The modules that make up the Orbi RBKE963 kit are particularly tall. © The Digital
The Netgear Orbi AX11000 (RBKE963) is the very first 6E mesh wifi system to land on our territory. As usual, the manufacturer is attacking the market with the top of the range and the characteristics of this RBKE963 bring together what is currently best in the consumer network sector. The RBKE963 is therefore a 6E mesh wifi system with four wifi bands with a cumulative speed of 11 Gb/s, including 4.8 Gb/s devoted to the brand new 6 GHz band. 10G and 2.5G RJ45 ports complete this high-end technical sheet. The launch price of this state-of-the-art mesh system is also skyrocketing: currently count €1699.
Netgear delivers in its mesh system a module that acts as a router and others that relay the wifi signal, called satellite modules. The Orbi RBKE963 therefore has three parts, but a two-module version is also planned, called RBKE962. The distinction between the modules is made by the presence of a yellow RJ45 port on the router, called WAN. The latter connects directly to your operator box or to the ONT box if your ISP allows you to do without its box (this is the case with Orange in France). The satellites are physically identical, but without WAN sockets.
The wifi characteristics of this mesh kit are in line with the current state of the art. The RBKE963 is a 6E wifi model equipped with three usable frequency bands: 2.4 GHz at 1200 Mb/s, 5 GHz at 2400 Mb/s and 6 GHz at 4800 Mb/s. A fourth frequency band of 5 GHz at 2400 Mb/s is reserved exclusively for communication between the modules that make up the Netgear Orbi AX11000.
For the wired part, Netgear has also seen very large. Each module has a 2.5G standard RJ45 socket and three Gigabit ports — only the router module has a 10G standard WAN socket. If your home is fully wired, you can connect your modules using the 2.5G Ethernet socket and activate the Ethernet backhaul.
Each module has a sync button, a reset button, and a proprietary power jack that the manufacturer also uses on some of its routers. An indicator light is present on the front between the bronze-colored lower part and the white upper part. A second very discreet indicator light, affixed above the power socket, allows you to know the status of the module during a reset.
As far as design is concerned, Netgear has taken up the characteristic shapes of its Orbi. The dimensions are impressive with 28 cm high for 19 cm wide and a depth of 8.3 cm. The weight is just as important: we measured 1.4 kg for each module. Therefore, it will be necessary to provide good fixings to your shelves if you want to integrate them into your decoration.
Ergonomics
The installation of the Orbi being identical from one model to another, you will not be out of place if you know the ecosystem. The easiest way is to install the homonymous application and let yourself be guided. The app explains with many steps the connection, the installation of the modules and their update. You can also choose the name of your wifi network (SSID), as well as the password.
Once the mesh system has been configured, two SSIDs are created: the first encompasses the three frequency bands with an ORBIxx type name; the second SSID, named ORBI-IoT, being dedicated to connected objects. Some of the latter having problems with the SSIDs which group together all the frequency bands, Netgear has circumvented the problem by creating a dedicated SSID on the 2.4 GHz frequency band. It is also possible to deactivate it in the application interface. Note that it is also possible to create an SSID only for the 6 GHz band specific to wifi 6E, which makes it possible to avoid roaming on the frequency bands, to benefit from the best possible speeds and, above all, to reduced congestion of the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz frequency bands, especially in cities.
The Orbi app doesn’t vary much, although we’re dealing with a high-end system. The options offered are the same as those of the Orbi RBK352. The settings are therefore basic, limited to the name of the wifi network, its password and access to statistics. It is possible to activate the guest wifi or IoT network, but for advanced settings it will be necessary to go through the web interface. Netgear has still not decided to include free parental controls, even with simple functions like time slots by user type, as offered by TP-Link or Amazon Eero. It will therefore be necessary to subscribe to Netgear Armor, billed at €99/year, regardless of the cost of this Orbi RBKE963 mesh system…
If you need to make settings not present in the Orbi application, you should access the system’s web interface by typing the router’s IP address (10.0.0.1) in a browser or go to the orbilogin address. com. Users of Netgear routers will recognize the interface and set of editable settings. It is thus possible to change all the DHCP rules, the DNS, or even to practice port forwarding. On the other hand, it is unfortunate to have to connect to the “webmin” to configure your VPN or activate the SSID dedicated to the 6 GHz frequency band.
Debits
To evaluate the performance of the Netgear Orbi AX11000 RBKE963 mesh system, we connected the router module to our operator box to which we connected a laptop PC via an adapter to the 2.5 Gb/s socket. We transfer a file (a disk image) of 4.73 GB from the first laptop PC to a second equipped with an Intel AX210 Wi-Fi 6 chip, but also to a fixed desktop PC located upstairs and connected to a Gigabyte GC-WBAX200 PCIe card with outdoor antenna and updated with Intel Wi-Fi 6E AX210 chip supporting wifi 6E.
Rates recorded during a 4.73 GB file transfer on the 6 GHz band. © The Digital
Connected to the 6 GHz frequency band, we obtain average speeds approaching 1.3 Gb/s, whether connected to the router (point 1) or to the satellite (point 2). Note also that the speed does not vary once connected to the satellite thanks to the frequency band dedicated to communication between the modules.
Once away from the modules and with a few more obstacles (points 3 to 5), the speeds stabilize at around 670 Mb/s. Thanks to its three modules, the RBKE963 largely covers our home, and even point 5 usually problematic takes advantage of high throughput.
Rates recorded during a 4.73 GB file transfer on the 5 GHz band. © The Digital
On the 5 GHz frequency band, near-end speeds are lower, around 800 Mb/s for uploading and just under 700 Mb/s for downloading. We also note that on this kit, with some exceptions, the speeds are always higher for uploading than for downloading. Away from the modules, the speeds decrease less significantly than on the 6 GHz frequency, which is normal since the higher the frequency band, the more the crossing of obstacles reduces the speeds.
Rates recorded when transferring a 4.73 GB file on the 2.4 GHz band. © The Digital
The 2.4 GHz frequency band of the Netgear Orbi RBKE963 offers the best speeds we have seen, at almost 300 Mb / s. On our measurement points 4 and 5, our test PC does not even bother to connect to the nearest module, which explains lower speeds than they should normally be.
In view of the results, if you are looking for the highest speeds, you will need to ensure that you are equipped with 6E wifi compatible devices and capable of capturing the 6 GHz band. Otherwise, it will be more reasonable to turn to a model that is satisfied with wifi 6 on the 5 GHz frequency band, such as the Orbi RBK852 or the TP-Link Deco X90.