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Netgear XR500 review

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netgear xr500
netgear xr500

Gaming these days needs all the edge it can get. The Netgear Nighthawk XR500 Pro Gaming Router aims to give gamers that edge.

Out of the box, the Netgear Nighthawk XR500 Router comes with four antennas, power adapter, an Ethernet Cable and a Quick Start Guide. The router measures 2.2 by 12.7 by 9.6 inches (HWD) and has a set of LED status lights along the front edge for power, internet, both Wi-Fi bands, guest Wi-Fi, both USB ports, and four LAN ports.

It has a built-in quad-port Gigabit Ethernet switch with a fifth Gigabit Ethernet port for the WAN connection, and two USB 3.0 ports for attaching printers or storage devices. Inside the router is a 1.7GHz dual-core processor with 256MB of Flash and 512MB of RAM.

Wi-Fi is controlled by two QCA9984 Radios and the QCA8337 switch. Connectivity includes 800Mbps on the 2.4GHz band with 256QAM and 1733Mbps on the 5GHz band.

Setting up the router is via a web browser. Once the router is connected to a modem, it will check the line’s internet speed to optimise performance.

In the set up you can also update the router password, add security questions and update network names. You can also set both 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands to have the same name and let the router select the optimal one for your devices to connect to.

It will also automatically have checked for a firmware update and carry that out if necessary.

The router is also the first Netgear router to use DumaOS, which is a gaming OS that can set bandwidth allocation, resource monitoring, and network prioritisation. The dashboard allows users to see what is going on with their network. There are also graphs showing real-time CPU and bandwidth usage, currently installed apps, guest networking status, Wi-Fi status, and Internet status.

There are also a plethora of other tabs to navigate to such as the ‘Geo-Filter’, ‘QoS’, ‘Device Manager’, ‘Network Manager’, and more. There’s a settings R-App where six tabs are located: setup, monitoring, content filtering, administration, USB storage, and advanced settings.

Performance-wise this router is a must for gamers looking for a competitive edge. The use of Geo-Filter and QoS is a godsend for console gamers who can’t bear lag.

Find it here on Amazon.

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