Arlo (Neighbor's Camera) same channel as my Nighthawk, hogging

[A_Arlo457]

I have a Netgear Nighthawk which works beautifully. Recently my neighbors installed an Arlo. I don't know which model number it is but it is on the same channel as my Nighthawk. I changed the channel to something else (6 and 4 for testing purposes) and the Arlo changed to the same channels again. Ever since that camera was installed I am barely getting 5mbps down/up where i used to get 50mbps down/up. The camera is placed just under 20ft (give or take) from my router in the office, seperate by a wall. How can I get the Arlo to stop being on the same channel as my own router? It is hogging bandwith/speeds and the range is absolute **bleep** now on 2.4ghz. 5ghz is completely fine as there is no Arlo on the 5ghz band.

[A_Arlo457]

Again, I want to stress that this is my neighbors Arlo and it is not mine. It should not tag along onto my router channel nor is it connected to it.

[jguerdat]

Arlo generally will select the channel of the router if it's close enough.  It seems the Arlo may not be near their router but closer to yours. Not much you can do other than to talk to the neighbor about repositioning the Arlo and/or repositioning your router.to be further away.  Maybe there's something in your router setup for wireless that could affect this such as forcing it to use N only, etc.  No guarantees...

[StuBee]

Jguerdat,

Why would arlo choose the same channel as the router?  The basestation and cameras do not talk via wifi to the router, so that wouldn't make sense in my opinion.  Maybe Arlo is using some algorithm to decide which channel is clearest (like many routers can)

Currently my Arlo is on Channel 6 (I assume thats what SSID "Netgear42" is) while my wifi network is on Ch 1.   However, I had just changed this today...so I'll see if it copies it at somepoint.

[TomMac]

when you first start up Arlo , it will sit on the same channel as yr wifi unit.  If you change the wifi channel after, arlo will stay there till it resets. ( or maybe reboots )

[StuBee]

Is this just for setup of the Android app?  Or is it required ongoing?   If the arlo app isn't accessing the cameras/basestation directly, seems that Netgear could have just used some cloud discovery method rather than requiring the device to access it locally.  It's so slow to access via the android app sometimes, I assumed it was all cloud based access.

[jguerdat]

The app has nothing to do with it. Like the brow, it's simply a viewing/manipulation tool. The base apparently uses the same channel as the router if close enough together since I suppose a competing channel that close together could cause even more chaos. Since the base pucks the channel on startup, you'd have to reset things each time the base restarts.

This is primarily a giant SWG on my part but seems plausible.

[StuBee]

Well I learned something new today.  

Same Channel competition is sometimes better than different channel interference.  Apparently there is some cooperation in same channel communication (even when the same channels are on different AP's)

http://www.metageek.com/training/resources/adjacent-channel-congestion.html

[TheShepherd]

I have an R7000 Nighthawk too and the release notes for the latest router firmware 1.0.6.28_1.1.83 states:

 14. [New Feature] Supports Arlo camera. Set up the R7000 as an Arlo base station and connect an Arlo camera to the R7000 without needing an extra base station.

Maybe it is related to your issue.

I will update my router later today and report my findings.

Cheers

[TheShepherd]

Quick update.

Just updated my router to the latest firmware.

Not getting any interference here, network speed is the same as before. Arlo basestation and the R7000 are working fine.

The R7000 and the Arlo basestation are separated by about 15 meters though. And the cameras are in between them.

Cheers

[R_Lowe]

I have nothing to contribute to the OP's situation, but I DO know that I'm going to quit telling my neighbors to get an Arlo - yikes - I don't want to get interference (I have the Nighthawk router too) be seeing their videos on my feeds, etc. etc.  haha.

[sethm1]

How are you seeing your neighbors feeds?

the curious side of me wants to know.

i have  R7000 Nighthawk and my neighbor (guessing a Xmas present) recently installed an Arlo.

as with others, if I change the channel number - the Arlo changes as well! 

Seems more of a nuisance then anything as I don't think there is a negative affect on my speeds.

and this in on the 2.4G 

[swilson317]

I think there may be some misinformation being passed around this and other threads on this subject. I too thought I suddenly had a neighbor with an Arlo camera that was on the same channel as my Netgear R7000 Nighthawk router. But when I started to troubleshoot further, I realized that it was MY router that was broadcasting the Arlo SSID (NETGEAR34-arlo_246988)!!!

Here is what I did to troubleshoot:

1) I used the Wifi Analyzer application on my Android phone and saw that both my SSID and the Arlo SSID were the exact same signal strength in the Channel Graph view. If my neighbor truly had an Arlo, I would think that the signal strength would be lower than my own router. So I was immediately suspicious.

2) I then logged into my router via Netgear Genie and changed the channel on my router. I then checked the Wifi Analyzer and saw that the Arlo SSID also changed. Again...VERY suspicious!

3) Then...on a hunch that maybe the software in the router had different features than that of Netgear Genie, I logged into the router via browser. AHA! There is a new option on the Basic tab called Arlo! When I clicked it, a page displayed with the Arlo version and a checkbox for "Enable Arlo" that was selected by default! I deselected that option and clicked Appy. The Arlo SSID is no longer being broadcast!

Mystery solved!

Steve

[jguerdat]

You obviously have new enough firmware on your R7000 to support Arlo.  If you want, you can remove the base station and sync the cameras to the router with the Arlo capability enabled.  Saves a little space and complexity.

If you go this way and need help, yell.  There are issues that I can help with.