WiFi stopped working after last IPFire/hostapd update

[robh (Rob Hills)]

I’m running IPFire 2.29 (x86_64) - Core-Update 199 and I have a Qualcomm Atheros AR928X Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01) installed.

When I upgraded IPFire last month, I noticed there was also an upgrade available to hostapd so I upgraded that as well.

After doing these two upgrades, none of my WiFi devices would connect to my network anymore. Prior to this upgrade, my WiFi had been working flawlessly since I first installed IPFire several years ago.

I have tried playing with the settings on the Wireless Access Point configuration page but haven’t yet been able to get a configuration that enables me to connect to WiFi.

I think that part of my problem is that the IPFire PCI Express Mini WLAN Cards page seems to me to be out of date WRT the settings now available on the Wireless Access Point Configuration page. Unfortunately I also don’t have a record of what settings I had previously for WiFi (my bad!). I’m pretty sure they’d have been whatever was the default when I installed IPFire in the first place as from memory, WiFi just worked from the beginning.

I’ve checked the hostapd/wifi log but haven’t seen anything there that tells me why I can’t connect. My (Linux mint) client computer just pops up a message “failed to establish network connection”. My android phone says “check password and try again” (the password is unchanged).

TIA,

Rob
Waikiki, Western Australia

[claus (Claus Beninga)]

Have a look here:

WIFI Issue with Update 199

Hi, Since update 199, I haven’t been able to access the AP. I have just run a software update on my APU board with a Compex WLE600VX 802.11ac Wireless LAN Mini-PCIe Card featuring a Qualcomm Atheros QCA9882, which I bought in 2018. It has been working fine for years. My clients try to connect, but they don’t receive an IP address. I’ve tried different wireless modes, but the AP is only visible in 802.11an, and I can’t start the AP if I choose 802.11ac. 14:21:01 hostapd: blue0: EAPOL-4WAY…

[robh (Rob Hills)]

Many thanks Claus, I applied the fixes discussed in this reply to the thread you linked and that has resolved my issue.

[alahleea (Al Ahlee)]

Hi RobbIt might be related to changes in hostapd defaults after the update rather than your hardware itself. Some updates modify security settings or supported encryption modes which can prevent older devices or previously working configs from connecting.

You could check ;Make sure the Security Mode is set to WPA2-PSK (AES) only. Sometimes mixed WPA2/WPA3 or TKIP settings cause connection failures.

Verify that the country code and channel are still set correctly in the Wireless settings after the update.

Try temporarily creating a simple SSID with default settings to see if a device can connect.

Restart the access point service or reboot IPFire after applying changes.

If the password hasn’t changed but devices report authentication errors, its often due to a security/encryption mismatch introduced by the hostapd update.