R7800 Still a good router?

[hawkward]

I've been a lurker here for quite a while, but now that I finally created a login, my first order of business is to say a very sincere "thank you!" to Voxel, Kamoj and everyone who has tested and made the Voxel firmware and various addons so useful and especially so reliable. I've been using the Voxel firmware for a couple of years now on my R7800, and it is great to own a router that doesn't EVER need reboots to restore connectivity.

On to my questions...

I have one of the older (maybe 4 yrs ago) generation of R7800 and it has been incredibly reliable, never dropping connections, etc, and I was going to recommend a friend get a R7800, but I have 2 concerns about the newer R7800s:
1). A while back R7800s were having flash memory problems that it seems were likely traced to Traffic Meter trashing the flash memory. Is this still a problem? Does traffic meter still need to be turned off for newer R7800s if you want them to last?
2). In another thread recently, someone mentioned that "enable telnet" has been removed in the latest Netgear firmware. Is that true, and if so, when you buy a "new" R7800 that has this firmware, is it no longer possible to telnet into the router? I presume I can just flash an older firmware version (or a Voxel firmware, of course) and get telnet capability back. Right?

Of course, if there's a better option today than the R7800, I'd be happy to entertain it, but one of the high priorities for my friend is reliable uptime, and the R7800 w/ Voxel seems to be one of the few ways I;ve seen to get reliability at the ~$200 (US) or less price point.

Thanks!

 

[HELLO_wORLD]

Welcome @hawkward

1) I do not trust newer memory chips, and I definitely would turn off Traffic Meter.
That being said, I have one of those newer ones (second one after my first one was RMAd because of this very problem). So far so good.
Even if the problem occurs, it is not the end of the world. I made a little utility that makes it work (used it before the RMA).

2) I am sure you can still flash @Voxel firmware from latest official one, but I never installed latest ones to firmly confirm.

 

[Razor512]

In terms of uptime the R7800 using the Voxel firmware has been extremely stable, but for other functions such as VPN and USB storage, the RAX50 does pretty well for the money, though the firmware is still a bit buggy when it comes to the USB storage. Basically if doing extended reads or writes, after around 1-3 hours it will randomly pause for like 20 seconds. I have no idea why and even if you run the debug function, it doesn't show any obvious errors.
This is an issue for streaming video because if a pause happens while streaming from the USB storage, then it will interrupt whatever you are watching for a time.


I don't use the traffic meter, and have not run into any issues with the flash storage, The R7800 has been working well for over 4 years now.

 

[jsmiddleton4]

Not a better router at its price point. As for now yes AX routers look good. They are too expensive and have firmware issues. The R7800 is fast and reliable.

 

[HELLO_wORLD]

I personally believe in separating tasks, and I am not crazy about a router used as a media storage, a print server or a downloading station...
For that, there are dedicated NAS, or SBC.
In that respect, the R7800 is perfect. Powerful enough to manage gigabit connections and add custom rules and advanced routing and filtering scripts (aegis, stubby...)
I would use also a separate device as well for VPN and DNS server (advanced adblocking, LAN DNS, etc...) as R7800 might not be powerful enough for that.

 

[Razor512]

While it is best overall in terms of performance (especially IOPS), to have a separate NAS, having USB storage on the router provides an energy efficient way of having bulk storage for feeding devices such as smart TVs and other media streaming devices while using a tiny fraction of the power of a NAS. Even if you have a NAS, USB storage on the router can mean the NAS idle and on a low power state.

A fire stick using VLC to stream from the USB storage on the router, performs about the same as if the media files were stored on high end NAS.
Since it seems to prioritize core routing functions, using the storage functions does not really impact overall networking performance, instead the USB performance will slow down as needed.
The same largely applies when using the VPN function as well. While none of these value add features will perform as well as having a separate device handle it, if the performance needs are not very high, it makes for a rather energy efficient and cheap way to handle those tasks.

 

[bartj12]

Fully agree with this!
If you use the R7800 as router it is very fast and rock stable.
I use a simple raspberry pi zero w as pi-hole dns and dhcp server. Rp3 for hassio and wireguard. Works like a charm.

I personally believe in separating tasks, and I am not crazy about a router used as a media storage, a print server or a downloading station...
For that, there are dedicated NAS, or SBC.
In that respect, the R7800 is perfect. Powerful enough to manage gigabit connections and add custom rules and advanced routing and filtering scripts (aegis, stubby...)
I would use also a separate device as well for VPN and DNS server (advanced adblocking, LAN DNS, etc...) as R7800 might not be powerful enough for that.

 

[Voxel]

R7800 is a workhorse... Cost/performance.

AX routers: Interesting. Promising. But: a dark horse yet.

IMO.

Voxel.

 

[HELLO_wORLD]

While it is best overall in terms of performance (especially IOPS), to have a separate NAS, having USB storage on the router provides an energy efficient way of having bulk storage for feeding devices such as smart TVs and other media streaming devices while using a tiny fraction of the power of a NAS. Even if you have a NAS, USB storage on the router can mean the NAS idle and on a low power state.

