Received my RBKE963 router and 2 nodes last week. After encountering some shortcomings with the DHCP functionality, I disabled it in favor of a Pi-Hole. Not really germaine to the issues I'm experiencing, though, as they existed prior to the changeover to the Pi-Hole as the DHCP server and DNS resolver.
Issues
I have an old iPad 2 mounted to the wall in our kitchen. It's used exclusively to display a video stream from a webcam that monitors our driveway. It will not connect to the "unified" SSID or IoT SSIDs, even though it supports both 2.4 and 5GHz bands. It will connect to the Guest network, but since that has no option to disable AP isolation, the webcam cannot be seen by the tablet. The WAN address and port forward for the webcam is not accessible from the Guest network either.
An older Lenovo T420 laptop running Ubuntu 20.04 LTS would not connect to the "unified" SSID unless I disabled WPA3 in the laptop's network configuration.
Our GE Café range would not connect to the IoT or "unified" SSID. I was eventually able to get it to connect to the Guest network.
All other devices appear to be functioning normally.
Additional note: None of the above were issues for the NetGear R9000 (running dd-wrt) that the ORBI replaced.
At this point the only practical issue is the iPad. I really don't want to buy a new tablet for such a simple and mundane task, especially after blowing a grand and a half on this new mesh system.
I have a ticket open with NetGear regarding the iPad, but thought I'd post here both as a potential heads-up and an alternate avenue for a solution.
There was some early information about mixed modes causing problems with non WPA3 supporting devices. I presume some of these older devices may not negociate the handling of mixed modes or the system isn't doing it right...still. Why NG removed mixed modes from the Orbi 7 and 8 series early on.
What Security setting(s) do yo have for your main/unified network as well as the IoT network? Have you tried disabling AX mode for 2.4Ghz?
My main RBKE963 network is set to WPA2-PSK [AES] + WPA3-Personal [SAE], but I disabled AX mode for 2.4 Ghz and my IoT network is set to 2.4Ghz only / WPA2-PSK [AES]. I use the IoT network for a handful of difficult, older wireless devices that don't see or work well with the main AXE wireless network.
What Security setting(s) do yo have for your main/unified network as well as the IoT network? Have you tried disabling AX mode for 2.4Ghz?
My main RBKE963 network is set to WPA2-PSK [AES] + WPA3-Personal [SAE], but I disabled AX mode for 2.4 Ghz and my IoT network is set to 2.4Ghz only / WPA2-PSK [AES]. I use the IoT network for a handful of difficult, older wireless devices that don't see or work well with the main AXE wireless network.
I have not tried disabling AX on the 2.4GHz network, but I will. I don't want to do it right now, since I don't know whether that will result in a reboot of the ORBI(s) and that's a little disruptive in this household.
Unfortunately, disabling AX on the 2.4GHz radio made no difference; the iPad is still unable to connect.
It acts like it's going to connect to the IoT network, but complains that the passphrase is incorrect. I do use a long and complex passphrase for that SSID, but none of the IoT devices have an issue with it (and changing it to something shorter would be a huge pain in the a$$).
For security, I have the unified network set to WPA2-PSK [AES] + WPA3-Personal [SAE]; for the IoT network I have WPA2-PSK [AES].
