The Best Settings for the Netgear Nighthawk XR500 Pro Gaming Router

Router settings go a long way in ensuring that you experience the device in its fullness. This is why it is important to know what to tweak and what to maintain as the manufacturer intended it.

When it comes to high speed professional gaming and reliability for multiple high intensity tasks, the Netgear Nighthawk XR500 Pro Gaming Router comes as the full package. Aside from being able to cover a wide home with high speed internet, this device also takes your gaming to the next level. To achieve this, you need to select the best settings for your device so as to allow it to deliver optimally.

So, what settings would deliver the best performance for your gaming? To enjoy the best gaming experience on yourNetgear Nighthawk XR500, you have to select the best range and speed settings. Below are a few settings that can help you achieve good speed and range.

Step by Step Guide for Speed and Range Settings

Before changing any settings on your router, the first and likely most important step towards determining the speeds you are receiving is to run a speed test. This gives you an idea of the kind of speeds your router is transmitting. A speed test also lets you know whether or not you are receiving the bandwidth for which you paid as you could be getting a 50Mbps speed when you paid for a 200Mbps data plan. To run a speed test, proceed as follows;

1. Through an Ethernet cable, connect your laptop or desktop computer to your router. Open your browser and search for a reliable speed test website such as the net. When conducting this speed test, refrain from using your console since they are often unreliable and result in untrue results. If your upload and download speeds are as expected, your settings are as they should be, meaning you have no need for changing them.
2. In case your internet speeds are lower than they ought to be, the first likely problem is that your Internet Service Provider is not delivering as they should. To confirm this, make an Ethernet connection from your laptop or PC to the modem using an Ethernet cable and run another speed test. If the speeds are still low, your ISP is likely the reason. You can make a direct phone call to them to have the issue resolved.

In case your speeds read higher than your previous tests, follow these simple steps.

• Disable your QoS

QoS could be one of the reasons for low speeds. To have it disabled, proceed to the DumaOS interface and find QoS. On the top left corner is an Anti-Bufferbloat panel and under this is an icon labelled Burger which will lead you to a number of Anti-Bufferfloat options. Click on the ‘Disable QoS’, and when a warning message pops up, click on the ‘Proceed’ field. This disables your QoS.

After this step, run another speed test. This should give you the speeds you desire.

Another important setting is disabling Smart Connect.

Once Smart Connect is disabled, proceed to manually connect to the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands. Additionally, it would improve your speeds and overall performance of the Netgear Nighthawk XR500 Pro Gaming Router to use a Wi-Fi Analyser to help you find the least congested transmission channel for the most ideal speed.

Gaming Settings

On the Netgear Nighthawk XR500 Pro Gaming router, different games may require slightly different settings to run smoothly. For instance, Geo-filter for each game may vary by a small radius, but to ensure each game is captured as it should be, ensure a Geo-filter of a radius of 1000KM to 1,500KM from your home is maintained. For Ping Assist, select 30ms. Keep in mind, though, that this setting is ideal for users that are in an urban setting of sorts where there is ample internet service. In case you live in far out regions, you may have to change your Ping Assist from the regular 30ms to 60ms to notice a difference.

When playing games such as FIFA, Fortnite and Apex, you can use your standard CoD settings since they are ideal for these other games. However, in the case of FUT, try and find EA servers that are closest to enable set your Geo-Filter radius around the located server. Ensure that Strict Mode is activated when you do this. This setting also applies for Apex and Fortnite. Your main goal is to ensure you are connected to a server that is as close to you as possible, but because they use Dedicated Servers only as opposed to Point to Point connection, this may prove a tad difficult since there are only limited options from which to choose.

We playing Destiny, you should disable Strict Mode. It was introduced due to Destiny’s match making, and to be able to play it well, you ought to deactivate it.

Best Settings for Netgear Nighthawk XR500 Pro Gaming Router Summary

 Conclusion

When gaming, you may realize that different games respond best when put at different settings. For ultimate experience, you may have to change the settings here and there depending on the game you are playing, but keep in mind that Call of Duty settings are largely ideal for running most others.

FAQs

1. Can configuring my Modem to transparent mode help?

Yes, it can.

2. What should I do if I can’t use Bridge mode or DMZ?

You can use port forwarding if these two options are not available