u/CartographerPutrid39

Body: To all fellow users of the Netgear Orbi 970: Spending several thousand US dollars to buy this so-called 'flagship' Mesh Wi-Fi, thinking it would be a once-and-for-all solution, turned out to be the beginning of a nightmare. Netgear's extremely idiotic automated design and locked-down firmware leave us with zero protection in Hong Kong's dense living environment, suffering from continuous environmental interference day after day! To summarize the core problems of this garbage system, it is a complete design flaw and misrepresentation by the manufacturer: 1. Completely lacks manual transmission power control (Tx Power Control): Unable to lower the power ourselves. In Hong Kong's densely packed public housing and private apartments, it constantly clashes with external strong APs and fights for airtime, making it impossible to operate properly. 2. Unable to freely lock bandwidth or channels: 80MHz cannot be precisely controlled manually, and it constantly forces binding to UNII-1 (Channels 36–48). In Hong Kong's urban areas, this frequency band is a complete disaster zone with massive interference! 3. Wired backhaul is ruined just the same: Even after investing heavily in a wired backhaul, the manufacturer still restricts it via firmware, refusing to release limitations to let users freely choose or free up channels (such as UNII-3), forcing all users in Hong Kong to swallow this garbage UNII-1 channel and making it impossible to completely avoid interference. This is definitely not a problem with our local environment; it is that Netgear knows about this flaw yet refuses to improve it, using locked firmware to strip consumers of their right to properly tune their networks! Having already sunk our money into this several-thousand-dollar piece of garbage, are we just going to let them keep ruining our experience? I want to recruit a group of fellow Orbi 970 users who share this experience and are victims: If you are also suffering from this brand's locked power, channel interference, throttling, and refusal to open up features, and want to seriously figure out how to take legal action (such as filing complaints with the Consumer Council, seeking legal consultation, or even exploring collective follow-up), please leave a comment below or contact me. Let's stand up, those of us with knowledge and shared resonance—don't let a multinational corporation treat us like suckers to be exploited! 

Body: To all fellow users of the Netgear Orbi 970: Spending several thousand US dollars to buy this so-called 'flagship' Mesh Wi-Fi, thinking it would be a once-and-for-all solution, turned out to be the beginning of a nightmare. Netgear's extremely idiotic automated design and locked-down firmware leave us with zero protection in Hong Kong's dense living environment, suffering from continuous environmental interference day after day! To summarize the core problems of this garbage system, it is a complete design flaw and misrepresentation by the manufacturer: 1. Completely lacks manual transmission power control (Tx Power Control): Unable to lower the power ourselves. In Hong Kong's densely packed public housing and private apartments, it constantly clashes with external strong APs and fights for airtime, making it impossible to operate properly. 2. Unable to freely lock bandwidth or channels: 80MHz cannot be precisely controlled manually, and it constantly forces binding to UNII-1 (Channels 36–48). In Hong Kong's urban areas, this frequency band is a complete disaster zone with massive interference! 3. Wired backhaul is ruined just the same: Even after investing heavily in a wired backhaul, the manufacturer still restricts it via firmware, refusing to release limitations to let users freely choose or free up channels (such as UNII-3), forcing all users in Hong Kong to swallow this garbage UNII-1 channel and making it impossible to completely avoid interference. This is definitely not a problem with our local environment; it is that Netgear knows about this flaw yet refuses to improve it, using locked firmware to strip consumers of their right to properly tune their networks! Having already sunk our money into this several-thousand-dollar piece of garbage, are we just going to let them keep ruining our experience? I want to recruit a group of fellow Orbi 970 users who share this experience and are victims: If you are also suffering from this brand's locked power, channel interference, throttling, and refusal to open up features, and want to seriously figure out how to take legal action (such as filing complaints with the Consumer Council, seeking legal consultation, or even exploring collective follow-up), please leave a comment below or contact me. Let's stand up, those of us with knowledge and shared resonance—don't let a multinational corporation treat us like suckers to be exploited! 

The entire Orbi system architecture is absolute trash. The engineers behind it are complete idiots—they clearly don't know the first thing about actual network engineering and just package their lazy, half-baked ideas as 'features.' Their so-called 'Steering Engine' is a pathetic joke, using crude 'Airtime Management' as a lame excuse. The moment it detects any load, it blindly kicks high-bandwidth devices (like MacBooks or PCs) off the network as if they were interference, completely ignoring whether these devices require a stable, dedicated connection. This 'scorched-earth' steering mechanism isn't optimization—it's straight-up sabotage.

Furthermore, their so-called 'IoT Isolation' is complete amateur-hour garbage. It’s not real VLAN isolation; it’s just a rudimentary, heavy-handed filter that indiscriminately blocks mDNS/Bonjour broadcasts. It forcibly paralyzes the network's entire discovery mechanism, rendering devices 'blind' and making basic features like AirPlay unusable. The most infuriating part is the black-box nature of the system. There isn’t a single manual override that allows users to lock bands or define custom policies, forcing you to play a ridiculous game of cat-and-mouse. Everything from the steering logic to the broadcast handling is absolute trash—it’s a complete insult to any power user.
Please share this warning and don't buy this brand. I want their engineers and CEO to see exactly how garbage their system design is. It's a complete insult to any power user.

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I am in just complete shock that a $2,000 system is this bad. I've seen some posts about random disconnects with the RBE971 and I can say I'm part of the team now. When the system is online, it's amazing. But there is no excuse for any wi-fi system to just randomly drop connection 3-6 times a day. It's an unusable product.

NetGear's Support team is the worst. Every time I call to report the issue, their solution is to factory reset and try again. I could never talk to anyone hiring than initial Level 1 Support. After months of dealing with NetGear's terrible Support team and getting absolutely nowhere I emailed NetGear's Chief in-house counsel and their chief home product officer with a long list of my tickets being prematurely closed with no resolution. Miraculously, I started getting calls from SVPs in Support and Customer Advocacy. Now I was able to finally get somewhere with my issue.

I setup a computer for their teams to remote into in order to collect logs and troubleshoot. After two weeks of that, they built me a custom firmware and pushed it to my system. It did not work and the disconnects ended up happening more. Instead of 3-6 times, I was dealing with 6-10 times. They essentially gave up and confirmed the RBE971 is a bad product, but apparently have no plans to stop selling it.

They ultimately decided to send me a different unit, the AXE11000, and refund me my money for the original purchase.

Hopefully someone looking for a new wi-fi system reads this before pulling the trigger on the RBE971.

Release Date:
April 27, 2026

Enhancements:

• Enhanced overall system performance and stability
• Improved device roaming behavior
• Optimized steering logic to reduce connectivity issues and improve client experience

Download Link:

RBE971: https://www.downloads.netgear.com/files/GDC/RBE971/RBE971-V12.1.8.7.zip
RBE970: https://www.downloads.netgear.com/files/GDC/RBE971/RBE970-V12.1.8.7.zip

Firmware Update Instructions:

To update your product’s firmware, follow the instructions in your product’s user manual. To find your user manual, visit https://www.netgear.com/support/, enter your model number in the search box, and click the Documentation button on the product page

Last Updated:04/27/2026 | Article ID: 000070692