Newbie to Openwrt, trying to use my DELL Latitude 5580 as a router. The configuration for wireless is as follows, wondering why the
Device is not active
as shown in Luci GUI.
config wifi-device 'wl0' option type 'mac80211' option macaddr 'XXX' option country 'US' config wifi-iface 'wifinet0' option device 'wl0' option mode 'ap' option ssid 'MyWifiAP' option key1 's:XXX' option key '1' option encryption 'wep-shared' option network 'lan'
Any ideas?
disable/enable wifi
ifconfig wl0 up
It returns
No such device
are wifi chipset/driver of laptop compatible with openwrt ?
X86 builds contain no wifi drivers by default. So you have to install them. Once the drivers are active a proper /etc/config/wireless will automatically be created. Do not attempt to write that file yourself from scratch, simply delete it and reboot and a skeleton file should appear.
But first identify the hardware you have. Install pciutils then run lspci and look for wifi controllers.
Intel and Realtek wifi chips have poor support. If the laptop has that type of card you won't get a lot of use from the internal wifi.
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v6/7th Gen Core Processor Host Bridge/DRAM Registers (rev 02)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation HD Graphics 620 (rev 02)
00:04.0 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v5/E3-1500 v5/6th Gen Core Processor Thermal Subsystem (rev 02)
00:14.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP USB 3.0 xHCI Controller (rev 21)
00:14.2 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP Thermal subsystem (rev 21)
00:15.0 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP Serial IO I2C Controller #0 (rev 21)
00:15.1 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP Serial IO I2C Controller #1 (rev 21)
00:16.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP CSME HECI #1 (rev 21)
00:17.0 RAID bus controller: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile SATA Controller [RAID mode] (rev 21)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP PCI Express Root Port #1 (rev f1)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP PCI Express Root Port #3 (rev f1)
00:1c.4 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP PCI Express Root Port #5 (rev f1)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point LPC Controller/eSPI Controller (rev 21)
00:1f.2 Memory controller: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP PMC (rev 21)
00:1f.3 Audio device: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP HD Audio (rev 21)
00:1f.4 SMBus: Intel Corporation Sunrise Point-LP SMBus (rev 21)
00:1f.6 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation Ethernet Connection (4) I219-LM (rev 21)
01:00.0 Unassigned class [ff00]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTS525A PCI Express Card Reader (rev 01)
02:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation Wireless 8265 / 8275 (rev 78)
03:00.0 3D controller: NVIDIA Corporation GM108M [GeForce 930MX] (rev a2)
This is what I've got from lspci, the skeleton is not showing up after deleting the one I created earlier and
Device is not active
That's why. Still no driver.
So the only option left would be to use out of tree drivers. Which means making your own build integrating non-free intel drivers. Maybe there are USB Wifi sticks which could be used. I don't know.
Thanks anyway.
Are there out-of-tree drivers for Intel cards? I thought those drivers were developen in mainline.
The main issue is lack of AP support on 5GHz. Ref https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/users/drivers/iwlwifi
But you'll need to add another card to get normal AP functionality (2 radios to cover 2 bands) anyway, so this might not be a show stopper.
What should be is the 24x7 usage you will expect from a router. There is no laptop built for this, and it will eventually die because of that. Plastic parts will crack and fall off due to the constant heat exposure. The battery will stop taking charge. Etc.
My fault. Sorry. I was to far ahead in thinking. If I would do my own build for such a project I would have choosen the latest version of those drivers.
Anyway:
This is the most important point made here.
This is for temporary use only. I'll see if I can find a usb wifi card. Thanks again!