This topic has been marked solved and closed to new posts due to inactivity. We hope you'll join the conversation by posting to an open topic or starting a new one.
Frankly I'm a bit surprised that this router is still getting firmware updates. It was released in 2013.
People complain because the firmware's not functioning properly but for some reason its a small set of the released devices. Not sure why but it tends to be more prevelent than other devices.
But to still be getting firmware on a 7 year old router? to me it shows an impressive level of backing by netgear.
I have a 3 year old tp-link C3200 that only got an initial firmware release and that was it. Nothing since. OR my linksys RE9000 from 3 years ago that only got the initial release.
its why I moved away from other companies. Not all of them even work on firmware unless its a major firmware bug found.
I still try out other companies because I like trying new things but I've found netgear to consistently update devices for longer than most.
@plemans On one hand it's true to be great to still get support for a 6-7 year old unit. On the other hand, it's still being sold new, so I honestly expect one or two more years of support.
What I dislike about Netgear, you only can open a support case for 90 days after purchase, there are other companies way better.
I also have an R7800 besides the R7000, and have there a data corruption issue (when it's in AP mode). Another person also had this and he could open a support case. He did receive after some months a beta firmware which fixed the issue for him. Since then was one or two official releases, but none of them included the fix from the beta. I can 100% reproduce the bug, transfer >300 MB of data wirelessly to a Lan attached device and the data is corrupt.
Regarding the R7000, I'm using it as a Bridge and have two issues in various firmwares. On 1.0.9.42, 1.0.9.64 and maybe also 1.0.9.98 I have the issue that if the upstream AP moves the channel because of a DFS event or similar, the R7000 stays offline and doesn't try to reconnect. I have to reboot it to get wireless working again.
On 1.0.9.98 I additionally had the issue that the LAN attached devices to the R7000 stopped realizing that they are attached or couldn't transmit data. Testing 1.0.11.100 now, release notes sound like this LAN issue might be fixed.
Going back to the old firmware now. The R7000 tends to disconnect around every 4 hours and after doing that a few times it doesn't anymore reconnect (it's in Bridge mode) and all LAN attached clients are offline. Only a reboot brings them back.
I have the R7000 (ac1900) too. The only way I found to keep the latest updates and still have no random disconnects is to turn on smart connect. I’m not buying another Netgear router after this. It’s ridiculous that it’s not fixed.
I purchased my R7000 router a few years ago and have been mostly running DD-WRT on it. However, recently, I purchased a dedicated firewall and since have converted the R7000 into an access point. Since I was not doing anything fancy, I re-flashed the latest native firmware. Since then, I have had the drop out issue, especially when I was streaming Google Meet.
For a while, I have reverted back to v1.0.9.42_10.2.44 and the router was solid. Then, I decided to go back to 1.0.11.100, however, after flashing the firmware I did a full reset and reconfigured the router from scratch (not by restoring the backup configuration). Since then, I have not had any drop out issues and the router is working fine.
I have been running it for 2 weeks since I updated without issues. I am continuing to monitor the situation, however, since I did a full reset, the router feels solid. I would recommend doing a full reset after the firmware update. It seems to have helped me.
I have another R7000 also running as an access point, which I have not yet updated pending a little more time.
In short, I was having issues, but after a full reset, the problems have not come back ... yet.
@Mike_Monroe wrote: I have the R7000 (ac1900) too. The only way I found to keep the latest updates and still have no random disconnects is to turn on smart connect. I’m not buying another Netgear router after this. It’s ridiculous that it’s not fixed.
The trouble is, for an unknown number of us, it's genuinely never been broken. And still I ask the question, why is it that for some of us, there is nothing wrong with the R7000 AC1900? That is a question that no one on this forum can answer. People can come up with their own ideas, but at the end of the day, some of us just aren't having any problems with the router even using the latest version firmware.
The thing is, we're not all using the same ISP's, we're not all using the same modems, we're spread throughout the world. Some of us have routers that are made in different countries often years apart. No one knows whether the internal hardware is identical to every R7000 AC1900 router ever manufactured. Different people flash firmware using a variety of methods, some wirelessly, some via hardwire and as harsh as it reads, some people undoubtedly don't actually know what they're doing.
Unless Netgear themselves come up with a qualified reason as to why some routers are working as intended and some are not, then this issue with the R7000 will just run and run, and seemingly it's been running on and on like this for years.
