Over the last couple of years, Netgear have been busy adding new routers to their Nighthawk line. For those of you who don’t know, the Nighthawk routers are now the flagship range within the Netgear router empire.
More recently, the most powerful Nighthawk routers have been launched – the R8000 and the R7900 (both codenamed “X6”).
The R8000 was released around a year ago and is the mainstream release. Since then, the R7900 has reared its head as an alternative.
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Nighthawk Nighthawk X6 R8000 Router
The Ultimate of all routers! We love the R8000, and with good reason. This badboy came out last year and hasn’t looked back since. If you want the best Tri Band router with a bunch of features, look no further than the R8000…
>>>Full Nighthawk R8000 Review<<<
Netgear Nighthawk X6 R7900 Router
The R7900 was released only recently. It has pretty much everything that the R8000 has up its sleeve. We’ll touch on this soon. You may be less likely to see this in the stores as most retailers will likely stock the R8000 instead.
>>>Full Nighthawk R7900 Review<<<
So what are the differences between these two behemoths of the AC router world?
R7900 vs R8000 – What’s The Difference?
Not a lot to say here! But here’s the two you need to know about…
2.4GHz Speed
Unfortunately for the R7900, there is a slight the slight reduction in theoretical speed on the 2.4GHz band. There’s a total of 450Mbps available on the R7900, while on the R8000 there’s 600Mbps on tap. This is because the R8000 has 256QAM modulation, which in turn increases throughput.
R8000 Has 2x USB Ports
That’s right. The R8000 has two USB (1x 3.0 & 1x 2.0), whereas the newer R7900 has just the one USB port….which luckily enough is USB 3.0.
Having two USB ports may or may not be a necessity for you. However, just make sure you take this difference into consideration before making the decision to buy.
And that’s it. That’s all the difference there is between these two. Most consumers will probably just opt for the more popular and widely available X6 R8000, but if you want to save a few pennies and the slight depletion in specs doesn’t deter you, then perhaps the R7900 is one to consider after all…
R8000 Nighthawk – The Ultimate
R7900 vs R8000 – 6 Shared Features
Within every other aspect of the routers – everything else is identical. Here’s a reminder of what’s what…
Tri-Band
Both routers have Tri-Band Wi-Fi. Two 1.3Gbps 5GHz bands, and a third 2.4GHz band. Of course, the 2.4GHz band is the only difference here in that, as already explained, the data rates are slower on the R7900 2.4GHz band.
1GHz Processor
The same Dual Core CPU is used. It’s 1GHz with 3 offload single processors to help when things get tough.
ReadyShare Suite
The list of ReadyShare products is maintained across the line. ReadyShare helps to back up your files/software (ReadyShare Vault), access files on your USB (ReadyShare USB) and lastly, printing (ReadyShare Printer)
Smart Connect For Band Balancing
This is a tool that intelligently adds clients to the most appropriate wireless band. This helps optimize the network as best as possible.
6 Adjustable Antennas
Six antennas, fully adjustable and replaceable. Manually adjust your antennas to get the most out of your coverage. This is especially true on multi-storey homes.
Beamforming+
Used to increase coverage, and reliability and speed in that extra coverage area. Beamforming is a great tool for eliminating dead spots too!
R7900 Nighthawk
Do you agree/disagree? Why not comment below and let us know what you think…
The R7900 cannot be used as wireless access point it has room be wired while the R8000 can