WL1837MOD: Interface hangs in AP mode

Arturs Laizans

Part Number: WL1837MOD

Hello!

We have WL1837MOD in embedded device using i.MX6 ARM Cortex-A9 CPU.
Linux kernel: 5.4.47
wl18xx: 8.9.0.0.90
hostapd: TI patched one (c0d9b775e285e0a5ad3c4b7cfe2c5ad7f5adb319)

We are experiencing some issues in AP mode where interface gets in a state where it does not pass IP traffic.
The easiest way to reproduce it is to have multiple clients (like 3) and make them connect connect, get HTTP resource, disconnect. Doing this in loop with 3 clients renders AP unusable in approx. 20 iterations. More clients makes it easier to reproduce. Disable/Enable makes the AP unfreeze. Enabling FULL TI debug logs makes it harder to reproduce (250 iterations might be needed to reproduce).
We tried different network configurations (DHCP, static IP, bridge), different ways to set up AP (hostapd, wpa_supplicant, iwd) and other stuff, and the issue is always reproducible.

wl18xx debug logs
wl18xx-conf.bin

over 2 years ago

0 Sabeeh Khan1 over 2 years ago

TI__Mastermind 30350 points

Hi Arturs,

Apologies for the delay. Is your host also acting as the dhcp server? I'm curious to see if when a client connects and then disconnects, the IP is not released correctly. Can you look into this?

0 Sabeeh Khan1 over 2 years ago

TI__Mastermind 30350 points

Also, do you connect more than 10 devices at a time? Doing so may cause issues.

0 Arturs Laizans over 2 years ago

Prodigy 30 points

The issue is present also using static IP.
We have setup with up to 3 clients now. Haven't really tried with more than 4.

0 Sabeeh Khan1 over 2 years ago in reply to Arturs Laizans

TI__Mastermind 30350 points

Hi Arturs,

Ok understood. To debug this problem further we will need to collect logs from the WL18xx. We have a guide on how to do this here: https://www.ti.com/lit/ug/swru435a/swru435a.pdf. And the tool page to download the software here: https://www.ti.com/tool/WILINK-BT_WIFI-WIRELESS_TOOLS

It would also be good if you are able to collect wi-fi sniffer logs into a wireshark capture. These two things would be critical in debugging and resolving this issue.

Could you also share your hostapd.conf?

Another thing to try is to disable ELP mode with these 2 commands:

0 Arturs Laizans over 2 years ago

Prodigy 30 points

Our design does not expose WL_UART_DBG pin so we are not able to collect those logs. Is there other way we could provide useful logs to you?

0 Sabeeh Khan1 over 2 years ago in reply to Arturs Laizans

TI__Mastermind 30350 points

Hi,

The device logs are very critical. If you have some other hardware or maybe TI WL18xx evaluation hardware that you are able to replicate the issue, then that would be good. Could you possibly use a jumper wire to connect to the device?

It would also be helpful to look at wifi sniffer captures; like a wireshark log.

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WL1837MOD: Interface hangs in AP mode