Connecting Nighthawk router as an access point to Orbi
I upgraded from the Nighthawk R7000 to the Orbi RBK53S-100NAS (from Costco) to getter signal and coverage throughout my house, without realizing that Netgear dummied down the parental controls and added an expensive month subscription to Disney to get medicore controls. Seriously?? That's just plain greedy and anti-customer.
Sooo, I configured my nighthawk as an access point plugged it into the Orbi located near where my children typically use their devices, so I can have them connect only to the nighthawk and use the parental controls in the Nighthawk.
I haven't seen any interference or dimminidhment in speed in the Orbi connections.
Are their any problems that I'm overlooking with this approach? Or a better solution?
Re: Connecting Nighthawk router as an access point to Orbi
Your Nighthawk R7000 must be different from mine. I have my old R7000 connected to the Orbi and running as an Access Point. On my R7000, both QOS and Parental Controls are greyed out, i.e. not available to me. My assumption is that "access points", not being "routers", cannot perform functions we expect of routers. If your R7000 allows you to configure Parental Controls, "Happy Day".
Re: Connecting Nighthawk router as an access point to Orbi
Yes, Orbi works as an access point conected to a router. The Nighthawk will assign all IP addresses, perform any "router stuff" like port forwarding, VPN, etc. If the Parental Controls on Nighthawk meet your needs, it should work.
Disclaimer: I have no need for Parental Controls, and thus have never spent any time looking at them. I believe Netgear is also pushing Disney Circle for Nighthawk, so maybe there are customers who find the native Nighthawk controls inadequate.
