[Ghost Flyer]

panengineer, on 21 December 2011 - 07:36 PM, said:

termnander,

Can you flash only the ramdisk image like a supplemental flash without flashing the kernal and bootloader? Otherwise I will just adb this over as I don't want to mess up my setup at this point.

Hi folks + Termnander,

Has anyone tested Termnander's supplemental WiFi fix yet? Here is his post with zip file for fixing WiFi issues, from the previous page of this thread.

Somewhere along the line, after installing KG's SH OPDN 3/02 2.1.0 and his 2.1.1 sup f/w, plus the wifi analyzer with it's add on for manually selecting which AP you want to connect to, plus numerous other miscellaneous apps, my WiFi has become erratic. Many times it won't scan, thus it won't connect. Other times, it locks up, when about 1/8th through loading a web page. It can take up to 3 or 4 reboots of the WPDN to get it working again. Other times, I'll turn off my WPDN for the night, when everything was working fine, but the next time I turn it on, WiFi won't work, and I'm back to rebooting it 3 or 4 times, sometimes. If I'm lucky, one reboot will do it.

By the way, in North America, access points only use channels 1 to 11. Channels 11 to 13 are used in Europe and in most of the world (except N America), and Japan is the only country allowed to use Channel 14, I believe. In N America, I think most Access Point radios will only allow you to configure channels 1-11.

I digress... back to my question... Has anyone had success with Termnander's wifi fix, by flashing his file?

Thanks,
Ghost Flyer

This post has been edited by Ghost Flyer: 01 February 2012 - 11:17 AM

[panengineer]

Ghost Flyer, on 01 February 2012 - 10:59 AM, said:

Hi folks + Termnander,

Has anyone tested Termnander's supplemental WiFi fix yet? Here is his post with zip file for fixing WiFi issues, from the previous page of this thread.

Somewhere along the line, after installing KG's SH OPDN 3/02 2.1.0 and his 2.1.1 sup f/w, plus the wifi analyzer with it's add on for manually selecting which AP you want to connect to, plus numerous other miscellaneous apps, my WiFi has become erratic. Many times it won't scan, thus it won't connect. Other times, it locks up, when about 1/8th through loading a web page. It can take up to 3 or 4 reboots of the WPDN to get it working again. Other times, I'll turn off my WPDN for the night, when everything was working fine, but the next time I turn it on, WiFi won't work, and I'm back to rebooting it 3 or 4 times, sometimes. If I'm lucky, one reboot will do it.

By the way, in North America, access points only use channels 1 to 11. Channels 11 to 13 are used in Europe and in most of the world (except N America), and Japan is the only country allowed to use Channel 14, I believe. In N America, I think most Access Point radios will only allow you to configure channels 1-11.

I digress... back to my question... Has anyone had success with Termnander's wifi fix, by flashing his file?

Thanks,
Ghost Flyer

Well, you couldn't flash his file, it was adb, but I made a flashable file that changed the buffer size as suggested. I really haven't noticed much difference, my wifi since I re-flashed my whole system is actually worse. My wifi seems to disconnect at about the same amount of time after starting every time. If I restart it at that point it generally does not drop out again until the next time I start it up. Not sure why this issue is happening again, I used to have this issue like most, but for some time it was not occurring on my system before I re-flashed, not sure if it was after I installed wifi analyzer and changed some settings or what. I need to do a little more testing and see if I can determine what had it working so well before. If you are interested, I will see if I can find my flashable zip of the supposed wifi fix increasing buffer size to see if it helps your issues?

[Ghost Flyer]

panengineer, on 01 February 2012 - 07:26 PM, said:

Well, you couldn't flash his file, it was adb, but I made a flashable file that changed the buffer size as suggested. I really haven't noticed much difference, my wifi since I re-flashed my whole system is actually worse. My wifi seems to disconnect at about the same amount of time after starting every time. If I restart it at that point it generally does not drop out again until the next time I start it up. Not sure why this issue is happening again, I used to have this issue like most, but for some time it was not occurring on my system before I re-flashed, not sure if it was after I installed wifi analyzer and changed some settings or what. I need to do a little more testing and see if I can determine what had it working so well before. If you are interested, I will see if I can find my flashable zip of the supposed wifi fix increasing buffer size to see if it helps your issues?

