Wireless network issues on FreeBSD-release-14.2 | rtw880

S

solidwarea

Hello! Please excuse me if I'm posting this thread in the wrong category or if I missed some crucial information. I tried doing a fresh install of FreeBSD-release-14.2 on my PC yesterday, but I could not get passed an error which I found essentially 0 recent information about. Following the exact same setup structure as FreeBSD-release-14.1, I setup the wpa_supplicants file, rc.conf and loader.conf with the commands necessary to allow the wpa880 driver to run, at least so I could install WifiBox to get better internet speeds. However, each time I try to connect either via a reboot or the "service netif restart" command, it gives up on connecting to my Wi-Fi and throws an error about an invalid wpa_supplicant argument. I've setup the wpa_supplicants file like always, minimal, correct syntax and I've made absolutely sure that the SSID and psk is correct. I've found no solution to this, but it works absolutely fine on release-14.1. I'd appreciate any ideas on how I could fix this and/or at least make the bug known. Thank you!
 
fraxamo said:
Can you also post the specific error please?
Click to expand...
Here, I included what I now also realize probably is more relevant information because as it seem the error I mentioned before displays on 14.1 as well but works anyway. I think it’s DHCP not working correctly.


Code: 
wlano: flags=8802<BROADCAST, SIMPLEX, MULTICAST> metric @ mtu 1500

options=0

ether *

groups: wlan

ssid "" channel 9 (2452 MHz 11g)

scanvalid 60 protmode CTS wme

regdomain FCC country US authmode OPEN privacy OFF txpower 30 bmiss 7

parent interface: rtw880

media: IEEE 802.11 Wireless Ethernet autoselect (autoselect)

status: no carrier

nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD, IFDISABLED, AUTO_LINKLOCAL>

Destroyed wlan (4) interfaces: wlang. Created wlan (4) interfaces: wlan0.

Starting wpa_supplicant.

Dec 5 19:03:01 erion wpa_supplicant[2394]: ioctl[SIOCS80211, op=20, val=0, arg_len=71: Invalid argument

Starting dhclient.

wlan0: no link

giving up

/etc/rc.d/dhclient: WARNING: failed to start dhclient

Starting Network: 100 red wlang.

100: flags=1008049<UP, LOOPBACK, RUNNING, MULTICAST, LOWER_UP> metric @ mtu 16384 options-680003<RXCSUM, TXCSUM, LINKSTATE, RXCSUM_IPV6, TXCSUM_IPV6>

inet 127.0.0.1 netmask 0xff000000

inet6:1 prefixlen 128

inet6 fe80::1%100 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x2

groups: 10

nd6 options=21 <PERFORMNUD, AUTO_LINKLOCAL>

red options=82096<RXCSUM, TXCSUM, VLAN_MTU, VLAN_HWTAGGING, VLAN_HWCSUM,WOL_MAGIC, LINKSTATE>

: flags=8802<BROADCAST, SIMPLEX, MULTICAST> metric @ mtu 1500

ether *

media: Ethernet autoselect (none)

status: no carrier

wlan0: flags=8843<UP, BROADCAST, RUNNING, SIMPLEX, MULTICAST> metric @ mtu 1500

nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD, IFDISABLED, AUTO_LINKLOCAL>

options=0 ether *

groups: wlan

ssid Network channel 9 (2452 MHz 11g)

regdomain FCC country US authmode WPA2/802.11i privacy ON

deftxkey UNDEF txpower 30 bmiss 7 scanvalid 60 protmode CTS wme

roaming MANUAL

parent interface: rtw880

media: IEEE 802.11 Wireless Ethernet autoselect (autoselect)

status: no carrier

nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD, IFDISABLED, AUTO_LINKLOCAL>
Click to expand...
 
I also sometimes get a warning about dhclient failing to start. However, can you post the error about an invalid wpa_supplicant argument that you mentioned in your first post please? Also, when you installed 14.2 how did you create your /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf file? Using the installer or manually?
 
Ah, my bad. I thought I had included it. Here’s the line I was referring to in my first post:

wpa_supplicant[2394]: ioctl[SIOCS80211, op=20, val=0, arg_len=71: Invalid argument[/CODE]
 
You may get some help by reading this post which details the same issue. The OP seems to have got things working by adding a couple of options to their /etc/rc.conf.
 
fraxamo said:
You may get some help by reading this post which details the same issue. The OP seems to have got things working by adding a couple of options to their /etc/rc.conf.
Click to expand...
Unfortunately, unless I misunderstood what I was supposed to put in the defaultrouter part (I added the router address), it did not seem to work. The weird thing is I did try doing a fresh install of FreeBSD 14.1 on the same machine earlier today, and following the same set of instructions, WiFi was up and running. I know this new update seems to have changed a few things with WiFi within the install process but I’m not sure what or if there’s anything I can do to have it the way it was in release-14.1.
 
arg_len=71 ... wonder what that is about? i.e. does it mean you have an argument/parameter of 71 bytes somewhere?

