NETGEAR - Nighthawk AX11000 Tri-Band WiFi 6 Router - Black

802.11ax - the latest wifi standard is here, and i've got to say this router is a beast both in appearance, size and performance. So if you need Wi-Fi 6 this is the router to get. SETUP The setup was smooth – I’m a little old school and missed using the app and used a web browser instead. I went to routerlogin.net and was greeted with an intuitive and easy to use web interface. It guided me through the setup, allowed me to select the kind of the WAN connection I needed, set my SSID and the thing I found most interesting was the ability to register it for use with the “NightHawk” app but more on that later! For the next part of the setup – and I can’t stress this enough: UPDATE THE FIRMWARE! During the setup process it prompted me to update the firmware, the firmware updated and the setup completed successfully. Occasionally with newer products it’s absolutely necessary to update the firmware to ensure everything will work as expected. Overall the setup process was smooth and I didn’t need to do anything extra to get it to work. If you have a complicated ISP you may run into some trouble but I’m using Xfinity and it was totally fine. During the setup process it prompted me to login and register the router to my account for remote management. NIGHTHAWK APP The “NightHawk” app is what I wish I would have used this to setup the router. You download the app, login to your Netgear account and then scan QR code on the top of the router and you can setup the router through the app. I felt this would have been faster. However, the feature I’m most excited about is the ability to remotely manage your router through the Cloud. The features are fairly basic still but it provides the following: Device Manager: Shows hostname, connected devices. When you select a connected device under the list it shows the Device hostname, Link rate (speed at which the device is connected) IP address, Mac Address as well as which radio it’s using. I also noticed it allows you to “Pause” a device and disable access temporarily which could be helpful if you want to turn off access for someone in your home. Wi-Fi Settings: Allows you to modify basic settings for your Wi-Fi like the password, SSID name, security type, etc. Traffic Meter: Allows you to see basic information about the data usage on your network. I will say this – the app isn’t perfect. I’ve found it occasionally has trouble connecting to the router if I’ve just switched to Wi-Fi from LTE. I’ve also found that it’s a bit slow – when you select a setting on the main page it can be sluggish and I’m stuck with a spinning wheel. I anticipate this will improve with time. PERFORMANCE I couldn’t make this router break a sweat. This router laughs at my connection speed from Xfinity. I tested several different aspects of its performance the best I could. One of things advertised is that it is for very large homes. I live in a roughly 3200 square foot home and I put this router in the center of my house for best coverage. NOTE: All tests were performed using a Macbook Pro. I performed speed tests and then monitored the RSSI(Received Strength Signal Indicator). You can (On a Mac anyways) see your RSSI by holding down the “Option” key and clicking the Wi-Fi icon at the top. My home has a cold storage room that’s enclosed with 8” of concrete all the way around. With RSSI – the higher the number, the weaker the signal. Conversely, the lower the number the stronger the signal. I wanted to test just how strong the signal was. So I went inside the cold room and got the following: RSSI:-73dBm (Which was okay) Speedtest: 75Mbps/full upload speed. These results were fairly impressive. I also went to the opposite corners of my home in the basement which are typically trouble spots for other Wi-Fi access points and got the following results: Furthest Corner North: RSSI:63dBm (This a reasonably strong signal) Speedtest: Full speed/no degradation Furthest Corner South: RSSI:61dBm (This a reasonably strong signal) Speedtest: Full speed/no degradation I did some additional testing outside because I was curious to know how far the signal would reach unobstructed. I live on a 1/3 acre and have a decent amount of property so I was curious to see what the results would be. It’s important to note: A router can have a strong Wi-Fi signal. Your device can pick up the signal, but your device isn’t going to have the same transmit power to the send the signal back to the router. So the router must have the ability to hear/receive the weak return signal without it degrading too much. I placed the router in my patio and proceeded to walk to the furthest corners of my property: North West Corner (located around 80 feet away): RSSI: 53DBM Speedtest: Full speed/no degradation South West Corner (Located roughly 110 feet away): RSSI: 64DBM Speedtest:100Mbps/Full upload So for these tests I was thoroughly impressed with its range, and even more impressed that it was able to still provide me my full upload (or that it was still able to hear my device). With 4K streaming, I tested it with a 5th gen Apple TV 4K. Connected wirelessly it played YouTube 4k videos without a problem. I also tested it with Netflix Ultra HD movies and shows, again no problems what so ever. I even had it streaming two 4k streams at the same time – no problem. This router features (1) 2.4GHZ radio and (2) 5Ghz radios and I didn’t even need to use the second 5Ghz radio. Finally – To use the full wireless speeds of this router, your device must have a compatible Wi-Fi 6 radio to take full advantage of the Wi-Fi 6 speeds otherwise you’ll see slower speeds. FEATURES This router carries over most of the features from other Netgear routers. The OpenVPN feature is nice – it allows you to setup a VPN (Virtual Private Network) to your home network. This facilitates the ability for you to connect directly to your home network from anywhere in the world. The OpenVPN feature is handy if you’re somewhere where certain kinds of traffic are blocked, but you can use your VPN to still be able to access what you need to. I would suggest using port 443 and the option to send all the traffic through your VPN. Works great! ReadySHARE. This router has (2) USB 3.0 ports and the implementation of ReadySHARE is more feature rich than I’ve seen on other routers. ReadySHARE will allow you to plug in an external hard drive and make it a NAS. This could be helpful for storing movies, photos and music and being able to access them as a share on your network. It also includes ReadyCLOUD which allows you to access your files remotely via the cloud. 1 Gig/2.5 Gig WAN – I’ll just touch on this briefly. If you have internet speeds north of a 1Gbps this router is for you. LACP Ports – if you know what this is then you know what you’re looking for. This feature is generally found in managed switches, but if you have a device that is compatible (like a NAS with more than one port) this router negates the need to buy a switch for that purpose. OTHER The router runs really warm and actually has a fan on top. The fan only turns on when needed so I anticipate it will last a long time. For fun – because of the RAX200’s size and weight (and heat output) I was curious to see to what Its power consumption would be so I got out my handy- dandy Kill-A-Watt meter and to my surprise it was only using 12-13 watts. Pretty impressive. Overall – this router is fast and extremely powerful. It has a strong Wi-Fi signal and equally strong ability to hear the devices it’s transmitting to. I did not have any Wi-Fi 6 devices to test it with – but should be getting some late December and will update this review with my findings. I can confidently say it works great with everything I connected to it. It’s friggin’ expensive though – so if you ABSOLUTELY need Wi-Fi 6 – this is the router I would buy. In closing. Just make sure you: - Have a compatible Wi-Fi 6 device. - UPDATE THE FIRMWARE And everything should go smooth. If there any changes I will update this review accordingly. Additionally, I received this router from Netgear as part of a test and review program.

