802.11ax Routers

Hardware Questions and Recommendations
1

According to the article, D-Link and ASUS launching 802.11ax routers by the end of the year...

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2

I spotted some support for ax in kernel upstream. I believe it is termed as “HE” mode (high efficiency) similar to how we currently have “HT” for high throughout.
No support in luci yet obviously.

3

Huawei already release ax model based on IPQ8074
https://wikidevi.com/wiki/Huawei_AP7060DN

4

I wonder if there'll be any viable drivers available for 11ax.

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5

I would expect them soon.
Unless Qualcomm gives it a little push

6

I am really curious whether we'll be seeing any fully opensource drivers for 11ax chips, like we did for ath9k. Seeing all the manufacturers turning to closed source firmware blobs, I'm very skeptical.

7

Judging from the way Atheros (now QCA) went, I'd say those drivers will be locked down even more. Let's hope Mediatek or someone else will be open to a FOSS driver with minimal firmware, like with 802.11ac.

I don't know of any chips that have open firmware. Ath9k was lucky enough not to need any firmware at all. Like I said, mt76 needs a small binary firmware. Intel has long been FOSS friendly with its wireless adapters, but they have been requiring binary firmwares ever since I remember (going back to my first Intel IPW3945ABG).

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8

I doubt Mediatek will have FOSS anything.

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9

At least they allowed an OpenWrt dev to write a driver for their first wave 802.11ac solution. That's more than you can say from most manufacturers. And mt76 works pretty reliably for me. Ath10k, on the other hand, has plenty of problems that can always be reduced to 'yeah there's some shenanigans with the firmware, and QCA isn't really forthcoming'.

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10

Any update on Support for any 802.11ax Routers?

11

just recently the driver has been pushed https://www.mail-archive.com/linux-wireless%40vger.kernel.org/msg59195.html

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12

Well, first routers have only launched and prices are too high for me to get one for hacking, also there is no support for the SoC currently in OpenWrt.

ath11k has been in Kalle Vallos git developing for some time

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13

There's a GPL dump. I'm sure that hurdle could be solved.
Too expensive as you said for me to bother yet.

14

Well, new SoC-s are half the fun.
But until they get drastically cheaper I wont be buying one from my student budget.

Hell, it looks like QCA has been at least half good since there is decent upstream support for IPQ8074.
But off course ethernet is again missing.
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/arch/arm64/boot/dts/qcom/ipq8074.dtsi?h=v5.3-rc8

15

I like the idea of the rax120, but it's still based on draft standards so feel like it might be problematic in the long term.
Also the others in that series (rax80 and rax200) are broadcom so that's no good.

16

Well, they are based on draft since the standard is not yet even ratified, but the QCA ones like IPQ8074 should be certifiable in the final standard and driver is getting there.
I was not even looking at Broadcom with their open source support.

All we need are cheap IPQ8074 based boards now

17

Another reason to hold, many times early hardware revisions get abandoned..

Some examples like QCA9880-AR1A (found in Archer C7 v1) have no support in first place.

Even early wave2 hardware, like QCA9980 (in Archer C2600) which receive no firmware updates and is EOL/abandoned, while the latter QCA9984 gets frequent updates.

So if you wish to buy a unit with the intent of running FOSS on it, early adoption isn't a good idea. Of course its a different situation if you want to hack around and play with the hardware..

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18

Well, this is not QCA9880-AR1A and ath11k is currently only developing for IPQ8074 as its the only QCA WiSoC for ax.
I agree that its gonna take time for FOSS to get stable

19

Anybody who doesn't know what they are doing, development-wise, should wait until this thread gets filled with replies clearly indicating what AX routers are being supported and what people are buying the most. The more popular, the better the support.

20

Its the beginning of 2020. My new gaming laptop has WiFi 6 built in. Are there any WiFi 6 (802.11ax) devices supported by OpenWrt?

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