Orbi - Fast, Secure, Whole Home Wi-Fi Router (AC3000 Tri-Band Router) by NETGEAR (RBR50-100UKS)

Product Information

I saw the tecnique in a post recently. Alas, I did not cut and paste it into my "Orbi Tidbits" file. Again, this router did well with the medium distance tests, following a similar pattern to the short distance tests. Anyway to associate RBK50 Voxell Firmware with another Openwrt router Belking Rt3200 for 802.11r Fast Transition?

In the Purch Labs material-penetration tests, the Orbi router's transmissions were powerful enough to punch through a metal-frame wall, a ceiling and a soundboarded wall with little drop-off. (The soundboard figure actually improved throughput by about 8 percent; we're not including regular drywall because it has little effect.) It’s better in the snapshot version than the current release candidate. In either case, support and stability may not be good for a network you rely on #YOLO. find your Orbi model numbers, look for the device product label on the bottom of your Orbi devices. First three tests involve direct router-to-client communication, with client laptop moving to new rooms and floors. Second three tests add extensions to same configurations. Percentages indicate change in data throughput between two sets. Netgear has taken the lead in the race to create a home Wi-Fi network system that all but sets itself up.Configuration changes are isolated to the device or to the interfaces that are affected, reducing outages when something has to change. Recently found out that the snapshot and release candidate versions of the base OpenWrt have support for the RBR50v1/RBS50v1 (it’s the same hardware anyways, by default it will ignore anything setup previously and setup a RBS50 to an RBR50). Was wondering if anyone else has been using the firmware and has any experiences? Wireless standards: IEEE 802.11a, IEEE 802.11ac, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11g, IEEE 802.3, IEEE 802.3ab, IEEE 802.3u, IEEE 802.11n Firmware updates in 2018 have added more fine-tuned parental controls with the Circle with Disney app. This app allows parents to set up profiles for each member of the family, complete with age-appropriate content filtering, time-limits for online use, and curfew settings to cut off connectivity when it’s time to be done for the night. (We mostly liked Circle with Disney when we reviewed the standalone device. The app should provide similar functionality.) Netgear Orbi RBK50 review: Verdict

At some point, Netgear activates the Automatic Update feature which allows the router to "find" this new firmware and offer to load it. Customers who never look at the firmware update feature will be blissfully unaware of it. This process appears to be "rolled out". My RBR50, for example, continues to report "No new firmware available." No simple “add satellite/sync” button. Adding a satellite must be done manually on both the router and the satellite. The router can handle up to three satellites, but each satellite communicates directly with the host router in a hub-and-spoke arrangement, rather than in a true mesh topology that would let data pass from one satellite to another. We measured an average throughput for the NetGear Orbi of 216 Mbits/s with a direct line of sight between it and the computer. The Orbi ships with a semi-random network name and a unique alphanumeric administrative passcode that should be safe enough to use during the short setup routine. Still, you should change both the name and code to something more personal as soon as possible.After that, it's equally easy to add additional satellites by following the directions in the app and then pressing the "Sync" button, with the rest of the install done automatically. We had to update the firmware for this router once we completed the setup, but the app automatically prompted us and made it very easy. You can specify the power for each radio on each AP to further reduce radio interference and promote a better roaming handoff. If you want the expanded coverage of a mesh network for your home internet solution and are looking for the best — and are willing to pay for it — then we highly recommend the NetGear Orbi. It has good throughput and range, all while being very easy to set up and use, and offers just about all the features most people want. What Other WiFi Routers Should You Consider? If you want a resilient network that automatically adjusts when AP’s are down, you will have to manually configure it, e.g. use batman-adv to manage the mesh networking.

At some point, Netgear has the option to install the new firmware automatically, usually in the middle of the night. Customers who look at the management interface (or the app) may realize, "hey. the firmware updated by itself." Customers who never look at the management interface will remain blissfully unaware that this has happened. This process appears to be "rolled out" over a period of time. Signal strength, router and extension. Orbi extension (circle) added. Red is strongest, blue weakest. (Image credit: Orbi extension (circle) added. Red is strongest, blue weakest. Credit: Purch Labs) With the Orbi router 30 feet and two walls away, the Orbi extension projected 429.1 Mbps to a laptop one floor above it — more than double Google Wifi's performance.At 150 feet, the Orbi router still delivered 229.1 Mbps of throughput, nearly seven times Google Wifi's 33.8 Mbps. (To be fair, the AmpliFi HD had very similar throughput at 150 feet, and the Velop had 26 percent more.) With such results, the Orbi's claim of 2,000 square feet of coverage per unit might be an underestimation. When the Orbi system is behaving strangely, one step that is often recommended is to update the firmware to the latest release. This may be not so much in hopes that it will fix the problem as in the realization that the first thing others will recommend is to update the firmware. Might as well get that out of the way. Our remaining evaluations looked at the data transfer performance of the NetGear Orbi and the other routers. For both the 5 GHz. and 2.4 GHz. bands, we conducted the same series of tests using the iPerf3 software, with the average result of three separate trials for each test being used for the final score. We ran a test with a short distance (10'), medium distance (35'), and a long-distance (70') between the router base and our test computer, including a line of sight and an interference test at the short and medium distances for a total of 5 different throughput tests for each router at each bandwidth. The NetGear Orbi got off to a great start in the 2.4 GHz. metric, outperforming many of its competitors. None of the closed source QSDK special sauce, so NAT accel is out... for most this might not be an issue, but LAN-WAN performance will not use the NSS cores in the IPQ80xx chipset by default - there are community builds where folks have merged closed source in, but that's a community build, not something that someone can just do a git clone from Master (or release branches)

The NetGear Orbi got off to a great start in our pair of close-range throughput tests, averaging 55 Mbits/s in the line of sight test. The NetGear Orbi performed slightly worse in the 5 GHz. metric compared to its results in the 2.4 GHz. metric but it still did pretty well overall. Decrease in throughput (vertical axis, in Mbps) per distance (horizontal axis, in feet). The Orbi has a smooth falloff, and its results over five test runs (thinner lines) were very consistent. (Image credit: Purch Labs)

The Netgear Orbi RBK50 is one of the most powerful routers we've tested

OpenWRT and complexity as mentioned - it's not a big deal for an experienced OpenWRT user, but for many, OpenWRT can be a bit daunting, things are not "obvious" in some places... No Netgear software (bloatware) i.e. Disney Circle, Netgear Armor, Netgear Smart Parental Controls, Netgear interfaces, Netgear configuration utilities and synchronization tools, Netgear mobile app integration (Are these a pros or cons? you decide). Much harder to configure. Each AP needs to be configured individually from its own interface. While this is typically a one time task, it still requires planning and testing. With its MU-MIMO technology, the Orbi served several devices simultaneously. It stood up well to our informal saturation test, in which we played videos on Surface Pro 3 and iPad Pro tablets as a Samsung Tab Pro S moved data on and off a network-attached storage system and a MacBook Air played an online radio station. The video and audio came through on all devices without a skip, stutter or drop-out. Netgear Orbi RBK50 review: Setup and support Like Google Wifi, the Orbi units have color-coded LEDs. When an Orbi device glows white around the oval on top, it's starting up. When it's blue, everything is OK. But if it glows amber, your internet connection is weak; if it's magenta, your connection is gone.