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

vishalrao

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.
 
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?

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TBH I am not 100% happy with Netgear stuff as they are okay on HW side but bad on SW side.
 
Are you testing on LAN only? My problem is slow uploads on the WAN (internet) connection side (speed tests uploads are slow)
 
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
 
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.
 
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.
 
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).
 
smnrock said:
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.
Click to expand...
what i meant was, i had upload speed issue when ont was in bridge mode and router was doing the authentication. But once i changed ont to do all the authentication and connected router to LAN port of ONT, the speed was normal, but of course with the cost of double nat.
 
So tried it with a different ONU (huawei HG8120C) and the issue persists :(

Can't think of anything else to try, so gotta wait for that Orbi firmware update, if it ever comes.
 
vishalrao said:
So tried it with a different ONU (huawei HG8120C) and the issue persists :(

Can't think of anything else to try, so gotta wait for that Orbi firmware update, if it ever comes.
Click to expand...
If the issue is on LAN too then upstream changes won't help i guess
Do you face this issue within the same node or only between different nodes?
(e.g. upload to wired device connected to RBR50 from client connected to RBR50
vs
upload to wired device connected to RBR50 from client connected to RBS50)
 
When you say node Do you mean I should test within the "LAN" from one device to another using something like iperf?

I've only been checking Internet speed tests from wired and wireless win10 devices and mobile phone and also the built-in speed test UI on the router.
 
vishalrao said:
When you say node Do you mean I should test within the "LAN" from one device to another using something like iperf?

I've only been checking Internet speed tests from wired and wireless win10 devices and mobile phone and also the built-in speed test UI on the router.
Click to expand...
Yes.. iperf server running on a wired gbe device and test with an iperf client connected to rbr50 and rbs50
And if that works fine then test with orbi set to AP mode.
this should help isolate where exactly the problem is (i.e. upstream or on rbr50 or on the link between rbr50 and rbs50)
 
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