So I am from Hong Kong and the first major mistake I made in 2020 is that I didn't read through this forum before purchasing the RAX80. Otherwise I would have probably gone for the Asus RT-AX88U.
My old setup was a 1Gbps line with an Asus RT-AC86U. Download speeds were around 600-640Mbps using a laptop equipped with Intel AC9560.
I have the iPhone 11 and recently upgraded to the Intel AX200 on my laptop so I figured why not upgrade to an AX router too. And here I am with my first Netgear Product and probably my final one.
I set up the router and updated to the latest .70 firmware, set separate SSIDs for 2.4GHz and 5GHz, chose an uncontested channel by using Wifi analyzer, the usual, and...well, you guys probably know what happened next from all of the posts here.
- download speed was very constant.....at no more than ~350Mbps. Dead at night 3am where no one is using anything. Same result across the iPhone 11, AX200 laptop and iPad Pro 2018 which I usually would have got 500+ Mbps. Max was around 400Mbps.
- The 5GHz network drops and reconnects every 10 seconds when I was in a Facetime call. Random disconnections and dropping to 2.4Ghz is also common.
- Tested the wired speed using the built in SpeedTest and was rated 940Mbps. So even my cheap $100 HKD modem is working as advertised while my $2800 HKD router is not.
- Tried the following "fixes": toggle QoS, using different channels, running it on AC, prioritize my device to Highest with QoS on, disable MU-MIMO even though it is an AC feature and I am running on AX, to no avail.
- Haven't tried the following which I will try tonight: disable Airtime Fairness, set static IP, set speed to 2400Mpbs max so I can use the other 80Mhz channels, or any other suggestions would be welcomed.
The slow speed is recorded when there is a grand total of one device connected to the router. One.
Thanks in advance for any feedback and comments. I would've returned it but unfortunately the retailer does not have a return policy. At least for now I have learnt my lesson, which is never to touch another Netgear product again. I mean even my old Linksys wrt32x is averaging 450+Mbps and Linksys is known for having slower speeds. Just totally unacceptable how an expensive AX router required so much manual toggle and can't achieve half the speed of a plug and done Asus AC86U.
As you already mentioned you have exactly the same issue as many people on here.
There is no issue according to Netgear, support will not help you & there is no firmware fix on the horizon.
The only solution is to throw it in the cupboard/bay/etc & buy something else.
Not sure if you have the 90days free support when buying in HongKong but it is worth a try to ask them to buy it back from you (one other user reported they accepted this).
However, in my experience the support is useless. The ask for lots of information, lots of log files but have no suggestions, solutions or feedback.... "lets try to take some more logs"...
Welcome to the community! We'd like to work with you on the issues you're experiencing. If you're interested in helping us debug your issue, please send me a private message with your contact info and serial number.
