Netgear AX11000, or more precisely, Netgear Nighthawk RAX200 Tri-band AX11000 is one of the most recommended routers. If you are thinking of a router upgrade for a faster and more secure connection at your home, then this router might catch your attention.
However, do you really need Netgear AX11000? This router is the best choice for larger homes, usually. Additionally, this router supports Wi-Fi 6 technology, but you can easily switch to its Wi-Fi 5 AC mode. This expensive router might suit your technical requirements if you crave extreme throughput.
Let’s review Netgear RAX200 Tri-band AX11000 to check whether it has got everything you need from a beastie router.
Build Quality & Design
Routers look almost the same, right? However, Netgear AX11000 seems to be a game-changer from the build and design perspectives. Netgear has realised a cool design for this particular RAX200 router. Instead of distinct and exposed antennas, you can notice wings.
Well, Netgear has integrated all the router’s antennas into its wings. On top of that, you can fold up or expand those wings at your convenience. Thus, you will get a neat and upright look with this purchase.
Coming to its build quality, this Netgear AX11000 features only 1 Gigabit Ethernet WAN port on its rear end. You might have expected a 2.5G Ethernet WAN port at this price. However, you can discover different configurations under the specific software. Aggregating the Gigabit Ethernet port with the WAN port can achieve faster connections.
Alternatively, you can utilise the 2.5G port on the rear end. Thus, you can get huge flexibility in terms of connection. You can also use the 4 Gigabit Ethernet ports and the 2.5G port to establish connections with wired devices. Besides this, the router offers 2 USB 3.0 ports on its rear side for fast sharing storage.
Netgear AX11000 Review: Powerful Features
The Netgear Nighthawk RAX200 AX1100 is a strong competitor to the Netgear RAX120. Both require the Netgear Nighthawk mobile app for setup. Also, they are aesthetically similar and have collapsible antennas. However, the differences lie in their features. You can use Smart Connect to set up the RAX200 AX11000 router.
With the help of Smart Connect, the router can select which devices should join which band. The perk of this connectivity is that you don’t have to stress about the configuration of each connecting device. On the other hand, you lose much flexibility as you don’t get to decide the most suitable band for a particular device.
This Netgear AX11000 review sheds light on the fact that this is a tri-band router. That means that you will get the following band options:
- One 2.4GHz
- One 5GHz on the standard channels
- Another 5GHz on the higher channels
Therefore, you can share the network evenly among your computers, smartphones, and other devices. Ensure you connect older devices to the 2.4GHz channel, as they won’t support the 5GHz channels.
You can sign into the web-based control panel for naming and securing each channel more precisely. The web-based admin panel lets you manage the maximum channel speeds, every network-channel combination, and more.
Additionally…
The 2.4GHz channel offers a data transfer rate of 1200Mbps. As this is a 4-stream network so the maximum speed of each stream is 300Mbps. On the other hand, the standard 5GHz channel delivers a data transfer rate of 4800Mbps, and it’s again a 4-stream network.
The latter 5GHz channel offers a data transmission rate of 2400Mbps with its 4-stream network. So, this Netgear AX11000 RAX200 router offers 12 streams and we found it impressive. The router is more than handy while handling multiple Wi-Fi 5 and Wi-Fi 6 devices.
This Netgear AX11000 router lets you control it remotely. The credit goes to the Nighthawk application that allows you to control the router, turn on/off the guest network, view connected devices, reboot, and so on.
On an interesting note, you can control the Netgear RAX200 Tri-band AX11000 router with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. You can try the dedicated parental control app called Circle. You might prefer to upgrade the version for the following features:
- Setting schedules
- Assigning bedtimes and time limits
- Blocking a kid’s access to one of his or her devices
You can access more advanced settings through the web-based interface. For example, you can opt for port forwarding, VPN support, BT IGMP proxying, and more. You can even improve both downloading and uploading speeds by turning on the OFDMA technology. This technology helps in enhancing the bandwidth by allowing a particular channel to be shared among multiple devices.
Coverage
The Netgear AX11000 RAX200 router offers an overwhelming range in terms of coverage. You can get coverage of up to 30-meter diameter for the 2.4GHz channel with this router. For the 5GHz channel, you can expect the range diameter to be in the range of 20 meters or so.
If you are eager to improve the overall coverage of your router connection, consider a mesh network from Netgear. The Netgear AXE11000 is a solid competitor to Netgear AX11000.
However, it’s better to opt for the mesh network from the battle of Netgear AX11000 vs AXE11000. Otherwise, you can get a compatible extender for enhanced coverage and speed.
Performance
The Netgear AX11000 review will remain incomplete if you don’t check out its throughput. Before we dive into the speed tests, it’s wiser to learn about the hardware behind the router’s productivity.
This specific router has a 64-bit quad-core CPU with a clock speed of up to 1.8GHz. In addition, Netgear has powered this networking device with 1GB RAM and 512MB Flash memory. This is quite similar to the Netgear RAX120 AX11000 router. However, the Netgear RAX200 AX11000 is a smaller and lightweight choice.
We ran a few tests to be sure about how the router performs under different circumstances. On average, the router is capable of delivering a data transfer rate of up to 742Mbps.
The speed went down to 380Mbps when we checked the efficiency on the first floor while the router was on the ground floor. Additionally, the router still manages to deliver a speed of up to 350Mbps on the second floor.
The internet speed of this Netgear RAX200 AX11000 router is better than that of the RBK852 mesh system from Netgear. Well, we tested the above-mentioned performances with the 5GHz channels enabled.
With the 2.4GHz channel, the throughputs weren’t like this. Perhaps, the 2.4GHz channel might be crowded where we tested the router. Overall, you will get magnificent performance and speed with this Netgear masterpiece.
Should You Purchase this Netgear RAX200 AX11000 Router?
Launched in 2021, the Netgear AX11000 RAX200 is a powerful choice if you are looking for explicit speed, performance, and excellent features. However, there’s only one downside to this router: its price.
Still, the router will be less expensive than a whole mesh system, so you can go for this router. If you are looking for a more powerful CPU for a steadier performance, then Netgear RAX120 is its closest competitor. This tri-band router is another premium product from the Netgear Nighthawk range.