The other posts about this sort of thing talk about stuff in /etc/rc.conf - any obvious differences between what you used in 14.1 and 14.2? Especially anything to do with networking.
 
richardtoohey2 said:
arg_len=71 ... wonder what that is about? i.e. does it mean you have an argument/parameter of 71 bytes somewhere?

The other posts about this sort of thing talk about stuff in /etc/rc.conf - any obvious differences between what you used in 14.1 and 14.2? Especially anything to do with networking.
Click to expand...
I actually have no idea about the arg_len to be honest. But there are absolutely no difference to how I set it up with 14.1 and 14.2, I even wrote some instructions for me to follow and took photos of my screen to ensure I’m doing everything exactly the same way. The installation is a bit different though, 14.2 now prompts if you want to install some WiFi drivers, the problem here is that I’ve tried both cancelling it and installing it, none of them showed any difference when trying to connect to WiFi after install though. I’ve been trying to see what specifically they’ve changed during the installation process on 14.2 but I can unfortunately not find anything relevant, specific or detailed enough to make sense of it.
 
Bug 249542 was raised about this exact issue but has a status of 'Closed Not A Bug'. One of the commenters mentions that even though they get the error their wireless connection still works. And the comment from Adrian Chadd, one of the FreeBSD network team, also makes it seem like the error message is just debug information and nothing to worry about. I think in your case, as you can't get past the error, it might be worth raising a new issue and linking to the original one. If you do raise a new issue please post the link back here if you can, it would be interesting to follow along. Thanks.
 
One more thing that you can try is to run the following wpa_supplicant command with the -d flag. This will give debug output and might shed some light on the issue. Using -dd provides even more information:
Code: 
wpa_supplicant -B -i wlan0 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf -d
You'll obviously need to change the interface name and the path to your config file if they are different. Funnily enough, when I ran it on my machine I also got the same error as was logged in the issue I mentioned in my last post, so I can confirm that this version of the error (see below) is harmless:
Code: 
ioctl[SIOCS80211, op=20, val=0, arg_len=7]: Invalid argument
bsd_set_key: alg=0 addr=0x0 key_idx=5 set_tx=0 seq_len=0 key_len=0
bsd_del_key: key_idx=5
ioctl[SIOCS80211, op=20, val=0, arg_len=7]: Invalid argument
wpa_driver_bsd_set_countermeasures: enabled=0
However, your error message is slightly different in that the arg_len=71 and not 7.
 
Just looking at this again, did you by any chance fat-finger the error message?

ioctl[SIOCS80211, op=20, val=0, arg_len=7]: Invalid argument # My one
ioctl[SIOCS80211, op=20, val=0, arg_len=71: Invalid argument # Your one

It looks like the closing square bracket ']' in the text of my error - 'arg_len=7]:' has been replaced by a '1' in your text. That looks like too much of a coincidence. I suspect that this isn't the cause of your problems and that it's something else. However, before we dig deeper can you confirm the exact error message again please? Thanks
 
fraxamo said:
Just looking at this again, did you by any chance fat-finger the error message?

ioctl[SIOCS80211, op=20, val=0, arg_len=7]: Invalid argument # My one
ioctl[SIOCS80211, op=20, val=0, arg_len=71: Invalid argument # Your one

It looks like the closing square bracket ']' in the text of my error - 'arg_len=7]:' has been replaced by a '1' in your text. That looks like too much of a coincidence. I suspect that this isn't the cause of your problems and that it's something else. However, before we dig deeper can you confirm the exact error message again please? Thanks
Click to expand...
I went back to check the photo I took of my screen and yes, it seems like it was meant to say 7] and not 71. Also I did actually raise a bug in Bugzilla, it seems as if someone has already replied. I'll have to answer. Here's the link to the bug report if you'd like to follow up on it: PR 283142. I'm honestly really confused as to what the problem possibly could be. It's also pretty difficult to debug as I can't have my system running on an OS to try different things for days in a row when I can't run it properly but I'm trying my best to have this solved so I actually can start using FreeBSD again and for any eventual issues that may rise for other users in the future.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top