Orbi RBR40 WiFi disconnects daily

[Shahab]

Hi everyone, My Connection: Arris TM1602 Cable Modem (Charter) -> Orbi RBR40 router -> 2 RBW30 Satellites Looking to get help with my Orbi system as I am experiencing my WiFi dropping daily, often multiple times a day. This has been going on for almost a month now. My initial issue was that DNS wasn't working properly, it wouldn't resolve hostnames. That issue was possibly related to Circle being enabled on my system. I had issues updating firmware on my system, so Netgear did a RMA on the router and one of the satellites. After I got the new system, I updated the firmware on both the router and satellites, even though they were current, then did a factory reset per Netgear Level 1 support troubleshooting. With my new system, the problem changed to the connection dropping altogether. I have verified that my internet connection via Charter isn't the issue by connecting directly to the cable modem when my wifi connection drops. I have had a support case open with Netgear for almost a month now dealing with this issue and they have finally escalated the issue to their engineering team. The engineering team finally got back to the Level 1 and said that the issue seemed to be with the satellites and they gave me a beta firmware to install on the Satellites. They also wanted me to update the router to the latest firmware version and then do another factory reset. I did all that and still have the same issues. I have run several packet captures from the Orbi Debug page and going through the logs myself, found a couple of entries that repeat pretty often. Has anyone else seen these and know what they might mean? FIXME:osif_forward_mgmt_to_app: Event length more than expected..dropping 16.33.12.828163 HYDR bandmon ERR : bandmonMBSAHandleRawMediumUtilizationUpdateEvent: Failed to resolve channel information for channel 157 Model Name Device Name Current Version Router RBR40 RBR40 V2.5.1.16 Satellite RBW30 Orbi Satellite-1 V2.5.0.2 . Satellite RBW30 Orbi Satellite-2 V2.5.0.2

[FURRYe38]

What is the Mfr and model# of the Internet Service Providers modem/ONT the NG router is connected too?

What is the size of your home? Sq Ft?
What is the distance between the router and satellite(s)? 30 feet is recommended in between RBR and RBS to begin with depending upon building materials when wirelessly connected. https://kb.netgear.com/000036466/How-far-should-I-place-my-Orbi-satellite-from-my-Orbi-router

What channels are you using? Auto? Try setting manual channel 1, 6 or 11 on 2.4Ghz and any unused channel on 5Ghz.
Any Wifi Neighbors near by? If so, how many?

Try enabling Beamforming and MIMO(MIMO may or maynot be needed) and WMM. Under Advanced Tab/Advanced Settings/Wireless Settings

Try disabling the following and see:
Armor, Circle, Daisy Chain, Fast Roaming, IPv6 and Set 20/40Mhz Coexistence to 40Mhz only. Set Short preamble instead of Long preamble modes. Save settings and reboot the router and satellite(s).

[CrimpOn]

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@Shahab wrote:

 Has anyone else seen these and know what they might mean? FIXME:osif_forward_mgmt_to_app: Event length more than expected..dropping 16.33.12.828163 HYDR bandmon ERR : bandmonMBSAHandleRawMediumUtilizationUpdateEvent: Failed to resolve channel information for channel 157

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These messages appear in the Orbi log (the Orbi web interface, Advanced Tab, Admin, Logs)?

[Shahab]

• Mfr and model# of the Internet Service Providers modem/ONT the NG router is connected to: Arris TM1602 Cable Modem
• What is the size of your home? Sq Ft?  I have a 2 story house with a finished basement.  Without the basement, house is 2,500 Square feet
• What is the distance between the router and satellite(s)?  Router is in the basement, and 1 satellite per floor in the main part of the house
  
• What channels are you using? 2.4 Ghz is set to Auto and 5 Ghz is set to 48
  
• Any Wifi Neighbors near by? If so, how many? I have 2 neighbors on either side of the house
  
• Try enabling Beamforming and MIMO(MIMO may or maynot be needed) and WMM. Under Advanced Tab/Advanced Settings/Wireless Settings - Already enabled

[FURRYe38]

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@Shahab wrote:

• Mfr and model# of the Internet Service Providers modem/ONT the NG router is connected to: Arris TM1602 Cable Modem
• What is the size of your home? Sq Ft?  I have a 2 story house with a finished basement.  Without the basement, house is 2,500 Square feet
• What is the distance between the router and satellite(s)?  Router is in the basement, and 1 satellite per floor in the main part of the house
  Any chance of you moving the RBR out from the basement? Basements are not idea locations for wifi routers. Concrete and steel in the foundation will impede wifi coverage and performances. What is the distance between the RBR and RBS? 

