LBR20: How to disable WiFI?

[hazarjast]

Hello,

Maybe this is a silly question or I'm overlooking something but I cannot seem a find a way to disable WiFi on the LBR20 when logged into the administration GUI from my PC. I  would prefer to use a WiFi6 AP with this router and disable the onboard Wifi. I have never had trouble disabling wifi on any other Netgear router bur cannot seem to find the option to disable it on the LBR20 unit. Any pointers to the correct menu location would be much appreciated.

Thank you!

[hazarjast · Accepted solution]

No worries at all I appreciate your quick reply, especially the part about telnet, that was the clue I needed to get me on the right track. So it seems the LBR20 has some firmware variation from the reset of the Orbi line but in general they seem to have the same base which is OpenWRT Chaos Calmer which luckily is quite well documented when it comes to WiFi configuration and radio control commands. Turns on that you can actually completely disable WiFi using the standard OpenWRT binary 'wifi' with the 'down' switch. It does spit out a couple of errors related to the bridge configuration (br-lan) but the end result is that 'wifi down' does complete shut off wifi on the unit.

Of course this is not persistent on reboot but if one piggy-backs off one of the existing procd services used by Netgear Armor (Bitdefender) it is easy enough to turn off wifi automatically on startup.

[CrimpOn]

The Orbi product firmware does not include an option to disable the WiFi radios. The only thing you can do is to reduce the power level drastically.  The web interface allows the power to be reduced to 25%.  There is a method using telnet to reduce power further:

https://community.netgear.com/t5/Orbi/Further-Reduce-the-Transmit-Power-in-Orbi/m-p/1672260 

The Orbi channels should be set so as not to interfere with the WiFi6 product.

I am a bit confused as to the reasoning behind getting a brand new WiFi6 product and not using it as a router.

Care to share why?

[hazarjast]

Thank you for your reply and information.

I already have a robust mesh WiFi network, I simply wanted the LBR20 for its Cat. 18 LTE modem to use as either primary or failover for my existing internet. Not including an option to disable WiFi and only limiting broadcast power seems like a major oversight in design for a new LTE router especially since it was not released supporting latest WiFi standards.

[CrimpOn]

Once again, I failed to pay attention to the subject line. "My Bad" entirely.
Many companies sell LTE routers for fail over. Maybe one of those can disable WiFi?

[hazarjast · Accepted solution]

No worries at all I appreciate your quick reply, especially the part about telnet, that was the clue I needed to get me on the right track. So it seems the LBR20 has some firmware variation from the reset of the Orbi line but in general they seem to have the same base which is OpenWRT Chaos Calmer which luckily is quite well documented when it comes to WiFi configuration and radio control commands. Turns on that you can actually completely disable WiFi using the standard OpenWRT binary 'wifi' with the 'down' switch. It does spit out a couple of errors related to the bridge configuration (br-lan) but the end result is that 'wifi down' does complete shut off wifi on the unit.

Of course this is not persistent on reboot but if one piggy-backs off one of the existing procd services used by Netgear Armor (Bitdefender) it is easy enough to turn off wifi automatically on startup.

[hazarjast]

Confirmation of WiFi disabled as shown in GUI attached.