Thanks, panengineer, but if it made things worse for you, I think I'll pass. My WPDN, for the most part, has always disconnected from WiFi during the first 2 or 3 minutes of using WiFi, and that was using all stock f/w and stock build, right out of the box. It was a quick fix though, back then, too. All I had to do was wait for it to automatically re-connect most times, which it would do rather quickly. Occasionally, I would have to turn off WiFi and then turn it back on, but once I was back on, it would stay connected. After I flashed Kewl Guy's OPDN and supplemental 2.1.1, it still had the same problem, being consistent with how it behaved when it was still stock. I'm not 100% sure, but I think it was still working the same after I installed wifi analyzer. I suspect that it wasn't until I installed 3 more apps, that I started getting these erratic wireless WiFi issues. I installed the add on app for WiFi Analyzer, which gives the ability to connect to a specific access point from a list, regardless of SSID (eg... two or more APs might have the same SSID, and with the add-on app, you can select which particular AP you want, based on it's MAC address, not SSID.... very cool and useful for my job... I don't remember the name of the add-on, but if you click on an AP to connect to, from within WiFi Analyzer, it will prompt you to download it.) The only other two things I installed, which I think is when it all went bad is the IceStream app for IceFilms, Mx Video Player and a codec file for it, but I'm, still not 100%. It wasn't until I was actually playing a movie in MX video and then powering off the WPDN mid video stream, that I noticed I have the problem more severely. So, this is why I'm not 100%. I think the problem started somewhere between WiFI Analyzer and Mx Video, if that is any help. I'll check with my colleague next week, and see if she is having the same wireless issue. Her setup is almost the same as mine, except she doesn't have the WiFi Analyzer add-on app.

I'm also wondering if all this might be a result of maleware/viruses, obtained from the free apps on the Android market or SlideMe market, that I installed. For example, after In stalled IceStream, or MX Video, I now get a message in my bar at the top, indicating that there are two battery updates for me. Everyday, I clear the message in the download section, but it keeps coming back. In the message, apparently, I have to go to some site to "opt-out", and that is all that site does, is register peoples' "opt-outs", while collecting info on your device and what you do. I don't know if our WPDN devices are prone to malware/virus threats or not, as I haven't read much about that. At one point, I thought I saw that WPDN owners should install a good anti-virus app and/or an anti-malware app, but then elsewhere, I think I read that doing this isn't necessary on these, so I don't know what to think about all that yet.

Anyhow.. Sorry for the long message. Thank you for your reply; I much appreciate it.

Cheers,
Ghost Flyer

This post has been edited by Ghost Flyer: 02 February 2012 - 01:14 PM

[panengineer]

Well not sure if it made things worse, but it hasn't made wifi better as far as I can tell.

As for viruses and malware, I installed the AVG free product, and scan with it occasionally. Not sure if it helps, but I'm not really noticing some of your symptoms. Sounds like you could have picked up something that is messing up your WPDN, so you might give AVG or one of the other free antivirus apps a try.

[Longjohn119]

Ghost Flyer, on 02 February 2012 - 01:08 PM, said:

Thanks, panengineer, but if it made things worse for you, I think I'll pass. My WPDN, for the most part, has always disconnected from WiFi during the first 2 or 3 minutes of using WiFi, and that was using all stock f/w and stock build, right out of the box. It was a quick fix though, back then, too. All I had to do was wait for it to automatically re-connect most times, which it would do rather quickly. Occasionally, I would have to turn off WiFi and then turn it back on, but once I was back on, it would stay connected. After I flashed Kewl Guy's OPDN and supplemental 2.1.1, it still had the same problem, being consistent with how it behaved when it was still stock. I'm not 100% sure, but I think it was still working the same after I installed wifi analyzer. I suspect that it wasn't until I installed 3 more apps, that I started getting these erratic wireless WiFi issues. I installed the add on app for WiFi Analyzer, which gives the ability to connect to a specific access point from a list, regardless of SSID (eg... two or more APs might have the same SSID, and with the add-on app, you can select which particular AP you want, based on it's MAC address, not SSID.... very cool and useful for my job... I don't remember the name of the add-on, but if you click on an AP to connect to, from within WiFi Analyzer, it will prompt you to download it.) The only other two things I installed, which I think is when it all went bad is the IceStream app for IceFilms, Mx Video Player and a codec file for it, but I'm, still not 100%. It wasn't until I was actually playing a movie in MX video and then powering off the WPDN mid video stream, that I noticed I have the problem more severely. So, this is why I'm not 100%. I think the problem started somewhere between WiFI Analyzer and Mx Video, if that is any help. I'll check with my colleague next week, and see if she is having the same wireless issue. Her setup is almost the same as mine, except she doesn't have the WiFi Analyzer add-on app.

