RBS50 using backhaul and ethernet but not WiFi

Placing two Orbi units close together will normally result in the highest backhaul connection signal (and thus Link Rate and speed), but is not a good practice because:

• It produces almost no increase in the area of WiFi coverage. The antennas are omnidirectional (circular).  Whatever area of coverage that results (considering walls, building materials, obstructions, etc.), overlaying another circle with a center 5 feet away means that a huge amount of coverage "overlaps".  Only a tiny sliver of coverage is "new".
• There have been reports of devices "ping ponging" between access points because the signal strength from one (and then the other) will temporarily appear to be larger and the device gets confused.

Before Netgear removed the command line interface (telnet), there was a command that could be run to display the actual Link Rate between the router and each satellite.  I enjoyed observing how true that tiny footnote in the Product Data Sheet was about the backhaul Link Rate was.  Notice the original RBR50 claimed a "speed" for the backhaul connection of 1733 Mbps:

And here's the footnote:

And here's that command displaying the status of an RBS50 that lies about 20 ft away with 3 interior walls, wooden flooring, and floor joists in the path:

root@RBR50:/# satelliteinfo wifi
[
  {
    "mac address" : "A0:04:60:xx:xx:xx",
    "hop" : "1",
    "bridge mac" : "A0:04:xx:xx:xx:xx",
    "backhaul conntype" : "5GHz",
    "backhaul rssi" : "-68",
    "backhaul macaddress" : "A0:04:60:xx:xx:xx",
    "backhaul phytxrate" : "780",
    "backhaul phyrxrate" : "780",
    "backhaul parentmac" : "A0:04:60:xx:xx:xx"
  },

Instead of the connection being 1733Mbps, it is actually 780Mbps. This is still plenty fast for my needs and faster than my ISP connection.

I agree with the conclusion that the satellite is defective because another satellite placed in the same spot resulted in a 5G connection and the 2.4G connection "moved with" the offending satellite.  If it is within the hardware warranty period, I would request a replacement.

Ya, seems like the one RBS is faulty and would need to be replaced if you want the 5Ghz BH.

Recommended normal distances for normal operation of RBS, is 10meters starting. Closer causes wifi signal over laps and connection issues between the RBR, RBS and wifi devices. 

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Magixians wrote:

According to CrimpOn in this post, putting two units close to each other should not cause issues like that.

 

https://community.netgear.com/t5/Orbi-Wi-Fi-5-AC-and-Orbi-with/RBS50-using-backhaul-and-ethernet-but-not-WiFi/m-p/2395202#M148343

 

Reset and also firmware re-load has been tested, without any difference.

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