Wireless is not working on Totolink A7000R

Installing and Using OpenWrt Network and Wireless Configuration
1

Hi All,

I find the wireless (radio0) is not active after upgrade the Totolink A7000R.

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I see the "I/O error" at the system log but can't find the solution so far. Would anyone please help?

Thank you very much

Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.notice hostapd: Configuration file: /var/run/hostapd-phy0.conf (phy wlan0) --> new PHY
Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.err hostapd: Could not set interface wlan0 flags (UP): I/O error
Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.err hostapd: nl80211: Could not set interface 'wlan0' UP
Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.notice hostapd: nl80211: deinit ifname=wlan0 disabled_11b_rates=0
Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.err hostapd: nl80211 driver initialization failed.
Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.notice hostapd: wlan0: CTRL-EVENT-TERMINATING
Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.err hostapd: hostapd_free_hapd_data: Interface wlan0 wasn't started
Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.notice netifd: radio0 (6190): Command failed: Invalid argument
Sun Feb  7 11:07:25 2021 daemon.notice netifd: radio0 (6190): Device setup failed: HOSTAPD_START_FAILED
2

upgrade from what to what ?

the 7000R is still in snapshot = beta, you should expect issues.

3

MT7615 support is pretty mature I'd say though, I have two of those as access points in my network. The I/O error on the second line suggests something worse may be happening (no idea what).

4

Hi frollic,

I upgraded/changed the official firmware to use the "snapshots"... I believe there is some "solutions" or "testing steps" for this error even it's a beta version.

Thank you very much for your reply.

5

Hi Borromini,

Yep, I have the same felling when I see the "I/O error". :crossed_fingers:

Thank you very much for your reply.

6

try to start the hostapd manually, and see if you can get any additional error messages.

7

I got the similar error...

Could not set interface wlan0 flags (UP): I/O error
nl80211: Could not set interface 'wlan0' UP
nl80211: deinit ifname=wlan0 disabled_11b_rates=0
nl80211 driver initialization failed.
wlan0: interface state UNINITIALIZED->DISABLED
wlan0: AP-DISABLED
wlan0: CTRL-EVENT-TERMINATING
hostapd_free_hapd_data: Interface wlan0 wasn't started
8

Could you paste dmesg output on a clean boot? MACs etc. redacted?

9

Still the same error in 2021.02 stable release. However, there is a workaround.

Here is an excerpt from my dmesg output when the error occurs:

[   10.848007] pci 0000:00:00.0: enabling device (0006 -> 0007)
[   10.866023] mt7615e 0000:01:00.0: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
[   10.890762] ieee80211 phy0: Selected rate control algorithm 'minstrel_ht'
[   10.895464] mt7621-pci 1e140000.pcie: bus=2 slot=1 irq=24
[   10.895493] mt7615e 0000:01:00.0: Firmware is not ready for download
[   10.906383] pci 0000:00:01.0: enabling device (0006 -> 0007)
[   10.930300] mt7615e 0000:02:00.0: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
[   10.955431] ieee80211 phy1: Selected rate control algorithm 'minstrel_ht'
[   10.976803] PPP generic driver version 2.4.2
[   10.986832] NET: Registered protocol family 24
[   11.006171] kmodloader: done loading kernel modules from /etc/modules.d/*
[   11.020260] mt7615e 0000:02:00.0: HW/SW Version: 0x8a108a10, Build Time: 20180518100604a
[   11.020260]
[   11.048384] random: crng init done
[   11.055279] random: 7 urandom warning(s) missed due to ratelimiting
[   11.350884] mt7615e 0000:02:00.0: N9 Firmware Version: _reserved_, Build Time: 20200814163649
[   11.412806] mt7615e 0000:02:00.0: CR4 Firmware Version: _reserved_, Build Time: 20190121161307

The issue affects only radio0 on 2.5 GHz after soft reboot.

"Firmware is not ready for download" led me to the following topic and post:

https://github.com/openwrt/mt76/issues/316#issuecomment-727223566

I applied the patch (and changed permission with: chmod 755 mt7615workaround).
After single hard reboot and several consecutive soft reboots radio0 seems to work as expected.

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