Hello everyone. Here's my issue: I bought my R7800 about a year ago, when I saw that they were running fiber in our neighborhood. At that time we had 6Mb DSL and typically got 5Mb at best. As my old WN3000 was getting rather long in the tooth, I bought the R7800 in anticipation of better internet. 3 months ago they installed the fiber connection at our home. Day of install, we connected the R7800 to the fiber modem. 970Mb down, 980 up on Speedtest. Wow.
But...I noticed a few days later that the internet connection seemed to not be as snappy. Run speedtest. 670Mb down, 45Mb up.
WTF... Down router for a minute. Power up router. Run Speedtest. Back to full speed. Couple days later...same issue, same fix.
So, latest firmware - 1.0.2.82, QoS, off, no parental controls, no traffic metering, no settings I can see that would slow it down. I never noticed this issue with the old DSL, but there's a huge difference in speed there.
This is in a home with 3 people, rarely more than 3 devices on network. 3 PC's hardwired on CAT6 network, phones only on wireless when it's needed. Network consists of fiber modem, router, 24 port switch, wireless printer.
Now that all the base info is out there, and I know routers need to be rebooted occasionally because the memory tends to "load up" with crap, is there anyway to avoid having to reboot almost twice a day to keep the router running at full speed? Any odd/obscure settings I need to check?
Here's another piece of the puzzle - I had rebooted the router just minutes before I made the above post. Reran Speedtest, 914 down, 934 up. Made that post. Proceeded to surf the 'net a bit, just a few news articles. Reran Speedtest again. 614 down, 54 up. That was maybe an hour later. So something is definitely going on. And the Speedtest results are the same on all of our PC's, so it isn't a machine issue.
Just off topic. What kind of fiber do you have? I have AT&T fiber gigabit and with Modem BGW320-505 in IP passthrough with the R7800 and i’m only getting 700+ down and 150+up. I disable everything i could in R7800 but won’t get the gigabit speed. Do you have any settings that might help me? TIA
My fiber connection is through the local fiber provider - MidSouth Fiber. The modem is a Calix Gigapoint 803G and is just a modem, so I can't do a connect through the modem alone. If I reboot my router, and run speedtest from any of our three PC's, I typically get about 950Mb down, and 980Mb upstream. My problem is that with every other device off of the network but one, after browsing for about 30 minutes the speed drops off to around 670Mb down and 70Mb upstream. The speed doesn't get any worse than that.
I've tried everything except a 30/30/30 reboot and as soon as I get a chance - because that will mean setting everything back up from scratch, I'm going to try that. I'm on the latest firmware which I upgraded to without doing the 30/30/30 bit. Arrgh. When we had 6Mb DSL I never saw a problem like this.
So I really don't have any suggestions for you, other than making sure you have the latest firmware, and then doing the full reboot, though you said you were going through your provider's modem/router as a test, which I would assume you have in bridge mode in order to use the Netgear router. If you can't get full speed with the provider's setup, I would get them to make it work at full speed with that alone before getting your own router involved. You need to know that part is working as it should before injecting another piece of hardware into the mix.
I posted here hoping for some help, but so far no one from the Community or Netgear has replied so I guess no one has any suggestions about why a gigabit router which is great in every other way, won't provide full gigabit service. Maybe I should have gone with the router the provider wanted us to use (something called a Gigaspire) but with a router that was a few months old I felt that was silly and I didn't want to pay the monthly fee for their router.
I have been using Netgear products for a good twenty years with good results, but in this instance I'm rather stumped.
My fiber connection is through the local fiber provider - MidSouth Fiber. The modem is a Calix Gigapoint 803G and is just a modem, so I can't do a connect through the modem alone.
Being "modem only" does not prevent you from connecting a PC to the device and testing the speed and the connection. You are simply limited to one wired device. That test would tell you what you are getting through the service.
You said earlier:
Run speedtest. 670Mb down, 45Mb up.
How did you run a speedtest? Wifi tests tell you nothing, because they are client dependent, and even wired tests are unreliable because some test servers are better than others. I usually run a handful of tests on different servers.
You also said:
I know routers need to be rebooted occasionally because the memory tends to "load up" with crap,
I have an R7800 that gets rebooting once in a blue moon, usually when there is a power cut. So that sounds like a myth to me.
A key point is that you have used this R7800 with an earlier Internet account.
It is highly advised to reset the router when changing accounts, so that it forgets any settings inherited from the previous account.
I've tried everything except a 30/30/30 reboot and as soon as I get a chance
I bask because I wondered where you got the 30/30/30 resetidea from. (Reset and reboot are completely different processes.) It is not the usual way to clear settings when you move accounts.
A conventional reset is usually adequate. If you have already done that, then I doubt if the recovery reset – the 30/30/30 thing – would get you much further. If you haven't reset the thing since you moved from DSL to fibre, that is the obvious first move.
When you do have things up and running, be sure to disable anything that puts a load on the router's processor, such as QoS (a pointless exercise with fast Internet) and traffic metering.
If you still see the same symptoms, which don't look good, then you might need to get into RMA territory.
@JellyKate wrote: Just off topic. What kind of fiber do you have? I have AT&T fiber gigabit and with Modem BGW320-505 in IP passthrough with the R7800 and i’m only getting 700+ down and 150+up. I disable everything i could in R7800 but won’t get the gigabit speed. Do you have any settings that might help me? TIA
Jumping in the middle of, or hijacking, someone else's discussion is a bad idea. (It is also "against the rules".) If you want people, especially the Netgear team, to pay attention to your problem and offer tailored advice, then start your own conversation.
