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R7000P drops WIFI connections frequently
I'm finding that the r7000P frequeently drops client wifi connections. I have two PIxel 2XL's that frequently get booted off the 5GHz wifi whenever you put any demand on the router. The symptoms are...
After many hours of troubleshooting, I've found that disabling the MU-MIMO function on the R7000P gives my devices a stable connection.
Advanced > Advanced Setup > Wireless Setting > [Disable MU-MIMO]. Apply.
I have been able to transfer several large files from a wifi device to a wired device without constant dropouts/disconnections at the expense of actually being able to use the MU-MIMO functions of the router.
There are either issues in the way Netgear has implemented MU-MIMO or an incompatibility issue with some other wifi devices on the network. Since I replaced the r7000P with a new one I suspect it's an issue in the Netgear router not my devices (I can't confirm this though as I don't have a different make/model MU-MIMO router to test).
Since MIMO is one of the main selling point for this router this also raises a few new questions.
No worries, I'll just have to wait until someone with a R7000P or a similar MIMO router has the exact same problem as I do to verify if what I did is a good workaround for my issue. (That's if Netgear doesn't solve it with firmeware update in before then).
It would also be interesting to see if someone comes along with a R8000P with the same issue.
joejoeinc, I suspect the problem would be more on the client side, it can't handle MU-MIMO and it drops it as the router changes how it operates.
Some interesting reading;
https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-features/33100-why-you-don-t-need-mu-mimo
From it:
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So the router end of MU-MIMO is a hot mess and support on the device end is nothing to write home about. But it doesn't end there. It turns out Broadcom also screwed up on the device side of MU-MIMO. Another little secret widely known by industry insiders, but by few consumers, is that Broadcom's 2x2 MU-MIMO client-side devices fall back to 1x1 mode when connected to a MU-MIMO enabled router. This happens with both Qualcomm and Broadcom-based routers; the problem is on the client side.
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Yes, that article is almost 2 years old, not knowing the state of the device with the problem (chipset and driver date) it is possible it caused the problem here (and with your situation). Not sure when the 'fallback' happens, but that cause a break in transmission and loss of the transfer even I guess?
Another 2 year old article, https://www.howtogeek.com/242793/what-is-mu-mimo-and-do-i-need-it-on-my-router/
A little different as it explains that 'pauses' in transmission can occur... and again, did the device just drop the link?
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The main benefit here is that instead of each stream being periodically (albeit very, very briefly) interrupted by the time it takes for the carousel to spin around once, a MU-MIMO router can keep its signal constant for those four devices, and fairly distribute the bandwidth to each without compromising the speed of any of the others at the same time.
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Again, this could point back to the device not handling it?
We don't even know how many MU-MIMO devices the OP has or how many were operating at the same time?
One of the reasons I decided against the R8000P.