Why has my wifi gone rubbish?

[Ignoramus]

Hello,

Does anyone have any thoughts, please, on why my wifi has suddenly gone rubbish?

I used to use Windows on this laptop and the wifi then was really grim - it kept dropping out/disconnecting. I know the issue was something to do with the laptop because I suffered a BSOD and the wifi worked perfectly well on the three laptops I used while I was trying to work out how to fix it. Once I'd got it working again, I removed the frame thing round the screen and played about with the receiver thing (I'd unplugged from the mains first, of course!). After I did that the wifi signal improved considerably.

However, Windows just kept crashing so I thought I had nothing to lose by trying Linux on the laptop. (My sister's a big Linux fan but I was a bit scared of installing it just in case I managed to damage Windows and I might need to create something in Windows to be read on Windows elsewhere, but that's by-the-by.) I had a few issues setting up wifi on this laptop (viewtopic.php?f=52&t=364658&p=2118104#p2118104) but after I'd 'repaired packages' or whatever it started to work - miles better than it did in Windows after I'd fiddled with the receiver.

A couple of days ago I had to try to recover something from the fried Windows. I did it before I installed Linux - esc to get into recovery mode, command prompt, enter notebook.exe and you get a menu of libraries, files and folders, which you can copy to a USB. This time I chose the Windows option from the BIOS/boot thing (it's the third thing on the list, after Linux and Linux recovery mode); I tried the whole notebook.exe thing again but got nowhere - I think I'd tried reinstalling Windows after it crashed last time, and hadn't saved this folder because I thought I'd never need it again.

Now, obvs, I'm using Linux all the time, and am loving it, but the wifi is now almost as bad as it used to be in Windows before I fiddled with the receiver. As far as I know I've not done anything to move the receiver in the frame, so all I can think of is that I've sort-of tipped off Windows that I'm using Linux and now Windows is wreaking revenge on me for switching!

I tried the repair packages thing that worked before but it doesn't seem to have made much difference.

Does anybody have, please, any thoughts on what's really happened, and how I can maybe make it better again? I appreciate it's a First World problem, but inconsistent wifi is so stressful it's exhausting.

Thanks,
Alison

[HAWR]

Hello Ignoramus,

in order to help you again it is very useful to see your actual system informations:

Code: Select all

inxi -Fxxxrz

And to see your actual state of network devices, please show the outputs of the following commands:

Code: Select all

lspci -nnk | grep -i net -A2

Code: Select all

iwconfig

And please answer, whether Windows is still in use and Secure Boot still disabled on your laptop?

[sleepygeek]

Does anybody have, please, any thoughts on what's really happened, and how I can maybe make it better again?

So you have had intermittent WiFi problems with this same laptop under both Windows and Linux while having no WiFi problems on the same WiFi network with other laptops? And you have tinkered with the WiFi receiver hardware and had improved though temporary results? And you have already gone through troubleshooting the issue in another thread? Sounds like flaky hardware to me.

[Ignoramus]

Hi, Hawr and sleepygeek,
I'm so sorry for not responding sooner. I had to be away from home for a few days with no internet access. I'm still not at home but where I am has wifi. The signal is better than it is at home, but it still drops (considerably) for no apparent reason. The only thing I have noticed is that the signal possibly - only possibly, mind - might drop when it's downloading updates or there's an update (or more) that's waiting to be installed. Or maybe I have too many windows/tabs open at the same time? I have eight at the moment and the signal's dropping again.

I'd be tempted to think the same as you, sleepygeek, but if that was the case, why did the problem only start after I'd tried to get into Windows again? And why do I not have the problem when I've just opened the laptop - which is when the aerial is most likely to have been disturbed? The wifi will be working fine from the second I switch on the computer then it will just drop like a stone, even though I've not disturbed it, not as far as I can tell, anyway. Mind you, maybe I have??? I learned to type on a typewriter, not a computer, so maybe i am a bit heavy on the keys, which causes the laptop to vibrate and jiggle the aerial about a bit? But that said, why does the signal suddenly get strong again without me doing anything? I'm not having a go at you or anything, I'm just generally mystified, and that'sprobably making me less polite than I could be, and for that I'm sorry.

Anyway, here's the info you asked me for, Hawr, thanks. If you can't see any software reason why the signal drops, maybe I'll just have to accept it is a hardware issue after all, and look into whether it's worth replacing the aerial or not.

inxi -Fxxxrz:

