AGIX Discussion

Nighthawk M6 5G Router – Review

While not typical of this tech blog, having just tested 5G for a small business Internet connection, I’m including the experience here to save you the trouble. In this case, we’re reviewing the “Nighthawk M6” 5G Router. There is a “Pro” version but we opted for the standard model.

This device is a 5G router with WIFI built in. It supports 1GBit Ethernet.

Our use case:

We installed the device as the Internet gateway sitting in front (Internet side) of a firewall running Netgate pfSense (2100 model). The WIFI has been disabled to prevent security issues and confusion.

My recommendations:

  1. Remove the battery and power it on. The router will get too hot otherwise, and operating without the battery forces the device to run in the “Optimal” profile.
  2. Join your computer to the device’s WIFI and visit “192.168.1.1” to reach the web management portal. You’ll be asked to reset the “admin” password.
  3. Enable the Ethernet.
  4. Set the Ethernet speed to 1GBit (assuming that’s suitable).
  5. Complete a firmware upgrade. Our test device upgraded from “NTGX65_10.01.38.00” to “NTGX65_12.01.41.00”. The upgrade process took a long time. While we weren’t timing it, we’d guess an hour. Reboots take approximal 3 minutes.

At this point the device should be configured to meet the needs of the use case described above.

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