Re: Bunch of questions before I purchase...

amiles248 · ‎2017-12-04

I am interested in having WiFi litterally everywhere. That being said I have a few questions:

1. Is Orbi limited to 1 router and 2 sateliites max? Or can you add unlimited satellites if you wanted to?

2. The RBK50 kit comes with 1 RBR50 and 1 RBS50. Adding an extra RBS50 is about 70% of the entire kit price. So my question is, can I purchase a second RBK50 kit and use the extra RBR50 as a satellite? RBR50 (as router) -> RBS50 (as sat) -> RBS50 (as sat) -> RBR50 (as sat)
3. If I already have a Nighthawk X6 AC3200 router and want to keep using it, can I plug the Orbi into one of the downstream ports from this router?

cyberprashant · ‎2017-12-04

@amiles248 wrote:
I am interested in having WiFi litterally everywhere. That being said I have a few questions:
1. Is Orbi limited to 1 router and 2 sateliites max? Or can you add unlimited satellites if you wanted to?
2. The RBK50 kit comes with 1 RBR50 and 1 RBS50. Adding an extra RBS50 is about 70% of the entire kit price. So my question is, can I purchase a second RBK50 kit and use the extra RBR50 as a satellite? RBR50 (as router) -> RBS50 (as sat) -> RBS50 (as sat) -> RBR50 (as sat)
3. If I already have a Nighthawk X6 AC3200 router and want to keep using it, can I plug the Orbi into one of the downstream ports from this router?

1. I think up to 4 satellites are supported, some ppl have added 5 even (not me) - have 2 satellites....can now space them apart in daisy chain or star topology w FW 2.xx series.

2. Been asked several times, seems it would be cool if possible but RBR50 can NOT be configured into a RBS50.....at least not yet (they are physically different port-wise)

3. Yes (I have the orbi downstream from an R7000 router (Lan -> Orbi wan)

aaz · ‎2017-12-05

1. Do you really need more than two satellites? The three devices cover my 4500 sq foot 3 story house quite well and go well into the back yard and the neigbors house.

2. No, but if you are able to purchase from costco they have the RBK50 with two satellites for just a bit more than I've seen the one satellite set elsewhere.

3. Why do you want to keep using your nighthawk? If you use it as a wifi router then your Orbi will just end up fighting for bandwidth with it. If you turn off wifi on it and use Orbi as a access point then you don't need such a fancy router. Either way I would sell it and use the Orbi as the router unless you have a really good reason for using a seperate router.

rugby49 · ‎2017-12-06

Have a 5000 square foot house, 3 floors. Have the RBK 50 and two satellites. Good coverage within the 4 walls. Not so great front yard and back yard. Works just not great. Might add a range extender to the patio in Spring to improve back yard. Only issues I have are the occasional hiccups with the PS4 and XBox. Both are connected into a satellite, used to be directly in the router, and sometimes download speeds will go into the kilobytes area. Never had a problem with Sonos or streaming.