WLAN stops and starts again

Networking WiFi
1

Hallo,
after updating my ipfire I have a strange behavior.
The WLAN stops and starts out of a sudden.
Obviously this derives from a stop an go of the cpu.

Screenshot_20211225_144631
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Has somebody an idea what the cause is?

https://fireinfo.ipfire.org/profile/b409d9c3397ec3dd6324f94382e812b1b01e13d1
WPA2

2

I just had failures when I updated to core 162. Try backing up and then wipe and reload. That fixed the problem for me :slight_smile:

3

Some additional information to the strange behavior above:
It is not only the WLAN affected but also the green line (blue line I have mentioned above).
The same picture for the cpu graph shows the memory graph.
The whole firewall starts and stops out of a sudden.

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The whole issue started after updating from 161 to 162 an is a real nuisance. It was a bad idea to update before Christmas holidays. The house is full with my Children and we have such a fragile internet connection

4

You should check the kernel logs

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5

Here are a part of the kernel logs from today:

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6

I would change network cables to new ones. ( Those that connect to red and green)

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7

I would consider the possibility of a problem in the driver of the network card. Maybe there has been a change from Linux 5.10 to 5.15 which has exposed a bug?

8

If the new/different cables do not help, please include a portion of the message log:

cat /var/log/messages

Search through the log for the date & times that lines up with the dead space in the graphs:

Screen Shot 2021-12-27 at 12.34.29 PM
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and include lines before and after the dead space. You don’t have to find every dead space, just a few recent ones as examples.

You may want to cleanse the message log of private information (e.g., IP & Mac addresses)

Did you try the rebuild as @dlfuller suggested?

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9

In the logs @ip-mfg has already posted I can see plenty of errors of the wifi or ethernet card (RT8211E). It seems the kernel looks for the firmware, loads it and then the link goes down.

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10

Hi,

this sounds related to a known XHCI regression in Linux kernel 5.15.x - please see this post for details.

Thanks, and best regards,
Peter Müller

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11

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12

Sorry for beeing so short and a lit of pushy, but I am really in the soup.
I have for children at home 2 are working for the university and 1 for business. If I can’t fix the problem soon, they will leave to their homes and the Christmas holidays are spoiled.

13

The hardware I use is a less then 2 years old box from tx-team.

14

Both networks, green and blue are effected.
With more users in the network, the brake downs of the network are more offen.

15

If I were in your place, I would backup your settings, downgrade to core 161 by fresh install and restore the backup. This should take no more than 20/30 min. I believe this is the most logical course of action given your predicament. Then, when you have more time, you can deal with the upgrade.

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16

I can try it tonight, but

  • the download area of ipfire offers only 162
  • I haven’t done a fresh install since my first installation two years ago.
    That means connect VGA and keyboard to the ipfire, put the usb inside and make a cold reset? Backup from the pc connected via ipfire.local domain?
17

Just change the url in the browser to 161 at the end instead of 162 and you will get the page for the 161 downloads.

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18

got it and created bootable image.
Thanks

19

https://www.ipfire.org/download/ipfire-2.27-core161

Yes. Briefly:

  1. you first download the image and use balena etcher or an equivalent imager to create a bootable usb stick;
  2. then, you plug the usb memory stick on your machine, make sure the firmware will boot from that disk and not from the internal hd,
  3. boot and proceed with the fresh installation (reformat of the internal hard disk included);
  4. proceed with the setup and make sure you choose the right structure (e.g. blue+green+orange+red or whatever you have) and correctly assign the network cards; also, make sure to correctly configure the red interface so that when IPFire reboots you can access internet (i.e. look how you did it and take note before proceeding);
  5. once finished, then you should be able to connect (https://ipfire.localdomain:444/cgi-bin/index.cgi) to the web user interface (WUI) using a laptop or a desktop in your LAN and restore the backup from your hard disk (see my next paragraph below).

Have a look to the documentation to refresh your memory.

Yes, please read the documentation page first. Again, briefly: before doing anything else you do a backup from the WUI and download the backup files in your laptop or desktop from where you will do the restore later. You will need them once you finish the 161 re-installation process to restore them using the same page in the WUI.

Take care to:

  1. do not change the backup files name;
  2. before restoring a plug in, reinstall the plug in first using packfire from the WUI and then proceed to restore from the backup file;
  3. if you have any special, non standard configuration, to have that included in the backup you need to include the files or the directories by editing
/var/ipfire/backup/include.user

there you have to use the console to do that. Again check the documentation.

From my text it might seem daunting but really it is not. It is pretty straightforward. I had problems only once, when I thought that the backup would restore also the configuration of the red interface, which for some reason it did not. Therefore now I make sure I remember how to set it up correctly from the setup interface used by IPFire during the installation procedure.

Good luck.

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20

Luck was with me.
ipfire 161 is running on my machine and - the last 2 hours - without any brake down.
Great thank you to you cfusco and to all the others of the community for the quick response and the offered help.

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