• What channels are you using? 2.4 Ghz is set to Auto and 5 Ghz is set to 48
  
• Any Wifi Neighbors near by? If so, how many? I have 2 neighbors on either side of the house
  
• Try enabling Beamforming and MIMO(MIMO may or maynot be needed) and WMM. Under Advanced Tab/Advanced Settings/Wireless Settings - Already enabled

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[Shahab]

@FURRYe38 unfortunately connection for cable modem comes into the basement, I don't have much concrete in the house - just the foundations, I don't believe there is any concrete btwn the router and the satellites.  Distance btwn the router and satellite is more than 20 feet I estimate.

Netgear support wants me to take a packet capture from the Orbi mgmt page when the connection drops.  However I am unable to connect to the Orbi login page when the connection drops even though I have remote mgmt enabled.   Any ideas?

Shahab

[FURRYe38]

Take a wired PC and web browser and navigate to 192.168.1.1/debug.htm

Enable WAN/LAN packet capture check mark then start the Capture. 

Keep the capture running until you see the wifi disconnect. Once you see this, log back in to the same IP address above and stop the capture, this will collect the debug logs from the RBR and save to where you have your browser download files to. Send this debug.zip file to NG support. 

[Shahab]

@FURRYe38Netgear support portal has a 10 MB file size limit.   I don't know when the connection will drop, I ran the packet capture for about 5-6 and it generated a 3.5 MB zip archive.   Previously when the connection has dropped, I have connected a laptop via Ethernet to the Orbi router and been unable to get to http://192.168.1.1/index.htm or to http://www.orbilogin.net/debug.htm.  Based on previous experience I have a general idea when the connection might drop, will try a long running packet capture.

Shahab

[FURRYe38]

If the zip file is over size then post it up on a shared cloud site like google docs or MS cloud site then share the link to the file to NG. You want to be sure to capture as much data as possible so they can review and see whats happening. Don't try to capture a portion as it might not be enough to identify the real problem. 

[guilloryjc]

Did you ever get this resolved? I'm having the same issue and have been for months. I didnt know it was so bad and frequent till this quaritine. Out of all the discussions on this I've only seen 1 resolved and that was a product defect.  All of the other suggestions didnt help anyone.

I wish I would have caught this during the 1st 3 months , now they want to charge me 90 dollars to do what I assume would be what everyone has described. Its not my internet its this orbi product , I never had these issues before this.

[Shahab]

Hi,
After more than a month of problems, I was finally able to talk to a supervisor from the 1st level team who escalated the issue to level 2 supervisor, who then likely escalated to Level 3. The level 3 rep then sent me a replacement router, upgrading me to a RBR50 from the RBR40. I had a few disconnects when I first got the RBR50, but for the past few weeks it’s been running without interruption.
Make sure you have the LAN/WAN packet capture enabled and running from the Orbi debug page. Then when you get a disconnect, save the packet capture (if it’s still running) and send it to Netgear. Try to keep a tally of when the disconnects happen, date and time, what device you noticed it on, etc.

[guilloryjc]

Thanks for the response.

What a pain, I have the RBR50 and its happening 2-3 times a day. My 3 months are up and now they want $90 to do what I assume will not help.

Did you pay or were you covered ?

[FURRYe38]

What Firmware version is currently loaded?
What is the Mfr and model# of the Internet Service Providers modem/ONT the NG router is connected too?

What is the size of your home? Sq Ft?
What is the distance between the router and satellite(s)? 30 feet is recommended in between RBR and RBS to begin with depending upon building materials when wirelessly connected. https://kb.netgear.com/000036466/How-far-should-I-place-my-Orbi-satellite-from-my-Orbi-router

Any Wifi Neighbors near by? If so, how many?

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@guilloryjc wrote:

Thanks for the response.

What a pain, I have the RBR50 and its happening 2-3 times a day. My 3 months are up and now they want $90 to do what I assume will not help.

Did you pay or were you covered ?

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[Shahab]

I belive you get 1 year of support via e-mail and 90 days via phone, right?

Shahab

[CrimpOn]

Alas, no. 90 days of support. One year of warranty. How a customer demonstrates failure in order to get warranty coverage is a mystery to me.