A fire stick using VLC to stream from the USB storage on the router, performs about the same as if the media files were stored on high end NAS.
Since it seems to prioritize core routing functions, using the storage functions does not really impact overall networking performance, instead the USB performance will slow down as needed.
The same largely applies when using the VPN function as well. While none of these value add features will perform as well as having a separate device handle it, if the performance needs are not very high, it makes for a rather energy efficient and cheap way to handle those tasks.

Don’t get me wrong,
I think it is nice that a router is able to do those things, and it can makes sense in a simple household setup. One family using internet for common tasks, wanting a simple setup: they plug their printer on the router, and use a stick to do some file sharing.
For a more complex setup, or more advanced users, the separation of devices makes a lot of sense.
A single SBC like an Odroid C4 (or even C2) is very energy efficient and can do many tasks as a companion to the router (pihole, dns server and sinkhole, smokeping, media server, home automation...), and even then, ideally, I would have one device for router assisting (network and filtering), and another for media server.

 

[ulaganath]

Dont jump for AX now rather wait for couple of months AX-E based routers are in pipeline. Asus already have flagship AXE11000 in rog site. Other's will be eventually start. For now R7800 is one of best all rounder for wave 2 . Easily can hand 20-25 devices without any issues. If there is some instability it could be modem . Move the routing to nighthawk then only use ISP as gateway. Never had a problem with Voxel firmware's Rock solid firmware and can run for decade if not touched . It already pumping in TB's for months.

 

[RMinNJ]

Yes my R7800 with Voxel has been stable and good. But if one needs a new router the Netgear stock firmware and support seem something I would not want to invest in.. ASUS with RMerlin seems to be the other alternative.

 

[Carolus]

Hello,

I have two R7800 routers Year 2016, one Main (V1.0.2.79SF) stays in the living room and one AP mode (V1.0.2.74SF) stays on attic
285 days continue running

The AP with Voxel FW is: a workhorse and stable!!
No droppings so far so good, The main is 157 days up with no issues!!

This is for my de next generation routers, and after this, I think maybe the Orbi 53 routers.

 

[Voxel]

Funnily. Let us vote what router should be next to support by "Voxel FW". My wishes: QCA chipset. Reason: re-usability of what is already done. Show must go on.

Voxel.

 

[RMinNJ]

Funnily. Let us vote what router should be next to support by "Voxel FW". My wishes: QCA chipset. Reason: re-usability of what is already done. Show must go on.

Voxel.

Regardless of the model that's the only way I would buy another Netgear Router.
//rant mode on against NG//
I ran into this when I brought my R7800 (not knowing about your firmware).. I was within 90 days of purchase so was able to open a case and work with them on a minor firmware bug. Support was ok. Imagine my surprise when I went to work with them on the 5Ghz they broke in that one release of firmware... could not even report the problem to them without paying for support. I was able to get a case opened and it was painful support..like I was the only one with the issue when everyone was complaining about it on the community forum...with no reply from them. They left broken firmware on their site and did not fix it for at least 3 or 4 months. The routers are thus basically unsupported by Netgear after 90 days..yes they will release firmware updates.. but one has no way of working with them to fix anything unless one pays them directly after 90 days.
//

RAX120 I guess? But I would be hard pressed to spend that much with NG support.

 

[kamoj]

Wait for an AXE router.
To me the whole AX-thing is a ploy to get money until AXE is ready to be deployed.
The current AX routers can not be update for 6 GHz band, since they are not tested and approved for that.
So I humbly vote for AXE router with QCA and open source code!

Funnily. Let us vote what router should be next to support by "Voxel FW". My wishes: QCA chipset. Reason: re-usability of what is already done. Show must go on.

Voxel.

 

[HELLO_wORLD]

I second the open source code statement, where hardware acceleration is accessible.

All the difficulties @Voxel is meeting is because of closed NG code.

 

[HWDan]

My concern is that AXE routers won't be cheap, probably $100 premium above AX premium routers (AND TRI-BAND?) which already hold an unwarranted premium over the same AC routers they replace.

Then the early adopters are the firmware beta testers for a year or 2, and that's before AXE clients even enter the picture. I'm betting on better AX routers to be more cost-effective ONCE AXE routers enter the market until AXE settles in, and that is at least a year if not 2 away.

 

[Voxel]

RAX120 I guess? But I would be hard pressed to spend that much with NG support.

One vote
Voxel.

 

[Voxel]

All the difficulties @Voxel is meeting is because of closed NG code.

You know... As far as I guess anybody can do the same what I did e.g .for ORBI RBK-50. The same could be done for AX. Enclosed codes or partially open. And for any NG router. Funnily. I do not understand why I am the first... Everything is obvious. Just some brainwashing.

P.S.
Go ahead with your project. It could be re-used for ORBI users as well.

Voxel.

 

[RMinNJ]

Read some positive stuff about the RAX50 but not the RAX80.. they are not Qualcomm based though.. Guess I would buy NG before Linksys...still selling routers with no firmware update since 2017..