Problem: Netgear Orbi RBK50 mesh slow upload speeds on LAN and wifi

vishalrao

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Gist of the issue is that the RBK50 exhibits slow upload speeds on LAN or wifi *after* a reboot.

If I make a modification to the WAN settings (like change the MTU setting a little bit) and apply the upload speeds are restored to my 300 mbps up/down levels, but then again if I reboot the system it drops back down to under 100 mbps.

Netgear community forums seems to have many posts about similar issues but wondering if anyone has any ideas/solutions? Tagging @superczar in case you have any ideas since you seem to be experienced with networking gear.

Note that I have tried a bunch of troubleshooting stuff like:

  • Replacing my old Cat 5e cables with new Cat 6 ones.
  • Flashing various older versions of firmware and doing factory resets and reconfiguring everything from scratch each time.
  • Even flashed the so-called "custom" Voxel firmware - same issue - and in any case the firmware doesn't seem to be too customised/bugfixes, just some additional features like VPN/DoH etc.

So looking for any suggestions here.

Right now it seems will have to live with this unless Netgear fixes this (if even possible) with a future firmware update.
 

Marcus Fenix

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This is pretty odd.
I just tested my Orbi (2-3 weeks old) with a file copy test. (SATA SSD connected via USB 3.0 on a Pi) and a Samsung 2 TB PM863 SSD on a Windows PC and these are my speeds. Both devices are connected via Cat6.

Are you facing issues with upload speed from a device over wifi?



TBH I am not 100% happy with Netgear stuff as they are okay on HW side but bad on SW side.
 

vishalrao

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Are you testing on LAN only? My problem is slow uploads on the WAN (internet) connection side (speed tests uploads are slow)
 

superczar

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vishalrao said:
Gist of the issue is that the RBK50 exhibits slow upload speeds on LAN or wifi *after* a reboot.

If I make a modification to the WAN settings (like change the MTU setting a little bit) and apply the upload speeds are restored to my 300 mbps up/down levels, but then again if I reboot the system it drops back down to under 100 mbps.

Netgear community forums seems to have many posts about similar issues but wondering if anyone has any ideas/solutions? Tagging @superczar in case you have any ideas since you seem to be experienced with networking gear.

Note that I have tried a bunch of troubleshooting stuff like:

  • Replacing my old Cat 5e cables with new Cat 6 ones.
  • Flashing various older versions of firmware and doing factory resets and reconfiguring everything from scratch each time.
  • Even flashed the so-called "custom" Voxel firmware - same issue - and in any case the firmware doesn't seem to be too customised/bugfixes, just some additional features like VPN/DoH etc.

So looking for any suggestions here.

Right now it seems will have to live with this unless Netgear fixes this (if even possible) with a future firmware update.
Click to expand...
That's rather unusual
The RBK50 used to take longer than the average router to settle down after a reboot - which is also the reason I was using it with one of those small power bank type UPSs .
But upload speeds - either on LAN or WAN weren't an issue.

I did face an unusual issue with LAN subnets after I added a third satellite (RBS20) but that is a completely different problem.

I am presuming QoS is disabled?
The other suggestion, (even though it probably does not address the root cause) would be to use those DC UPSs - Generally I could let these run for months without needing a reboot
 

smnrock

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I had similar issue in Google mesh wifi when connected in bridge mode. Upload will not cross 100 mbps. But it was fine once i connected in normal(route) mode.
 

vishalrao

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Yup QoS is disabled but wifi WMM is enabled (I gues that is QoS for wifi) but I see the same issue over LAN too.

My fiber ONT is in bridge mode and the mesh is in router mode yes.

Will see if I can come up with further stuff to try, in the mean time just hope for a firmware fix.
 

Party Monger

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Seems like your router syncs the internet ethernet connection as 100mbps and when you change something, it checks again and gives full speed.
Basically 100mbps ethernet to 1000mbps ethernet. This could be both because of the cable, the modem or packet loss on the connection between modem & cable.

If that's the issue, it could be with the cable or the modem cable is coming from.
Since you tried different cable, you can try a different modem. Also maybe try different brand of cable. (amazon with return option).
 

vishalrao

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Yeah I will try a different fiber ont later in the day.