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Orbi WiFi 7 RBE973

Orbi Pro - Three Networks

schumaku
Guru

Orbi Pro - Three Networks

In follow up to a post by @alderud on the Orbi Pro community Please explain the three networks please allow cross-posting my reply here dear John. And please no "it works as designed" replies.

 

@alderud wrote:

My guess is that Netgear messed up their engineering and marketing of the Orbi Pro....but I am still hoping for somebody to save my sanity...

It might be worth to bring this to the attention of @johngm (the Small Business General Manager) as the people in charge (I'm told) @NaderA and @AbhayB play the head-in-the-sand politics as the common ostrich...we don't see anything, nobody can see us - so why bother about real world customer needs when it comes to the Employee network "design" or the long overdue replacement of the MD5 signed certificates by SHA256 for the Orbi Pro OpenVPN service. We're well in May 2018 where OpenVPN _does_ bring things forward and can stop MD5 usage with any day update (as they did on the OpenVPN for Windows client already).

 

@alderud wrote:

Well, to my surprise the “Employee” network is not really an employee network where connected device have no access to critical infrastructure, instead the employee network is really the same as a guest network where connected devices have no access to anything but the Internet....or have I missed something?

 

You are perfectly right. Printers are "critical infrastructure" along with any other LAN IP in Netgear terms.

 

Hey, this does save you from the second most helpdesk call problem. After the undoubted #1 "I have lost my password" the #2 is "I can't print." Sarcasm only, sorry.

 

@alderud wrote:

Who has employees that do not require access to a printer or a file server?

Netgear probably - as they design and implement such odd things.

Message 1 of 4
alderud
Aspirant

Re: Orbi Pro - Three Networks

I sent this message to @johngm:

 

Dear Sir,

 

I am told you might be the one to fix a major bug in your marketing or engineering department. Basically the Orbo Pro “employee” network does not behave as expected, especially since it is more restricted that the “guest” network of the Orbi “for Home” (RBK50). The way I see it you should either:

 

- Ask your marketing department to call the networks “Company”, “Guest” and “Guest with landing page”

 

or

 

- Ask your engineering department to fix the “Employee” network so that employees can access shared devices such as printers and file servers.

 

Reference: https://community.netgear.com/t5/Connect-with-the-SMB-GM/Orbi-Pro-Three-Networks/m-p/1562615#M114

Message 2 of 4
johngm
NETGEAR Employee Retired

Re: Orbi Pro - Three Networks

Dear Alderud,

 

I am sorry that the documentation of the product is not more clear.  The thought was that small businesses would have a "work" SSID with all resources which are required for the business and that the owner wants under direct control and authorization, an "employee" SSID for employees personal use which does not require the employee to traverse a captive portal to get to the internet and a "guest"  SSID with captive port for internet access.     We will enhance the documentation of the product to make it clear that Orbi Pro does not allow assignment of resources on the management SSID to the SSID other SSID domains.  

 

Thanks for the suggestion.

 

John

Message 3 of 4
alderud
Aspirant

Re: Orbi Pro - Three Networks

Thank you for explaining your thought process. That is most appreciated!

Message 4 of 4
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