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Forum Discussion
What you can expect with your Orbi system
I'm writing this mainly because a post like this would have saved me a lot of time and effort. If you're thinking about buying an Orbi system, or recently purchased one, here's a few things you can e...
tsig, would you care to offer any specifics on your setup to help others out? Which model are you using (and when did you purchase), how many satellites do you use, and how long has your system been up? What is your general usage pattern like?
If you read through the details, you should understand that many people like myself thought we had a great "set it and forget it" experience with the fastest speeds we'd ever seen. It was only after many months that issues started appearing. It also depends on how you use your system; there are use cases where the issue will never show itself, or will be seemingly infrequent, and a simple reboot will make it seem like there aren't any issues.
What worries me is the number of people that had a great experience for weeks or months before it all went south. It makes those of us that are still enjoying a trouble free Orbi experience wonder if we are sitting on a ticking time bomb that will likely go off when we are not home and the family has no Internet, no home security, no entertainment and the day after the return period runs out.
These community forums were created by Netgear to increase customer engagement and increase customer stickiness (make us keep buying Netgear stuff). What would help in that regard would be for the Orbi product folks to explain what the heck is going on, what is the nature of the bugs that caused a firmware recall, what is the roadmap for fixing them and what is the plan to test the fixes before wide deployment.
Roamabout - the good news is even if you start to have the same problems, it's nowhere near catastrophic. The worst for me would be losing connection in the middle of an action game and not being able to get back in time before the match was lost. In general it manifests as a freeze or lockup, so it stops you in the middle of whatever you were doing involving the internet (downloads, games, streaming, etc). Sometimes it comes back on its own, other times you can disconnect and reconnect wifi, and at very worst you have to power cycle your satellite.
I'd call it a major annoyance, but one that if you know about it in advance you might be able to mitigate. If I was going to keep using Orbi, this is what I'd do: the most important stuff I'd connect via ethernet, to the modem if possible. Next most important stuff, I'd connect via ethernet to the Orbi main router. Position the main router so that you're using it for the max amount of wireless items (cameras, doorbell, etc). Finally connect any Orbi satellites to a power source that can easily be switched on and off for quick reboot.
Obviously you shouldn't have to go to these compromises as it kind of defeats the whole purpose of a system like Orbi, but if you really don't want to spend more money you can kind of make the most of it with what you've got.
- I disagree with a minor issue. I work from home and cell reception is bad so I use WiFi calling on my iPhone as my primary phone. So disconnects are a major issue. I have lost phone calls and dropped from conference calls. Not good. Just got my system last week. Got it from amazon do returns are good. I’ll give it another week and the. Goodbye
What FW is currently loaded?
What is the Mfr and model# of the ISP modem the NG router is connected too?
Is the Orbi system operating in Router or AP mode?
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 them to begin with depending upon building materials.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?
What WPA security modes are you using?Try disabling the following and see:
MIMO, Daisy Chain, Fast Roaming, IPv6 and Set 20/40Mhz Coexistence to 40Mhz only. Save settings and reboot the router and satellite(s).If you updated to recent FW v.210, try enabling Daisy Chain. Some have mentioned that this seems to be working in reverse order, enabling means disabled actually.
Bsbrady wrote:
I disagree with a minor issue. I work from home and cell reception is bad so I use WiFi calling on my iPhone as my primary phone. So disconnects are a major issue. I have lost phone calls and dropped from conference calls. Not good. Just got my system last week. Got it from amazon do returns are good. I’ll give it another week and the. Goodbye
rphsiaThat is pretty much how my network is set up with most of the critical infrastructure on wired connections back to my switch which is where the Verizon router connects. The next critical layer that can only use wifi (such as the Ring stuff) is all connecting to the router.
The Sat's have some non-critical wired connections to printers and cameras as well as some smart home wireless devices and support for roaming phones/tablets. Annoying if they dont work but not the end of the world.
I am now into week three of 100% trouble free experience with the Orbi. If I had not found this forum I would be patting myself on the back for a good purchase that is doing everything I had hoped. No reboots, no drops, no performance degredation. Just that nagging doubt that this is all short lived and I would have more confidence if I was hearing encouraging noises from the Orbi product group indicating that they were on top of this.
rphsia Your comments are pretty much spot on, but I do want to point out that the impact of the drops depends on your usage.
If you mainly use your Orbi's for personal or entertainment purposes, sure, it's not the end of the world if it drops every now and again. In our case, there are 3-4 people that frequently work from home and require a stable VPN connection to do so (all different companies, different VPN types). We don't need too much bandwidth, but stability is key.
Due to the frequency of the drops, when people would work from home I got stopped to "look at the Orbis" 2-10 times per day. That's a lot.
I'm sure my usage is atypical, but the point is that the impact of the drops is all depending on what you do. If the issue was performance degregation, it probably wouldn't be noticed by us - though they may be signficant to others. However, since the issue is connectivity loss, it's a big deal to how we use our network.
What's sad is that many were saying it's the Chromecast/Android issue, but I've had all my Chromecast devices unplugged and uninstalled the Google Home app from my phone, and I am still having the disconnect issues with the Orbi wifi system.
It was a great system for almost a year, but these last few firmware updates have been a headache!
I would take a refund if I could get it, and would buy another brand. I am now recommending to everyone to stay away from anything Netgear.
Netgear doesn't seem to care, they already have our money!
