Orbi drops wifi for iPad Pro, iPhone 7 and Macbook Pro intermittently

[thebishop]

It can be due to a number of different factors:

- Placement of main/sattelite devices and how they interact for roaming between the devices (the placement could possibly matter if this firmware logic is non-robust)

- Problems in handling specific clients (e.g. 2.4 vs 5GHz bands, whether using multiple streams etc)

- Any other differences in configuration and setup that would make the software to use a different logic path (software systems are complex, so it could be for a wide range of reasons)

- Actual differences in hardware 

So those who are unaffected could have different placements, different clients, different configuration, ... The only way to know for sure is to reproduce and capture relevant logs and then have Engineering analyze it.

As noted by someone else, all my devices were rock solid with the old Apple Time Capsule wifi as well as with a Huawei B593 wifi previously, so obviously it is an issue with the Orbi system.

[Tingyunliu]

To thebishop, thanks a lot.  It's very clear to me now.

[loomis1975]

I think this is a long shot, but maybe worth a try.  The one thing I did early on (last year) that helped with a lot of disconnecting/reconnecting problems on an Ipad Air was turn the transmit power on 2.4 ghz down. I would start at 50 percent and test it out a bit, and then drop to 25 percent for another reference point.

I think the biggest differences most of us have are probably distances between router and satellite(s) and the building materials therein that signals are passing through.  It is easy to get too much 2.4 ghz thrown around by both routers and satellites. I don't have very many devices that rely on 2.4 ghz only, so it wasn't much of a sacrifice to do this and it seemed to help, so I've never messed with it since.

This might be entirely unrelated to the big majority of all these problems and we might just have to wait for firmware updates to see if it gets better.

[Tingyunliu]

I have very limited knowledge about wifi.  How to do this?  I'd like to try.  Thanks.

was turn the transmit power on 2.4 ghz down. I would start at 50 percent and test it out a bit, and then drop to 25 percent for another reference point.

[thebishop]

Perhaps worth a try, but as a workaround only, one of the reasons for moving to Orbi was to blanket the whole house with no-compromise rock-solid wifi regardless of client device, and decreasing transmit power albeit for older devices, would be contrarian with this goal 😉

[Jako888]

The other difference between us will be region.

I am only guessing here - but could the region setting impact this at all?

I have the drop outs and I have region set to Europe.  My settings are exactlh the same as the user who shared the screenshots and had not drop outs. Only difference is region - his / hers was Singapore.

Just guessing - and starting to get a little annoyed that Netgear is taking this long to fix the issue.

[thebishop]

I also have Europe for region.

[tucsontico]

I was initially having similar problems and I, too, am running firmware v1.4.0.34. I discovered that moving the satellite to a slightly different location (only 8-10 feet) helped a lot. Additionally, do not enable the Guest Network. The Guest Network appears to cause poor connections and dropouts in my situation but my region is North America.  Once I got the satellite placement correct and the Guest Network disabled, the system has been rock solid and I'm getting strong wifi signals all through–and ouside–my 3000 sq ft (concrete block and stucco constrcution) house.

[Retired_Member]

It's a known issue in Netgears firmware which they say they are working on to fix.  They been collecting logs from mine and a few other peoples devices.  It drops our iOS devices (iphone 7s, ipads) and Android devices (Samsung S7 Edge, LG V20).  

[thebishop]

I tried moving the sattelit as far as possible, but still dropping (possibly not as often though).

killabandit, thanks, if that is the case there is still hope 😉 I just want to state it also drops for macOS Macbook Pro laptops, not only mobile devices. Lets see how the next firmware works out. Anyone who knows approximately the cadence of new updates?

To Netgear Engineering: I would be happy to both provide additional debug logs and/or try out beta firmware if you need external testers with reproducible fail cases. 

[Robofski]

Any update on this issue, I'm experiencing the same problem with multiple iPads.  About ready to box it up and return! 

[wongja]

Same here 

both my ipad pro and iphone constantly drops connectipn

its frustrating.

[thebishop]

I have reason to believe it is still being worked on, one would hope to see a new firmware addressing it with unknown ETA.

Looking forward to a) see it sorted out b) being able to get one additional RBS50 here in Europe... 

[colts_guy]

I am having the same issue with our iphone 7's as well.  The Orbi's work great for everything else but unfortuantly I am going to have to return them if a fix is not found soon as it is a must for our mobile devices to work with it.

