Orbi to improve coverage?

[mwhals]

My house is 2650 square feet and is one level. My R7000 is about 1/3 back from the front of the house and 2/5 from the right of the house. I have a poor signal in the room at the right back of the house and the room at the left back of the house. I am thinking of using my R7000 without the Wi-Fi since it is the firewall for my network.

I am trying to determine which Orbi would work best. The Orbi router would need to be in the same room as my R7000. I am thinking that a satellite in each of the two end back rooms would take care of my needs.

Any thought? Which models? My internet speed is 200 Mbps, but I plan to up it to 400 Mbps.

[mwhals · Accepted solution]

With the Orbi issues, I decided to try relocating my AC1900 Nighthawk to the other side of the office. This was great as it covers the whole house now. No need to get the Orbi in my opinion.

Thanks for all the help that was provided.

[FURRYe38]

I have the AC2200 Orbi system. Orbi router and 1 Satellie. I have a 5000sq ft house. It fully covers the house hold and a fair wide area outside. Operation, Range and Performance is stellar. 200/10 ISP service plan. 

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@mwhalswrote:
My house is 2650 square feet and is one level. My R7000 is about 1/3 back from the front of the house and 2/5 from the right of the house. I have a poor signal in the room at the right back of the house and the room at the left back of the house. I am thinking of using my R7000 without the Wi-Fi since it is the firewall for my network.

I am trying to determine which Orbi would work best. The Orbi router would need to be in the same room as my R7000. I am thinking that a satellite in each of the two end back rooms would take care of my needs.

Any thought? Which models? My internet speed is 200 Mbps, but I plan to up it to 400 Mbps.

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[mwhals]

The AC2200 can be the RBK30, RBK40, or RBK43 that cover 3,500 / 4,000 / 6,000 square feet, respectively. With an Orbi needing to be in the front half of the house and about 40% across, I am not sure if It needs two satellites on the back wall of the house on either end.

[FURRYe38]

Well I have my Main base at the far end of a 60 foot expance and 1 Satellite at the far end of the house. Total distance between them is about 45-50 feet approx. Ya, placement is key. However with the Orbi router and 1 Satellite (RBK30) in use, you have some room to put the router not as close to center in the house and use the Satellite at the remote location to help make the coverage better. I guess a good balance with placement will be needed. Size of your house may not require a Sateliite. My orignal house was 2200 sq ft. IF I kept the main host router centrally located in the house, wireless range was complete throughout the house. So maybe in your case, just the Orbi router will all that will be needed. 

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@mwhalswrote:
The AC2200 can be the RBK30, RBK40, or RBK43 that cover 3,500 / 4,000 / 6,000 square feet, respectively. With an Orbi needing to be in the front half of the house and about 40% across, I am not sure if It needs two satellites on the back wall of the house on either end.

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[mwhals]

My R7000 can not touch the back corners of the house. Either direction, it has to penetrate a bathroom and/or utility room. My house is much longer than it is deep. if I have the plugin Orbi on either end and a smaller Orbi router, maybe it would be good. I would have 30-40 feet distance between each satellite and main router. The two satellites would be 100 feet apart.

I also want my full speed internet in those back corners, so just having a signal is not good enough.

I could put the Orbi more centered since I have Ethernet in our living room area. I will try my router in that location. That will give me more information to figure it out. Maybe a more powerful router is a better option.

[FURRYe38]

Well the wifi power and range on the R7000 is different and probably lower than the Orbi system. 

From my placement and range and operation in my house, I get to spec speeds with the Orbi router and 1 Satellite. Been amazing range and performance for my sq footage house. 

If you doing 100feet then ya you may need more than one Satellite. 

I would first test the Orbi router and just 1 Satellite first, test the range and performances. Then add as you need. They can be daisy chained from what I'm told. 

[nicholb]

Another thing to consider is you don't want to put the satellite(s) in areas of poor reception. They need to be within the area of good connection so they can boost that over to the the poor areas. So if you put the Orbi router in the room where the R7000 is, you would want to have the satellite somewhere between the router and where you are not getting good reception. Ideally you want the satellite at the edge of the router's good reception area. Think overlapping circles. 

