NETGEAR Orbi Whole Home Tri-Band Mesh WiFi 6 System (RBK753) – Router with 2 Satellite Extenders | Coverage up to 7,500 sq. ft. and 40+ Devices | AX4200 (Up to 4.2Gbps)

Product Information

A good shot of the router and satellites straight out of the box. It’s hard to tell immediately which one is which, so Orbi have handily labelled them for you to get you going. With the satellite a floor above the router and the test system 50-feet away, the throughput it received was 209.4Mbps, or about half the 405.5Mbps that the Orbi RBK852 was capable of. That said, the Linksys Velop AX4200 (329.2Mbps) was impressive, nonetheless. It keeps management simple, as you don’t have to worry about which network to connect to, but those that want more configuration choices are better off with a standalone router. It’s a real shame that Circle, the parental control system, still hasn’t been enabled on any of the Orbi Wi-Fi 6 products, as it means that Netgear is losing some ground to its rivals. Without this option, you can only toggle the individual device’s internet access.

For most people, the Orbi system will be configured in wireless mode, with the router and satellites communicating via Wi-Fi 6. For that small number, maybe up to 10 users, the performance they will experience will match that of the much more expensive option, as each will only be taking a modest amount of the 1800Mbps available. And, on the SXK80, additional bandwidth can’t be easily allocated to each user even if the overall pool is greater. Another caveat to Insight is that nothing it does is typically instantaneous. It easily took more than 20 minutes to get our Mini router configured, as at each step, it refers to the centralised control of the Insight servers.The Orbi RBK763S is limited in terms of what user-configurable options there are, especially when it comes to Wi-Fi. A close-up view of the router unit from the front and side. The units look incredibly good with the white and silver colour scheme. The separation gap lights up below the Orbi logo highlighting booting up and errors and then turns off when it’s in normal operation. Expensive? At first, I thought the same thing, but taking a look at the features and performance on offer, as well as the pricing of matching competitor products it becomes a much better option and one I fully recommend for those wanting a high-spec product that is treading very close to the toes of it’s bigger brother, the 850 series. In my tests, that proved to be true, with the RBK752 managing decent throughputs of 442.92Mbps at close range, 319.54Mbps on the first floor, and 284.78Mbps on the first floor. That’s just a little way behind the RBK852, although the bigger system still has plenty of streams left for other clients, whereas I was maxing out the bandwidth of the RBK752.

Big thanks to NETGEAR for sending the Orbi RBK753 mesh networking kit over for today’s review! Related reading: That being said, it’s also the best spec we’ve tested so far, so we must temper expectations. Though, the performance on offer is brilliant for a 7 series Orbi mesh product. Another view of the bottom and top of the router unit. Nothing major to note here other than ventilation on the top and bottom which should allow plenty of ventilation for passive cooling as no fans are present in the units. If you’re looking for a decent spec mid-range mesh Wi-Fi kit, that comes with Wi-Fi 6 (AX) out of the box with an excellent range at around 7500 ft² (696 m²), awesome performance with tri-band connectivity, supports 75 concurrent connected devices, looks great on a shelf and just plain works with minimal configuration then the Orbi RBK763S should certainly make your shortlist. Orbi has added a whole list of features to the RBK753 that you might find useful. We’ve compiled a list of them for you:

Quick Summary

The RBK853 does come with twice the amount on Ethernet ports on its routers when compared to the RBK653 and RBK753. Today I had about 4 dropouts within the space of an hour (none before and none since) but it's simply not acceptable. While the Wi-Fi specs are reduced, for clients, this system still has eight streams of Wi-Fi 6 split across two devices, which is powerful. If you buy the RBK753, which adds in an extra satellite, then you’ve got 12 streams.