New Firmware -- Overtemp warning

[vanillaknot]

Turning off LAN port: Are you sure you don't have "ethernet standby" set? See screenshot.

Otherwise, sounds like maybe your unit is just aging prematurely.

I am also a rural user of my MR1100 as the household's main connection. AT&T service in my area is quite good. I get steady rates in the range 40-70Mbps, better in the evenings and on weekends, of course. I'm insufferably annoyed that I can't reasonably take the thing mobile, but fortunately we have another hotspot (Unite) that does pretty well, too. One of the big advantages of the MR100 for us is the LAN port to keep it connected to the household wired LAN as well as providing wifi.

The recent busy-ness of this thread is indicative of how badly Netgear needs to address the problem. But I doubt that they're listening at all.

[jpainter01]

Does the Nighthawk MR1100 log somewhere that it had an "Overtemp" warning?  Mine is plugged in 24/7 and feeds a SOHO router via Ethernet.  How can I tell if the Nighthawk is experiencing this?

[vanillaknot]

The only indication is the front screen, which will say "battery heat mode" plus words that charging is suspended. In this case, the web page indicators are stupidly wrong (see screenshot), because it says "battery charge status - yes" even though it's losing charge.

[jpainter01]

Will the Nighthawk overheat if you run it plugged in without the battery?

[JSchnee21]

I've only ever seen over temp warning associated with the battery charging status.  Though I've never run mine in direct sunlight for hours to see what would happen.

As I and others have commented.  For stationary applications, remove the battery entirely, leave the back cover off to aid with cooling (and/or add a small fan) and power the unit with a quality QC2/QC3 power adapter and USB-C cable (I like Anker equipment).

The wall wart that comes with the MR1100 is garbage and not QC2/QC3 capable.

If you want "battry backup" for your stationary application power the MR1100 from a separate UPS.  You'll need one anyway for your wireless access point(s) and other networking / security / camera gear.  Or a large 20K to 26.5K mAh portable QC2/3 capable battery pack

[jpainter01]

Thank you  JSchnee21

for the additional advice, especially for leaving the back off.  

[vanillaknot]

OH.

MY.

GOSH.

Two days ago, for no good reason I could articulate right now, I thought of doing something that I never thought would have the slightest interesting effect.

Today, I have a charged battery. In fact, I have one charging, and another (spare) charged.

Want to know what I did?

I turned off the @#$% screen.

That's all.

Apparently, that stupid little LED screen is what generates so much heat that the thermister hyperreacts and shuts down battery charging. Or perhaps the thermister is simply too close to the screen so as to make it too sensitive to whatever heat the screen generates. Don't know. Don't care.

See screenshot. Go to Advanced Settings -> Device and give it a timeout. It'll go dark shortly. Then it'll go cool. Then it'll go charge.

Let me say it again... Once more, with feeling:

OH.
MY.

GOSH.

[DingalThorpe]

FWIW,

I was looking for information about this not-ever-charging-the-battery-because-stupid-somehow MR1100 problem.  It is rewarding to see that it affects others.

I consider this problem solved for me.  Thanks!

Some data points that I've collected:

• Using the factory-supplied adapter, charging almost never happens, although it has charged the battery approximately twice in the four months I've had it, for whatever reason it decided to do this.  Ambient temperature doesn't matter:  The battery is too hot, it normally says.  (Although one time, it told me that it was reducing charging current to prolong the life of the battery, which would be lovely, but it still didn't do me the courtesy of charging it.)
• The modem works fine without a battery and the factory-supplied Netgear US 120VAC adapter, which doesn't support any iteration of QuickCharge.  I have used it this way continuously, with constant 24/7 data transfer (easily averaging over 10 megabits over the duration), for months at a time.  It is stable in this configuration, for me.
• According to the indicators on my QC II battery pack, QuickCharge is indeed being utilized if it is available.  I did not measure the voltage on the wire to see if it was 9v or 12v, or the current, though it would have been interesting to have done so.
• When using QC II, the status screen in the modem declares that the battery is "Quick Charging" and does actually charge it.
• Using an old 2-port Anker USB travel adapter that predates all iterations of QC, the battery does indeed charge.  It has increased from 3% to 12% over the past few hours (during which time it has been both powered on and actively transferring data), which is adequate for my purposes.

From this, I can deduce that QC isn't needed (but it's probably nice to have), that a somewhat-unremarkable, high-quality aftermarket power supply from Anker charges the battery without overtemperature alarms, that the temperature alert is a bug as-implemented, and that the included US 120VAC Netgear adapter is completely unsuitable for use with the device that it came with.