I checked the admin device list and it is correctly placing devices on the 5 ghz band. My speed is a lot faster than it was with the .42 stable firmware, and I am having zero issues. As long as smart connect continues to work correctly, I’m content with not being able to divide networks and assign devices manually since it will undoubtedly cause dropping issues again. Everything is working as it had for years until that dreaded update 🙄
First off, want to say I appreciate this forum and finding this thread. I updated to the latest firmware about 2 weeks ago and instantly noticed a change/issues with 5G just dropping out completely. Have had absoutely zero issues with this router since I purchased it in Oct of 2016 so I'm not quite at the 4 year mark of having it. I updated to the 1.0.11.100 firware and things went downhill immediately. 5G was absolutely horrible. Even when it was working I'd get weird speed lags where I was only hitting 16Mbps down load where i normally am easily over 100. I will also say that I was always pretty consistent with updating the firware but I don't know what version I was on before updating to the latest one. I can see that there are 4 firmware versions listed after the 1.0.9.42 so I would assume I was using one of them and hadn't had an issue until I used the latest version. I have gone back down to 1.0.9.42 as of today and immedialty noticed the difference. Going to have to sit with this one I suppose until they release a version that works out the 5G bugs, if that ever happens. Thanks again to everyone for sharing their issue and what they did to fix it.
Model: A7000|Nighthawk AC1900 WiFi USB Adapter - USB 3.0
Ah ok, my bad. Yes, I did a full reset about a week ago. The 5G started to drop immediately after installing the most recent firmware. As soon as the router rebooted and my devices were back online, I'd say within the hour I had the first drop. Nothing worked to fix it for meo ther than downgrading the firmware, unfortuenately.
To answer your question - there are *many* variables as to why it works for some and not others. Are you using QoS? WMM? Smart Connect? WiFi Security? Address Reservation? Guest Network? Parental Controls?
What about thermal issues? Is your router in an enclosed area? Do you have a mix of hardware Ethernet connections to the router and WiFi? How many WiFi attached devices?
Your firmware has to juggle every combination of these. My speed went from 200Mbps to 23 because I had WMM turned off.
Or it could just be a bad firmware upgrade lol. Most people have already scoured these threads for months. Trying everything known to God. For most, the only thing we did wrong was update. Years of stable routing all of sudden going haywire overnight....literally. Variables understood.....but they’ve been exercised to the fullest extent.
I was having the same issue with my 2yr old nighthawk router and it turned out to be a corrupted fire stick believe it or not. Everything I tried would not fix this thing downgrading software, factory resetting etc... Once I reset my fire stick to factory defaults it solved the connection issues immediately.
I don’t have any fire sticks. I despise those things lol. Mostly apple products (tv, 2 phones, tablet, iMac, iPod), 2 Xbox’s, a 4K Panasonic blu ray player, and a Samsung smart tv. Plus my home security devices. Everything has been pretty much flawless with smart connect enabled. So I won’t complain. I get to run the latest firmware.
It will show the current versions. on the bottom of that it says "show more" This will expand and show ALL the firmware updates. Select the one you want and download it to your computer.
Log into your router.
Go to the Admin portion and select firmware.
In that menu you hav the option to upload firmware from your computer. Select the file you downloaded. At some point it will warn you that the firmware you're installing is older than what you have. Ignore this and continue the install. Router will reboot and you will have your old firmware.
Understand this is a rough tutorial, but I think I hit all the bullet points.
Same issue. I've had the router for years. Its on auto update for firmware and at some point after a firmware update I have unstable 5ghz network. This is a huge issue and a real disappointment with this router after years of stable operation. Hopefully they put out another update to correct the issue. I wouldn't expect support on an old router like this except that it is still sold new instores.
It is surprising that when you go to any big box store in my area, you usually see this model being sold as new. It sucks that you only get 90 days of technical support and then after that, you’re on your own with troubleshooting, aside from the 1 year warranty.
Just for the sake of testing it, I updated my firmware again and the issue definitely is still there. 5Ghz keep dropping almost every 10-15 minutes. But when rolled back to the old good version (x.42), works like a charm.
@DragonWarrior I totally accept that to some of the contributors here that I am probably starting to sound like a broken record, but I'm still not having any issues whatsoever with the very latest firmware and I've been running it for 2 months now, no WiFi drops on either 2.4 or 5ghz.
I have made some 'tweaks' from default but nothing other than what I've already publicly posted. I did make one further tweak the other day, I now use my own preferred NTP server localised to my Region. I have no idea what the default NTP server is that Netgear use?
Just for the sake of testing it, I updated my firmware again and the issue definitely is still there. 5Ghz keep dropping almost every 10-15 minutes. But when rolled back to the old good version (x.42), works like a charm.
I'd be interested to know just how many devices you are operating on 5ghz band? I have a maximum of 9 devices using 5ghz WiFi at any time split between standard 5ghz and Guest. I'm just not getting any drops at all and this is what I don't get, why are you and others getting constant WiFi drops on 5ghz WiFi and I'm not? What's different about your set up to mine? Why does v.42 firmware seem to work for you and yet the latest firmware doesn't, and yet v.100 works absolutely without fault for me. It's weird isn't it.
