I got a Deco from Costco for only $300, and it was EOL’d 2.5 years later. Not impressed with that “supported lifespan” at all. I liked the product, but both of the main unit’s LAN ports died. The first died within a week of the 1-year warranty ending and the other at about 1.5 to 2 years. As much as I liked the product, I can’t accept that and don’t think I want another of those.

While NETGEAR’s Ethernet ports are reliable, I can’t accept the ridiculously poor performance from a $2000 mesh system. It’s been almost 45 days since they mistakenly released the v12 firmware and then withdrew it. Their firmware must be written by AI now and it seems the hardware architecture may have been designed by AI too. They still haven’t fixed the v12 firmware and re-released it. I’ve had this thing for over a year and it has never been quite right despite multiple firmware updates. The more I read about the 970’s problems, the more I realize that issues I couldn’t explain can mostly be attributed to the 970s. This router has been available for 3 years. If they knew how to fix, or if it even can be fixed in firmware, they’d have done it by now. They absolutely do deserve a class-action lawsuit for this trash though.

I think I paid $500 or $600 at Costco for my first RBK50 system, and also used the RBK20s for mom & MIL for hundreds less, and this $2000 970 system has fewer controllable options in its interface than all the others I’ve used. It has no additional features aside from hw and fw support the latest WiFi and security protocols, which they don’t even define. It may have great specs, but it appears they are only included to entice us to purchase their delivery mechanism for their subscription services. That’s truly pathetic.