[bowmah]

Add me on the list. The first few days were pretty solid then recently, I am also noticing drops from iOS devices. Reconnecting brings thing back to life but this is getting very annoying. This system cost an arm and a leg and I am getting intermittent drops. Yikes!

I hope it's true the Netgear engineers are still working on this and that the fix has not been rolled out in a recent firmware because the issue is still happening.

[hodipo]

Add me on the list as well. IPad keeps dropping while other iOS work fine.

Resetting Network on iPad or even complete newly configured iPad did not work.

This is really sad since the Orbi as such is great

[Retired_Member]

iCraps didn't work reliability on my AC88u, AC87u or my AC68u.   Stop using iCrap.

[rivets]

IPad and iPhone dropping connections randomly and had a lot of battery drain due to repeated reconnecting but this is also random. But streamed from iPad over airplay to Apple TV for 2+ hours last night without any glitches at all which is much better than with previous wifi set up. All very strange. Never had this kind of problem on any other wifi setup anywhere so definitely an Orbi problem of some kind. 

I'm using the latest firmware. 

[thebishop]

Stay tuned...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsqZDl99PNk

[rivets]

 https://youtu.be/LmW5McLF-Uk

[rivets]

1.9.1.12 is still dropping connections so not fixed yet. 

[lovingbenji]

Same problem here

I must admit I am very disapointed by my ORBI36 (above all regarding the price). My iPhone 7S, Ipad(s) are constantly disconnecting ... very annoying.

And I just upgraded to the latest firmware. Still the same.

Netgear WHAT ARE YOU DOING ?! if you are unable to fix this just tell us QUICK and we'll have time to return our Orbi and buy another (working) brand.

[rivets]

I have moved my satellite as far as I can get it from the router and everything seems to be working fine. No dropouts since I did this and I have re-enabled beam forming and MIMO. Apple/Sonos house. 

I have 2.4 on 25% and Orbi on channel 1 and Sonos on channel 11 with one Sonos wired into the router. 

[fbraz50]

Disable the guest network. That's something for me to try and disable... Over the last few days I've been having consistent drops with my Orbi system as well. This is the second set of these units that I have had. The first set died within 30 days so I returned them and went out trying other systems. None worked as fast as the Orbi so I bought another Orbi combo. Everything had been working fine for several months until the past few days. Then all of a sudden my main desktop started getting consistent packet loss through the Orbi system. Me getting back into gaming over the last month or so has made the packet loss very noticeable. I can now consistently drop completely out of Overwatch matches every 20-30 minutes. It's not fun getting EXP penalty because you are "leaving matches" too early.

What I have tried thus far:

• I restarted/reset all my network equipment throughout this process which included: Ubiquiti Edge Router Lite - Cable Modem - Orbi AP and Satellite. Alternatively, swiched the router as well.
• I ran pingplotter to www.google.com to see where the drop was happening. This was to see if it was ISP related or within my own network. I was getting packet loss to my gateway IP which was my Ubiquity Edge Router Lite. To isolate any potential issues with that router I switched back to my Asus AC68U Router with the wifi completely disabled so it is acting as just a router. The packet loss persisted every 20-30 minutes.
• I thought it was my Windows 10 Desktop or the wireless card. My Event Viewer showed wireless adapter issues so I thought the wireless card was acting up. I bought a new wireless adapter from a different manufacturer and the problem persisted. I ended up returning that new card and then tried a wireless media bridge to Ethernet from TP-Link (RE450). The connection was a bit more stable but still consistent packet loss every 20-30 minutes.
• As a last resort I turned off the Orbi WiFi units completely and re-enabled the AC68U WiFi and all my problems went away. I was able to game for several hours with no issues or drops. My home wireless coverage is nowhere near as good now but at least my computer can maintain a connection without getting packet loss.

I will switch everything back and try disabling the Guest WiFi when I get home tonight and test again. I hope the issue is that simple but we will see. I really don't want to look for a new wireless setup again.

I know what people will say and I wish I could have my desktop on a wired connection but I cannot for various reasons.

[fbraz50]

UPDATE:

Disabled Guest-WiFi and nothing changed. Same pattern of packet loss continued.

Seeing all these posts of new firmware made me wonder about that and seeing as I am a big boy and can manage my own firmware updates I tried downgrading from frimware 1.9.1.12 to the previous version. I figured I would try since my issues started a few days ago, around the same time this firmware was released. Nope, I can't do that. As soon as I downgraded my Satellite and then my Router they both auto updatd themselves to the latest version .

So the issue persists... Trying to find way to disable auto update on these things.