I have had EE’s 1.6Gb package with the Smart Hub Pro 7 for around two weeks. I upgraded from the 1Gb package, although I had to leave and rejoin as a new customer because there was no direct upgrade path to the 1.6Gb service.
When the service was first activated, the hub was running firmware version r3.8.25-R-1595997-PROD-1. Wi-Fi 7 devices using the 6GHz band would either fail to connect completely or connect only intermittently.
After two days, the hub updated to r3.8.26-R-1595999-PROD-1, after which I lost all 6GHz wireless connectivity. The only workaround was to disable the 6GHz band, forcing my Wi-Fi 7 devices to connect using either 2.4GHz or 5GHz.
The wired performance has been excellent. When connected by Ethernet, I consistently receive speeds of around 1.5–1.6Gbps, so I have no complaints about the broadband connection itself.
I contacted EE and spoke to a technical support representative who was part of the team dealing specifically with 1.6Gb service issues. He advised that a newer firmware version, beginning with R4, was available and said he could not understand why my hub had not received it.
I asked whether the firmware could be pushed manually using the hub’s MAC address. He explained that this was not standard practice, but I mentioned that EE had done something similar for me several years ago when I had an issue with the Smart Hub 6. He said he would ask his team leader whether it was possible.
However, when I asked whether I might need to request a manual update every time new firmware was released, he said that this was possible. The eventual solution was therefore to send me a replacement hub.
The replacement arrived yesterday and is running the original r3.8.25-R-1595997-PROD-1 firmware. It has not yet updated, and its behaviour is exactly the same as the previous hub when it was running that version.
I am therefore not particularly optimistic, as I do not believe there was anything physically wrong with the original hub. This appears to be a firmware issue. When the wireless connection works, I can achieve speeds of around 1.4–1.6Gbps, but the connection is too random and unreliable to be usable.
The technical support representative is due to contact me on Tuesday, 21 June, to follow up.
Has anyone else experienced this issue, or does this situation sound familiar?