The new RAX200 is phenomenal. I have Comcast Blast internet which is advertised at 300mbps and since I got my new RAX200 I average 353mbps. The RAX200 supports all my devices from smart light switches to smart locks and 16 other devices without missing a beat. The only reason it doesn’t get a 5 is really no fault of Netgear just that some devices firmware wasn’t compatible at first. Overall a great buy.

My Netgear x10 router which was really good,but I have ax devices..so I wanted to be able get the benefits of the new ax standard..my 400mbps speedtest from my x10 went to 800mbps on the Rax200..using my Samsung s10+..I have 1gigabit Xfinity internet..wow..wow..wow..Awesome..if you have ax devices..get this!

I was an early adopter of the RAX200 (05/08/19) and have been pleased with it's performance. I have over 15 wireless devices connected to it and I am not getting any lag nor drops from those devices. I did have issues with older firmware but with the latest firmware version 1.0.1.12_1.0.41 it has been very stable. I am using a CM1100 modem with Ethernet Port Aggregation enabled and my internet speeds are at what I am paying for through my ISP. All in all I am happy with this new WiFi 6 router.

Replaced the x10 with the AX12 and man, this thing is awesome. Super pricy but if you have a lot of devices and streaming to multiple devices, this is a great router.

I returned the orbi mesh ax6000 for router, big mistake. I'm not sure who released this product but they need to review their work. I'm not an idiot and it took me almost an hour or resetting both my modem and the router in order to get it to recognize my internet. I changed all the settings to what suits me best and this is horrible. By horrible, I mean in all reality, the worst possible scenario for a wireless router. I have the Netgear cm1150v modem, this wireless router and gig speed internet. Sitting 10ft from the router, with an ax wireless device (laptop & note 10), I'm downloading at 110mbps. I can't imagine a world in which this is acceptable. The orbi mesh I just returned, I could be upstairs and on the other side of the house and still download (at the slowest) 500+Mbps. The signal with this isn't acceptable even with their "smart connect" enabled or disabled. I've tweaked every setting I could possibly think of and this never gets better. I'm not sure if a firmware update could fix this but I'm going back to the orbi mesh ax6000. Until this router can have an easier setup and better download speeds, I can't recommend it even for the "future proofing" people. I would strongly suggest you consider another wifi 6 router.

Swapped out older router for this one andmy internet got so much faster!! My other computer at the other end of the house also has full signal through wifi now, excellent range! Definitely recommend!

The Rax200 has been the best router ive owed, supplying the speeds I need. And having the best support towards the product. The Rax200 is the foundation for the future of routers.