[mwhals]

I was not successful making the R7000 an access point, because I do not have a second router. I did find that I do get 100 Mbps in my back two rooms with just the R7000. I want to get closer to 200 Mbps all through the house and may go up to 400 Mbps service.

[FURRYe38]

The R7000 needs a primary host router to connect to when in AP mode.

The R7000 may not have the power or range to reach remote locations. Either adding a extender or installing a Orbi system would be options to review.

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@mwhalswrote:
I was not successful making the R7000 an access point, because I do not have a second router. I did find that I do get 100 Mbps in my back two rooms with just the R7000. I want to get closer to 200 Mbps all through the house and may go up to 400 Mbps service.

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[mwhals]

I am going to look at Orbi systems tomorrow. I will keep the R7000 as a router and firewall. The Orbi would be set up as an access point.

I am not interested in 2 band extenders due to the speed penalty and separate SSID.

[FURRYe38]

well if you think about it, Orbi is kind of using two ssids, just depends on location and which closer signal your device will connected to. The router puts out a signal as well as the Satellite.

The Orbi will be good for your needs. I would disable the wifi on the R7000 router if your going to keep it as your main host router. Then connect the Orbi up in AP mode.

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@mwhalswrote:
I am going to look at Orbi systems tomorrow. I will keep the R7000 as a router and firewall. The Orbi would be set up as an access point.

I am not interested in 2 band extenders due to the speed penalty and separate SSID.

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[mwhals]

I saw on Amazon a review of the rbk53 with a one story ranch house the same size as mine and they said it worked beautifully. We have 7.3 acres, so if the signal spills into our land, that is good since my cell phone would connect in the yard.

Amazon has the RBK53 for $20 more than the price Best Buy has the RBK43, so it is a no brainer for me. Either would work though.

I had planned to disable the R7000 wireless, so it would be one SSID instead of two. The Orbi would be used as an access point. Keeping the R7000 is important to me as it’s firewall has stopped a couple of attacks and the Orbi does not have a firewall. I could use a small Netgear non Wi-Fi router for the same reason. I may do that anyway to save space on the bookcase.

[Mikey94025]

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@mwhalswrote:
I had planned to disable the R7000 wireless, so it would be one SSID instead of two. The Orbi would be used as an access point. Keeping the R7000 is important to me as it’s firewall has stopped a couple of attacks and the Orbi does not have a firewall.

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I don't think this is correct -- Doesn't the Orbi have an equivalent firewall to the R7000?  For example, this post refers to Orbi's SPI firewall: https://homeservershow.com/forums/topic/11739-netgear-orbi-anyone-other-then-me-thinking-of-trying-i...

[FURRYe38]

Ya, you'll be good with what ever you choose to get. 

Regarding Firewall. ALL routers have firewalls, including the Orbi systems. So you could replace the R7000 router if you want to with the Orbi router and still have a secure router. However if your R7000 is working and set up well for you, then of course, disable wifi on the R7000 and install the Orbi as the upgraded wireless AP system. You'll be fine. 

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@mwhalswrote:
I saw on Amazon a review of the rbk53 with a one story ranch house the same size as mine and they said it worked beautifully. We have 7.3 acres, so if the signal spills into our land, that is good since my cell phone would connect in the yard.

Amazon has the RBK53 for $20 more than the price Best Buy has the RBK43, so it is a no brainer for me. Either would work though.

I had planned to disable the R7000 wireless, so it would be one SSID instead of two. The Orbi would be used as an access point. Keeping the R7000 is important to me as it’s firewall has stopped a couple of attacks and the Orbi does not have a firewall. I could use a small Netgear non Wi-Fi router for the same reason. I may do that anyway to save space on the bookcase.

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[mwhals · Accepted solution]

With the Orbi issues, I decided to try relocating my AC1900 Nighthawk to the other side of the office. This was great as it covers the whole house now. No need to get the Orbi in my opinion.

Thanks for all the help that was provided.

[FURRYe38]

Enjoy.