NETGEAR Orbi WiFi 6 Modem Router AX4200

This Orbi system just replaced our Netgear Model C7000v2 AC1900 Wifi Cable Modem Router and two Nighthawk X6S AC3000 Tri-band Range Extenders (Model EX8000). My speeds had not been very fast considering the 120 Mbs I was paying for, and the extenders were dropping often. When we walked from one end of the house to the other, or out into the yard, the signal dropped sporadically and it took minutes to get it again. These were expensive pieces of equipment and didn’t work together very well at all. My husband and brother were always complaining. I got frustrated having to continually troubleshoot the problems, so I looked at mesh systems. The reason I went with the Orbi was because I saw that the satellites could be “daisy-chained” to cover our long ranch house and yard. (Placing Satellite 1, then placing Satellite 2 in a straight line from the Router to stretch out the signal for a longer distance rather than grouping them in a circle)
This Orbi Whole House WiFi 6 Cable Modem plus three Orbi Satellites delivers FULL speed and complete coverage to the whole house and the yard with no dropping. We can’t believe the difference! It was reasonably easy to install using the Orbi app on my iPhone, and I am not a techie.
Considerations:
The mesh system picks the band (2.4 or 5 MHz), not you; but it hasn’t dropped even once so no need to have to switch it based on distance from the router.
You can add up to four satellites. I have three and it provides great coverage, even through the exterior brick walls and into the basement.
If you put a satellite near a window, it gives coverage for quite a distance out in the yard. (Husband is out watching the ball game while barbecuing.)
It also works great for our Ring doorbells. We can now (usually) answer before the person outside just gets tired and goes away.
If you pick the same network name (SSID) as your old system, all the existing devices just hop on automatically.
The Rokus are screamin’ fast at streaming now.
This is by far the BEST WiFi we have ever had. It has been almost two weeks without a single drop. It has a Guest network feature so that friends can get on when they come and everyone loves it. I can’t say how the Tech Support from Netgear is, because I haven’t needed it. If I find any downsides besides the price, I will update this review, but right now we are loving it.

Connectivity is great! The 3.1 modem is on point with delivering over the 1000/35 I’m subscribed to when using an Ethernet cable every single time. Wifi is good too. The 2.4 signal covers my 1800 square foot home perfectly, even without the satellite. Adding the satellite, I can use my own wifi at my mother-in-law’s house next door (believe it or not, I love her being my neighbor lol). The 5 signal doesn’t reach quite as far, but it still covers the house well, and on it, I hit about 800/30 in almost all areas of my house including the back yard! Pro’s that have specific VPN and/or other advanced needs, this combo will do most, but definitely do your research prior to purchase if you fall into this category! The Orbi App is SOLID. Again, nothing too advanced, but absolutely meets every expectation I’d have of any other brand’s app and then some. I’d almost forgotten to mention setup; it’s so easy. I connected the power and coaxial cable (not provided), connected via an Ethernet cable, Spectrum automatically detected the modem and asked me to sign into my online account (Spectrum’s activation took about 10 minutes), scanned the QR code on the front of the modem using my phone’s camera, setup a password, changed the wifi name and password to something I like, and that was that. It took a total of 13 minutes (including Spectrum’s 10) to do it all start to finish. Overall, I’m very pleased with my purchase and experience. I’d recommend this product to anyone looking for fast, consistent, and easy internet and wifi!

I bought a Netgear Orbi CB750 that worked great for about 2-3 weeks!
It was a breeze connecting to the Netgear Orbi app and getting the connection process started. Just a few simple steps and then call my ISP (Spectrum) so they can complete the process and get me online.

After about 2-3 weeks of great service in most of the house, I tried moving the satellite a few feet down a hall to help extend coverage into the living room and possibly get some juice in the backyard. Unplugged it a few times and connected it to a surge protector, which Netgear does recommend. After a few days, I started having lags in my office, so I put the satellite back in the old spot and connected it back to the wall outlet. After I did this I eventually lost all the connections for wifi on computers, TVs, and security cameras. but our iPhones were still picking up wifi? yes, weird. iPhones must have magical powers 🙂 I was glad that my Hue lights and switches continued to work, just couldn’t control them remotely through the app.

I immediately started rebooting the Orbi satellite a few times and then resorted to factory resets. Over and over I couldn’t get them to connect and then did the same with the Orbi modem unit. I did this so many times that I eventually had to change my passwords for my account and still couldn’t get in to access any of the Admin settings in the app. On the third day, I called support, support couldn’t figure it what was going on with the app and why I was getting some strange error code when connecting the app to the Orbi. Netgear agent recommended connecting to my MacPro in my office and my Mac got all wiggy and tripped out on me. No connection at all through the ethernet cable, just made my computer do weird stuff.

After I got off the phone with Netgear support, I gave it a last-ditch effort, oh the frustration by now after 4 days! Already surfing online for anything comparable to what the Orbi offers or claims to offer, isn’t an easy feat, nor for the money and convenience of having a non-component set up with the simplicity of a combo modem/router! I finally gave up and went to Spectrum to pick up one of the modems they offer to customers and decided to go with another brand wifi mesh router to add on to it. When I got home something inside me said to give it another try, and although the app was feeling very slow and buggy during the setup, it was getting me through the process! Wow, I thought I was dreaming or imagining things!

I got to the point when the app prompts to wait for the IPS to connect the unit, 10 minutes went by and I got to this point twice before but had no luck, so I called Spectrum support and told the guy what was going on. He had never helped set up an Orbi system before and since Netgear is a third-party product, they don’t offer support. I kept talking to him about the problem I was having and he did say he’d try a revision with my MAC address and during the time I was on the line, nothing seemed to be working, so I thanked him and we hung up. And then!!! Just about 5 minutes later I checked back in the app and it looked like it was working!!! Can I mention that there’s a god or some friendly spirits watching over me today?

I had great coverage throughout most of the house except the living room, and great speeds as well, until I started changing the placement of the satellite Orbi a few times to get more range into the back part of the house and backyard. But something happened and the internet got a bit laggy at times. Eventually, it took a dump and stopped working. The app showed that I was connected but the only wifi I got was our to our iPhones. My office computer is no longer connected, the TV is in another room as well. By the next day, I had to Hotspot my phone just to use my desktop. longer as well as my wifi security cameras. The first time I had the problem I was able to reconnect them but 3 days later it crashed again and over 5 hours of

It was so easy to install but I have no idea what happened to the Orbi system, Netgear’s support team was amazing courteous, friendly, and determined to help resolve the issue, I’ve gotta give them a ton of credit there. Even after reading some of the bad reviews from other customers, I can still understand their problems and concerns with issues pertaining to the warranty period or some of Netgear’s policy, so I feel fortunate that I was able to figure out the problem with some great Netgear support agents as well as the Spectrum agent to help me through this. It seems somehow it was the combination of technical problems and possibly operator error that got me to this review.

Anyway, at this point, I’m very pleased again with the Netgear product and even more pleased with Netgear tech support so I would highly recommend this Orbi router/modem, it’s a powerful tool to keep our homes functioning in this current technological age of home automation and to keep those of us who work from home connected!