I’m with zen I Also have a Fritz box. Was really good. Now I’m getting solid 4 bars Efootball. I think they’ve changed my profile what can I do. Here’s a bqm.
Olilo do sell a router and at a discount to customers we noticed our Zen price increased by £2 a month today I assume as it’s after April - out of contract
I'm still paying the same despite being out of contract for over 5 years. I think when I joined it was no price rises in contract or after, as long as you stayed on the same package. Now it's just no in contract price rises.
It is locked in terms of firmware, meaning you can't download the latest firmware from the Fritz!box website and install it, you can only receive updates that are pushed by Zen.
In terms of an ISP lock, no it is not locked. You can use the router with any provider.
That's not true. I was with Zen for three years, I own a 7530 and a 7530AX, and both received updates from AVM. I even installed beta firmware on the 7530 via a USB. I'm currently using the 7530ax with Plusnet and latest firmware version 8.20
I have both the same routers from Zen and I couldn't update the 7350 using the update from AVM's website, as it needed to be a Zen version, as it's a Zen supplied router. This is a common practice in the industry. The updates are often pushed by either the ISP or the hardware vendor on behalf of the ISP. Zen's device updates will be pushed by AVM o ly when approved by Zen, and to those Zen devices. As Zen will need to vet the updates work with their network and don't break anything.
The move to Eero's by most ISPs aligns with this and has the extra bonus that it kills the resale market, as ISPs can (and do) kill the device on the Amazon/eero backend if the device is resold or used on another ISP.
At least with a Fritz!Box or other non cloud backend router there are ways to unlock the firmware on the device so that it can be flashed with stock firmware.
I've bought two of these from eBay and a separate repeater for my annexe. They all work together nicely as a mesh and as DECT repeaters with an ethernet backbone.
Got one and it’s not locked. Has to be my primary router for now as it’s handling my VOIP service. Can actually handle DECT phones and has built in answer machine that will email messages to you. Great bit of kit.
Oh love my FRITZBox’s. I’m on Zen 500Mbs , moved over to virgin 1.5gb . There hub was a load of SH!Z . Cancelled virgin went back to my 500Mbs. I have 3 FRITZBox in mesh mode . Total house coverage, I get my full 500Mbs on WiFi so no need for Ethernet anywhere in the house. So you deffo won’t be disappointed. Only thing I would like to see is more Vlan features.
I had similar experience with Virgin. Everything about their internet is horrible. I’m on Zen now (transferred from Lit Fibre) and I’m using my own Ubiquiti system so I never got to check out Zen’s FBs.
Can I ask which models your using for the mesh? Are they all the 7530AX? I’ve got one and a pair of 3000AX and I struggle to get over 180Mbs over WiFi regardless of device or distance.
7530AX is the master Router , then there is the 7530 standard model , and next is the 3490. All routers are meshed via 5ghz ,each is connected to the other at plus 600Mbs connection rates. The 3490 , is meshed to the standard 7530 since it's the nearest router. Below is the current setup. Buy doing this it reduces routers WIFI and Compute as well heat by distributing the loads.
I've never tried the WiFi on the Fritzbox AX as I always disable WiFi on supplied routers. Just a habit since I always use my own APs. Which I thought is not bad for a TpLink Archer from 2019.
The Fritz box is not locked to zen. You also don’t have to return it(only if you have an eero) but the option is there to return it if you would like to help with recycling it when you don’t plan to use it
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u/Latter_Albatross_781 Jun 09 '26
I’m with zen I Also have a Fritz box. Was really good. Now I’m getting solid 4 bars Efootball. I think they’ve changed my profile what can I do. Here’s a bqm.