[Dev] Chromebook C201 wifi

Mon Apr 1 14:01:16 GMT 2019

Thanks for your input Josh, that is interesting. I had a look at the
bootloader options, but couldn't see anything that looked like it would
affect the power going to the USB ports.

I had another read of the ThinkPenguin page (
https://www.thinkpenguin.com/gnu-linux/penguin-wireless-n-usb-adapter-gnu-linux-tpe-n150usb
) about their wifi dongle in more detail, and under 'Power
Consumption', the highest it lists is 310 mA. This is quite a lot lower
than the 500mA that a USB 2.0 port is supposed to provide - would the
available power really be only 60% of the standard?

I also found this page for the ath9k_htc_firmware: 
https://github.com/qca/open-ath9k-htc-firmware/wiki/usb-related-issues#start-of-content
. Under 'USB related issues', it mentions stability issues, so it seems
there are some issues the devs are aware of. It mentions about powered
USB hubs, saying that people have had issues with specific USB
controllers.

I will also attach a printout of my dmesg for when I plugged the dongle
in, tried to connect (causing the system freeze) and then unplugged it.
I'm not sure if it sheds much light on the situation, but some of the
errors look similar to what they are talking about on that Atheros
firmware page.

Regards,

Lee

On Sun, 2019-03-31 at 21:24 +0100, Josh Branning wrote:
> This is interesting, a while back I tried plugging in an external HDD
> to 
> an olinuxino (ARM) using parabola, and it didn't get enough power 
> either. At that point, I assumed it was because the board wasn't 
> providing the right power through the USB. I was using a power pack
> that 
> matched the recommended input voltage and current of the board.
> 
> Possibly a different thing entirely, but you never know ... there
> could 
> be some setting in the kernel or bootloader or something that means
> the 
> devices are only getting limited power through the USBs.
> 
> Another way to test if it is a parabola issue, could be to burn a
> live 
> CD or make a usb of a different distro, and see if the adapter works 
> with that, though if it is solely a bootloader issue, I guess that 
> wouldn't be much help less a alternate one is also supplied. It is 
> something I didn't do, because I assumed it would have probably been
> the 
> hardware simply being not able to supply required the power.
> 
> Note that on some other less-free similar dev boards, USB hdds
> worked, 
> albeit with a different distro. I know fosho that on some of these 
> boards there is a bootloader setting where you can adjust the output 
> current/voltage, so there may be one in u-boot too.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Josh
> 
> 
-------------- next part --------------
NetworkManager is disabled, this is trying to set up wifi connection manually, using wpa_supplicant:

Atheros wifi USB is plugged in (no sign of any problems):

[   60.808087] usb 2-1: new high-speed USB device number 2 using dwc2
[   61.032485] usb 2-1: New USB device found, idVendor=0cf3, idProduct=9271, bcdDevice= 1.08
[   61.032564] usb 2-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=16, Product=32, SerialNumber=48
[   61.032632] usb 2-1: Product: UB93
[   61.032667] usb 2-1: Manufacturer: ATHEROS
[   61.032707] usb 2-1: SerialNumber: 12345
[   61.060437] cfg80211: Loading compiled-in X.509 certificates for regulatory database
[   61.071605] cfg80211: Loaded X.509 cert 'sforshee: 00b28ddf47aef9cea7'
[   61.109932] usb 2-1: ath9k_htc: Firmware ath9k_htc/htc_9271-1.4.0.fw requested
[   61.110280] usbcore: registered new interface driver ath9k_htc
[   61.389274] usb 2-1: ath9k_htc: Transferred FW: ath9k_htc/htc_9271-1.4.0.fw, size: 51008
[   61.640980] ath9k_htc 2-1:1.0: ath9k_htc: HTC initialized with 33 credits
[   61.904852] ath9k_htc 2-1:1.0: ath9k_htc: FW Version: 1.4
[   61.904909] ath9k_htc 2-1:1.0: FW RMW support: On
[   61.904955] ath: EEPROM regdomain: 0x65
[   61.904957] ath: EEPROM indicates we should expect a direct regpair map
[   61.904963] ath: Country alpha2 being used: 00
[   61.904964] ath: Regpair used: 0x65
[   61.930629] ieee80211 phy0: Atheros AR9271 Rev:1

Here, the connection is started and system hangs shortly afterwards:

[  693.696726] wlan0: authenticate with 48:5d:36:d0:27:ae
[  693.955494] wlan0: send auth to 48:5d:36:d0:27:ae (try 1/3)
[  693.959246] wlan0: authenticated
[  693.964085] wlan0: associate with 48:5d:36:d0:27:ae (try 1/3)
[  693.969608] wlan0: RX AssocResp from 48:5d:36:d0:27:ae (capab=0x1431 status=0 aid=3)
[  693.980037] wlan0: associated
[  693.982330] ath: EEPROM regdomain: 0x8348
[  693.982333] ath: EEPROM indicates we should expect a country code
[  693.982335] ath: doing EEPROM country->regdmn map search
[  693.982337] ath: country maps to regdmn code: 0x3a
[  693.982340] ath: Country alpha2 being used: US
[  693.982342] ath: Regpair used: 0x3a
[  693.982344] ath: regdomain 0x8348 dynamically updated by country element
[  693.984668] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 8 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  693.986683] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06400029
[  693.992800] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 4 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  693.994811] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.080386] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 2 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.082394] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.182778] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 0 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.184795] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.285179] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 1 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.287192] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.387564] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 6 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.389633] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.489968] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 5 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.492078] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.592358] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 7 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.594529] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.694771] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 2 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.696892] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.797151] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 1 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.799144] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.899552] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 6 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.901505] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  694.992911] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 1 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  694.995015] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  695.001969] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 4 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  695.004105] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  695.104371] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 5 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  695.106498] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  695.206755] dwc2 ff580000.usb: dwc2_hc_chhltd_intr_dma: Channel 0 - ChHltd set, but reason is unknown
[  695.208952] dwc2 ff580000.usb: hcint 0x00000002, intsts 0x06600029
[  703.983547] wlan0: deauthenticating from 48:5d:36:d0:27:ae by local choice (Reason: 3=DEAUTH_LEAVING)
[  706.820083] ath: phy0: Unable to remove station entry for: 48:5d:36:d0:27:ae

Whun I unplug the USB device. Here the system unfreezes and everything works normally again:

[  841.392140] usb 2-1: USB disconnect, device number 2
[  841.425692] ath: phy0: Failed to wakeup in 500us
[  841.438006] ath: phy0: Failed to wakeup in 500us
[  841.504269] usb 2-1: ath9k_htc: USB layer deinitialized