I'm also wondering if all this might be a result of maleware/viruses, obtained from the free apps on the Android market or SlideMe market, that I installed. For example, after In stalled IceStream, or MX Video, I now get a message in my bar at the top, indicating that there are two battery updates for me. Everyday, I clear the message in the download section, but it keeps coming back. In the message, apparently, I have to go to some site to "opt-out", and that is all that site does, is register peoples' "opt-outs", while collecting info on your device and what you do. I don't know if our WPDN devices are prone to malware/virus threats or not, as I haven't read much about that. At one point, I thought I saw that WPDN owners should install a good anti-virus app and/or an anti-malware app, but then elsewhere, I think I read that doing this isn't necessary on these, so I don't know what to think about all that yet.

Anyhow.. Sorry for the long message. Thank you for your reply; I much appreciate it.

Cheers,
Ghost Flyer

I think it has something to do with Google Apps, maybe even the market itself .... When I flashed just Base the WiFi worked great, after I flashed the market update only it got a little worse it seemed but not too bad. Later I came back and flashed Base with Market and all the Google Apps because I needed location services for a couple of weather/solunar programs I was trying and it's been flaky ever since. In the Morning I usually have to start it up cold and then reboot immediately to get the WiFi going but once it's going it doesn't drop very often. Sometimes you can turn it off and on several times without a hitch, sometimes you have to reboot.

The WiFi chipset drivers are old and a bit buggy so they are touchy as hell about usb timing apparently .... They are supposed to scan the channels every few minutes but in the WPDN the software thinks it is scanning but the hardware isn't really scanning so the software never receives the signal to tell it that it found an active channel and the software basically is stuck in a scan loop until it errors/times out and then good luck trying to get it to scan again .... The PCIe version didn't have that problem so for a while there was two drivers the standard ones for PCIe and then some tweaked specifically for USB and then about a year ago or so they 'unified' the driver for both USB and PCIe again

Unfortunately without the source code or a way to burn a custom complied kernel there isn't much chance of getting the drivers fixed and I seriously doubt Pandigital is going to sink any more money into these to upgrade the kernel and WiFi drivers .... What is really sad is they could have relesed the kernel source code a year ago and had it fixed for free, the GPL works both ways

[DVD2955]

WiFi troubles:

I have noticed that when my WiFi does not connect it seems to be mainly due to the fact that some piece of software is not reading the MAC ADDRESS of the WiFi card.

Once we are able to read and write down the devices MAC ADDRESS is there any way to force the data into the correct data streams??

It is my understanding that the MAC ADDRESS is set at the modems factory.

David

[Sir Tanon]

I know this thread has been dead a while, but I thought it might be worth it to revisit the wifi issue. I had a few ideas as far as directions we might take.. if it's even really worth it at this point.

I think it is.. but that's just me.

I was poking around with my WPDN earlier, in a terminal, and got these pics.

Pic one is the result of an 'ifconfig' and an 'iwconfig' command. As you can see, ifconfig sees the lo interface, but iwconfig is showing it with no wireless extensions.

Pic two is the result of a 'service list' command. I don't know if there might be value in trying an 'insmod' command or similar to force a reload of the wifi service/extensions, but it seems like one possible approach.

Pic three is the result of a 'lsmod' command. I know I've seen discussions on here about the drivers in use - in this case, the rt3070 drivers - and how they're not quite the correct ones for this adapter. I also remember seeing discussion regarding which ones ARE the best. I wonder how difficult it would be to either 1) Copy the correct ones to the internal SD card and run either a depmod or insmod to insert them into the kernel, or simply delete/rename the 'bad' drivers and then copy the 'good' ones to the SD card and rename them to look like the rt3070 drivers.

..any thoughts?

[Sir Tanon]

Oops.. forgot the pics. D'oh!!!

Attached File(s)

•  iwconf.jpg (184.15K)
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•  Services.jpg (218.49K)
  Number of downloads: 6
•  Drivers.jpg (71.43K)
  Number of downloads: 6