OpenWRT 10.03.1-rc4 has just been released, so I’m once again upgrading my Buffalo WZR-HP-G300NH home router. Each release candidate in the 10.03.1 series has improved performance of the Atheros wireless chipset, but I still see occasional network interruptions when the laptop is idle overnight. How does wireless on rc4 stack up against rc3?
I followed the same upgrade process as I used to upgrade to rc3. I ran tests with fping
and iperf
before and after upgrading. All tests were performed from my laptop (on 802.11g wireless) to gozer (on gigabit Ethernet) and frances (another laptop on 802.11g wireless). fping
results:
# 10.03.1-rc3 gozer : xmt/rcv/%loss = 400/389/2%, min/avg/max = 0.79/9.55/273 frances : xmt/rcv/%loss = 400/387/3%, min/avg/max = 1.80/22.8/230 # 10.03.1-rc4 frances : xmt/rcv/%loss = 400/393/1%, min/avg/max = 1.75/15.3/1158 gozer : xmt/rcv/%loss = 400/388/3%, min/avg/max = 0.86/5.06/144
For the iperf
tests, I send various streams of UDP traffic between my laptop (wireless) and gozer (gigabit Ethernet). I monitored the running throughput with bwm-ng
, which confirmed iperf
‘s output.
10.03.1-rc3 – 29.0 mbit
10.03.1-rc4 – 29.5 mbit
Conclusion: general wireless performance hasn’t changed since rc3. Now to wait and see if it disconnects in the middle of the night.
I also note that the rc3 results vary from the results in the last upgrade post. The slight improvements there fall within the margin of error. Wireless performance varies with numerous external factors, and the 2.4 GHz spectrum is notoriously crowded in London. What matters is that these tests were performed within an hour of one another, and presumably are subject to the same interference issues. I’m concerned only with the difference between them, not the absolute numbers.
As with previous releases, it is still not possible to support multiple wireless networks with different encryption types.
Update: yes, rc4 still has problems with disconnections on this hardware.
Tags: openwrt
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do let us know if this version disconnects in the middle of the night.
i’m using gargoyle’s latest version and so far it doesn’t have wifi disconnecting.
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That is stange, isn’t gargoyle a web frontend for openwrt?
I have a Buffalo WZR-HP-300GN as well, running openwrt 10.03.1-rc4. So far I have experienced very few wifi disconnections only with a Mac client (nothing so far with a Win client).
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For some reason 10.03.1-rc4 appeared to drop the wan connection for me after some random period of time. Maybe not dropping the wan, but somehow preventing me from accessing anything outside my local network. Rebooting fixed it, but it would continue to break.
The latest trunk seems to be better, but LUCI fails :(
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Disabling WMM option solved my disconnection problems.
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Actually the wmm_enabled option is already there, you just have to change it to: wmm_enabled=0. It should be line 110.
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