topic Mandatory to use Sky Hub with FTTP? in Broadband

Mandatory to use Sky Hub with FTTP?

ireworks — Wed, 06 May 2026 09:00:09 GMT

I have Sky Fibre To The Premises with an Optical Network Terminal in my property, connected to a Sky Hub. I also have a Netgear RAXE300 router that I would like to use in place of the Sky Hub.

- When connected as ONT > Sky Hub, the internet connection works.

- When connected in double NAT with ONT > Sky Hub > Netgear, the internet connection works.

- When connected as ONT > Netgear, the internet connection does not work

- This initially worked for ~24 hours before the internet connection was no longer availablet. I assume that this is some kind of device policy enforcement on Sky's end after detecting the Sky Hub is no longer connected?

have tried in the Netgear router settings:

- VLAN Tagging: update VLAN ID to 101 with priority 0 to mimic the tag of the Sky Hub

- MAC Address cloning: Cloned the MAC address of the Sky Hub on the Netgear router

Are there any other settings or configurations that I can apply to get my desired setup of ONT > Netgear to have an internet connection?

Re: Mandatory to use Sky Hub with FTTP?

TimmyBGood — Wed, 06 May 2026 09:02:30 GMT

@ireworks

It's not mandatory, but Sky themselves won't offer any help and Sky Talk Internet Calls cannot function through such hardware.

Re: Mandatory to use Sky Hub with FTTP?

TimmyBGood — Wed, 06 May 2026 09:04:49 GMT

@ireworks wrote:

This initially worked for ~24 hours before the internet connection was no longer availablet. I assume that this is some kind of device policy enforcement on Sky's end after detecting the Sky Hub is no longer connected?

No, that doesn't happen. It's much more likely that the Netgear received one of its own firmware updates and this messed something up.

Re: Mandatory to use Sky Hub with FTTP?

cuke — Wed, 06 May 2026 09:24:20 GMT

Could it be that the Netgear RAXE300 doesn't support Opt61? A few years ago, when I wanted to use a third party router I found that the only Nighthawk that supported Opt61 was the RAX70. The support for Opt61 is rather haphazard with Netgear products.

Re: Mandatory to use Sky Hub with FTTP?

Chrisee — Wed, 06 May 2026 10:11:45 GMT

@ireworks you need to use one of the two authentication methods Sky use in the UK

The simplest is DHCPv6 PD which most routers support and works in 80% of Openrea ch lines and 100% of City Fibre lines

If tha tvd oesn't work use DHCPv4 Option61 with a string of the form anything@skydsl|anything which I think most Netgear r outers support and works on 100% of Sky lines support.

Re: Mandatory to use Sky Hub with FTTP?

cuke — Wed, 06 May 2026 10:30:09 GMT

@Chrisee wrote:
@ireworks you need to use one of the two authentication methods Sky use in the UK

The simplest is DHCPv6 PD which most routers support and works in 80% of Openrea ch lines and 100% of City Fibre lines

If tha tvd oesn't work use DHCPv4 Option61 with a string of the form anything@skydsl|anything which I think most Netgear r outers support and works on 100% of Sky lines support.

I went through the RAXe300 manual and there is no reference to Opt61, https://www.downloads.netgear.com/files/GDC/RAXE300/RAXE300_UM_EN.pdf whereas the RAX70 has. As stated the support for Opt61 is haphazard with Netgear routers and even variations of the same model may not include this. I did my research on this when purchasing a RAX70, which I still have

Re: Mandatory to use Sky Hub with FTTP?

ireworks — Wed, 06 May 2026 11:53:03 GMT

Thanks for confirming this @cuke. After posting, I found another thread where you'd pointed the missing Option61 for this model.

Thanks to everyone else for responding.

I've setup the Hub as a gateway towards the Netgear router in the DMZ - a bit superfluous but would appear to be the only method of not having a double NAT situation while getting the use of the Netgear router on Sky.