I use the speed test at www.speedtest.net. I test with several servers located all over the US. We have 3 PC's in the house, and I have conducted the tests with all of them. I conduct the speed test with only one device - whichever PC I am testing from - connected directly to the ethernet ports on the router. Normally they would be connected to my gigabit network switch. Nothing connected to wifi, nothing. All PC's are hardwired over CAT6 cable. I get the same results regardless of PC, so I have eliminated problems with any of them.
I didn't think I could just plug into the WAN port on the modem, so I'm going to try that and see what happens.
Many people here in this forum have mentioned routers needed to be rebooted periodically and while that works - for a few minutes - the speed problem reoccurs pretty quickly. I don't use QoS or speed metering, no parental controls. The only thing I change from factory settings is the password (I would change the username if it would let me), the gateway (router) address, and the wifi settings.
All of that said, I'll try plugging direct into the modem and see what happens and then go from there. I'll report here what happens. Thanks for your input!
Many people here in this forum have mentioned routers needed to be rebooted periodically and while that works - for a few minutes - the speed problem reoccurs pretty quickly. I don't use QoS or speed metering, no parental controls. The only thing I change from factory settings is the password (I would change the username if it would let me), the gateway (router) address, and the wifi settings.
Perhaps you could point us to some of those messages. It would be interesting to see why they suggest that.
Anecdotal evidence is never a good guide. A reboot is not recommended practice. It is something that people do when trying to fix problems.
Most people would leave the "gateway (router) address", whatever that is, alone. Why would they want to change it?
Things you may need to change are the ISP specific settings. A common one is "MTU Size". Your ISP should be able to tell you the optimum settings for its service.
Ok, I'll check that out. That being said, what is the best procedure for upgrading? Normally I just upgrade through the web interface and reboot the router. Do I really need to do anything else?
Well...same result. Upgraded to new firmware, rebooted modem, ran speedtest. Great results - 960Mb down, 970Mb up. Opened a couple of websites, went back and ran speedtest again. 675 down, 60 up.
Okay, since I finally got a day off, I sat down this morning and did the full 30-30-30 reset back to factory defaults. Only one device with hardwired connection. No other devices connected by wire or wifi. Ran speedtest.
Looks good so far. Browsed the 'net for about 30 minutes - just email and a couple news sites.
Back to the original problem. No Qos, no metering or Access control - all factory defaults. Firmware version V1.0.2.84
If you have access to a different AC adapter it would not hurt to try. Be certain the replacement has the same voltage and at least the same or greater amperage.
Another option is to flash with Voxel firmware from here: Voxel
Well, I flashed it with the latest Voxel FW, and...no difference. This is a strange problem and I really don't think it's a router hardware issue.
As I said earlier, if I reboot the router, or just power it off, upon startup I run speedtest, from any of our PC's, I get full speed. And this is with only one device on the network and without clearing browser cache or anything - though I have done that with no discernable change. My primary Browser is Firefox, but Edge works just as well.
Fire up every PC, phone and tablet (which gives me 11 devices on network - 4 hardwired, and 7 on wifi), but do no browsing. Still full speed.
And what I am calling full speed is around 940Mb downstream, 970Mb upstream.
If I just stop at that point and do no browsing on any device - so far I went 3 hours doing nothing online from any device, I can run Speedtest from any device and get full speed.
Browse the 'net from any device, just 10 minutes or so, then run Speedtest, and I'm looking at 670Mb down, and 45-60Mb up...
I may just pull out all the stops and go DD-WRT and see what that does.
I have the same problem with AX6000 and 2 XR1000s on gigabit fiber. I've tried upgrades, downgrades, and factory resets more times than I can count. On all 3 devices, up/down is ~940 at boot. After 30 minutes, like clockwork, it drops to ~670/70. I connect a much cheaper TP-Link AC1750, and speeds stay in the high 800s. Something has to be inherently wrong with how these routers are handling the speed or communicating with the fiber terminal.
Someone recommended using the Voxel firmware (there should be a thread here with the link in it). I tried that and have had no more issues since. It's a very easy change to make, the user interface is the Netgear UI so it doesn't look different, all the controls are in the same places. I have looked into WW-DRT, I think it is, and that looks like a bit more work to install and set up. I would try Voxel first, and if that doesn't work go the WW-DRT route.
Someone recommended using the Voxel firmware (there should be a thread here with the link in it). I tried that and have had no more issues since. It's a very easy change to make, the user interface is the Netgear UI so it doesn't look different, all the controls are in the same places. I have looked into WW-DRT, I think it is, and that looks like a bit more work to install and set up. I would try Voxel first, and if that doesn't work go the WW-DRT route.
Like any communications system it is important to have the system well grounded. If your ONT has a separate ground connection, make sure it is well grounded with copper wire and the connections are tight. Also make sure the AC power is well grounded per local code. The various devices and connecting cables have a tendency to collect a capacitive charge over time and it will interfere with data throughput.
With a cable internet system, the entrance box to the home is where the ground is usually connected to a ground rod and then to the coax shield.
Unfortunately, the best solution I can provide is to return it if possible and purchase a different brand. I went with a TP-Link AX6600 and have been EXTREMELY satisfied. Blazing fast speeds and a much faster web interface as well. This is there top of the line model, and they have a version of it with gaming features as well (priorize game traffic, etc.). They have a wide range of products at different price points, and in my experience, they all work very well. Best of luck.
