This is obviously going to make the most customers happy because it would give us a report per-device of the usage. This isn't rocket science: Even if the device has a database limitation of 100 devices to monitor, or even 50, it would be useful. COMCAST does it on their modem devices for xFi. It can't be that hard.
- Do the metering externally by providing SNMP statistics on a per-device basis for smaller timeframes. This would mean that the Orbi doesn't have to store "dead" devices forever and would be up to whatever stat-gathering tool was used.
- Do the metering externally by providing some app that collects the data to a desktop. Maybe Java so you can hit Windows, Linux, and Mac all at once with it.
- Provide traffic mirroring to a selected wired port. This would at least give me the ability to plug in Wireshark or other tools to see what is going on. It would be super useful for troubleshooting intermittent issues and not just bandwidth monitoring.
- Provide netflow/sflow output to a collector on the home network. This would also have broader uses than just bandwidth monitoring, but it is potentially the hardest to use solution in this list. If it is easy to implement in the Orbi (i.e., the chips already support it), then I'll take it happily.
- Other things I haven't mentioned. Look, I'm desperate, here. I will find a way to use anything that helps.
I get 2 months free "warnings" from Comcast, but the cost of not knowing this outweighs replacing the Orbi. Once I start getting charged $10/50 Gig, I'm going to need to know right then and there. And if I don't have a reasonable answer by that time, another Orbi will be going out to eBay.
195 Comments
How much more that comment would mean Furry if it came from a Netgear representative. And there may be someone asking for support or help somewhere in this thread but this is a feature request thread and the understandable frustration comments from those posters ignored by the company for years (since 2018 to be exact).
Thanks Furry for your wonderful input. As you stated this is an idea exchange where users can post about ideas or requests. Adding bandwidth monitoring into their devices seems an awfully lot like an idea and/or request. Its unfortunate that this idea and request seems to go unanswered by NG in which you will end up with so many posts that indicate their devices don't do this. I would encourage others to keep posting that they think this idea or request is a good one and maybe just maybe NG will take notice based on the numbers in this post. Sending people off to individual device forums to be told their device doesn't do this won't really accomplish anything. Please understand this is a frustration held by many who purchased NG devices only to find they lack this basic function. Allowing others to outside of the community to see this aspect of NG and make a sound decision on their next purchase seems totally legit in my book.
Of course you can post about this and discuss it. Just some seem to post that there maybe problems that could be helped if they posted in the support forums and find solutions. As you can see, since 2018 NG doesn't seem to walk to make this work for those who have requested it. Thats NGs decision and I can only speculate that there maybe reasons behind it and not bring this request to there products. And of course, if this feature is wanted by users asking for it, then of course, you'll need to find a router mfr that does support it on there products. Good Luck.
Part of why I posted initially was in hopes that NetGear actually cared about their customers & would implement a solution available on other products that cost a fraction of what Orbi costs.
Now I post regularly so that other unsuspecting potential customers don’t make the same mistake. I switched long ago to another solution & sold my Orbi access points. I’m a big believer in voting with dollars. I hope as many people as possible see these posts & choose a better option. Then NetGear can one day refer to these posts while trying to figure out why no one is buying their crap products & wish they had implemented a solution so many people requested & needed.
I started this thread and left for Google nest wifi pro mesh network with bandwidth monitoring a long time ago ... vote with your dollars.
Netgear doesn't listen to your requests.
And that's it for me as well. Left netgear because exactly of this reason and will probably never come back. And I'm leaving this thread as well.
It has been 5.5 years since I posted this idea. I haven't bought a Netgear device since this one. My 24-port gig switches were not Netgear. My new routers and wifi access points were not Netgear. I have not bought Netgear for clients or personal use. The Orbi was the biggest piece of networking garbage I ever owned. It is a meme between my son and I.
Just because of my career and tech-heavy personal life, this has easily cost you over $10,000. Every so often, I get a notice from this thread, and I wonder why no one just closes the item. Not only do you not have the ability to give people the thing they are asking for, you are too spineless to commit to that mediocrity by letting people off the hook. Just close the thread and say it will never happen, already.
Where is your self-respect, Netgear?
How far you have fallen.
Sincerely,
Unsubscribed
Wow, Netgear.... is this really happening!? At least respond to this highly desired feature with maybe a reason why it's not available? Perhaps it's my time to leave as well. However, I'd love to continue using your product. Could you please communicate with us?
Guess it's NOTgear now.
MR6150 - In my mobile subscriptions plan I use the option for 50GB a day. But I can’t put in that in the settings for the router. Please include this in a future software release as that would be really helpful for me.