System:
Kernel: 5.4.0-94-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 9.3.0
Desktop: Cinnamon 5.2.7 wm: muffin 5.2.0 dm: LightDM 1.30.0
Distro: Linux Mint 20.3 Una base: Ubuntu 20.04 focal
Machine:
Type: Laptop System: TOSHIBA product: SATELLITE L50D-B v: PSKULE-01L002EN
serial: <filter>
Mobo: AMD model: Larne serial: <filter> UEFI: Insyde v: 1.20
date: 05/07/2014
Battery:
ID-1: BAT1 charge: 4.3 Wh condition: 4.3/44.1 Wh (10%) volts: 14.9/14.8
model: Panasonic PA5185U-1BRS type: Li-ion serial: <filter> status: Full
cycles: 312
CPU:
Topology: Quad Core model: AMD A4-6210 APU with AMD Radeon R3 Graphics
bits: 64 type: MCP arch: Puma rev: 1 L2 cache: 2048 KiB
flags: avx lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 sse4a ssse3 svm
bogomips: 14372
Speed: 998 MHz min/max: 1000/1800 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 998 2: 998
3: 998 4: 998
Graphics:
Device-1: AMD Mullins [Radeon R3 Graphics] vendor: Toshiba driver: radeon
v: kernel bus ID: 00:01.0 chip ID: 1002:9850
Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.13 driver: ati,radeon
unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,vesa resolution: 1366x768~60Hz
OpenGL: renderer: AMD KABINI (DRM 2.50.0 5.4.0-94-generic LLVM 12.0.0)
v: 4.5 Mesa 21.0.3 direct render: Yes
Audio:
Device-1: AMD Kabini HDMI/DP Audio vendor: Toshiba driver: snd_hda_intel
v: kernel bus ID: 00:01.1 chip ID: 1002:9840
Device-2: AMD FCH Azalia vendor: Toshiba driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel
bus ID: 00:14.2 chip ID: 1022:780d
Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.4.0-94-generic
Network:
Device-1: Realtek RTL810xE PCI Express Fast Ethernet vendor: Toshiba
driver: r8169 v: kernel port: 2000 bus ID: 01:00.0 chip ID: 10ec:8136
IF: enp1s0 state: down mac: <filter>
Device-2: Broadcom and subsidiaries BCM43142 802.11b/g/n vendor: XAVi
driver: wl v: kernel port: 2000 bus ID: 05:00.0 chip ID: 14e4:4365
IF: wlp5s0 state: up mac: <filter>
Drives:
Local Storage: total: 931.51 GiB used: 35.97 GiB (3.9%)
ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Toshiba model: MQ01ABD100 size: 931.51 GiB
speed: 3.0 Gb/s rotation: 5400 rpm serial: <filter> rev: 4M scheme: GPT
Partition:
ID-1: / size: 503.54 GiB used: 35.94 GiB (7.1%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda5
Sensors:
System Temperatures: cpu: 56.1 C mobo: N/A gpu: radeon temp: 56 C
Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
Repos:
No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list
Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list
1: deb http://packages.linuxmint.com una main upstream import backport #id:linuxmint_main
2: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal main restricted universe multiverse
3: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-updates main restricted universe multiverse
4: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-backports main restricted universe multiverse
5: deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ focal-security main restricted universe multiverse
6: deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu/ focal partner
Info:
Processes: 213 Uptime: 1h 05m Memory: 4.78 GiB used: 2.05 GiB (42.8%)
Init: systemd v: 245 runlevel: 5 Compilers: gcc: 9.3.0 alt: 9 Shell: bash
v: 5.0.17 running in: xfce4-terminal inxi: 3.0.38

lspci -nnk | grep -i net -A2
01:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL810xE PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller [10ec:8136] (rev 07)
Subsystem: Toshiba Corporation RTL810xE PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller [1179:f920]
Kernel driver in use: r8169
Kernel modules: r8169
05:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Inc. and subsidiaries BCM43142 802.11b/g/n [14e4:4365] (rev 01)
Subsystem: XAVi Technologies Corp. BCM43142 802.11b/g/n [1b9a:3002]
Kernel driver in use: wl

iwconfig
lo no wireless extensions.

enp1s0 no wireless extensions.

wlp5s0 IEEE 802.11 ESSID:"TALKTALK7051C0"
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.462 GHz Access Point: 5C:B1:3E:70:51:BD
Retry short limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Power Management:on

[Pjotr]

Try this:
https://easylinuxtipsproject.blogspot.c ... html#ID2.1
(item 2.1)

[AndyMH]

Sounds like you booted into win10? Was fast start enabled in win10? If so boot back into win and turn it off.

[Ignoramus]

Hi, Pjotr,
Thanks for the suggestion. I've done what you said and turned the power management off. I'll see how it is and post a reply here, although it may be a couple of weeks before I can gauge how much of a difference it's made, but I will report back.

Hi, Andy,
Thanks for the response. I'm sorry but I'm not techie at all so I have no idea what I booted into. The laptop came with Windows installed, but after that kept crashing I installed Linux Mint xfce (as I already had that on a USB, long, long story) but I think I upgraded to Cinnamon, and when some upgrade or update thing was offered (20.3?) I went for that too. I don't remember doing anything to reduce the amount of space allocated to Windows on the partition or whatever, but I changed the boot order so Linux is now the first choice. Sorry for being so completely clueless!

Thanks to you both for your advice/thoughts, they're much appreciated.

[HAWR]

Hello Ignoramus,

here is a how-to for disabling Fast Startup in Windows. After that is done, make a real shutdown, wait a few minutes and boot Linux Mint again:

[urlhttps://www.isumsoft.com/windows-10/turn-on-off ... ws-10.html][/url]

[Ignoramus]

Hi Hawr,
Sorry, I've only just seen your reply. You know, I think the issue may be/have been mechanical, that I must have disturbed the cable again (the frame thing around the screen doesn't fit 'properly' since I drilled through the screen to bodge-repair the [rubbish] hinges). If you do happen to see this, is there any point disabling the Fast Start-Up in Windows if I've set this up so Linux gets priority over Windows? Windows must still be on here somewhere, but the reason I installed Linux was because Windows kept crashing. I didn't modify the partitions (whatever that means), I just Linux decide for itself where it wanted to go, if that would make a difference.
To be honest, though, it's no longer critical that this laptop is working perfectly, as I've managed (I think!) to get Linux working on the laptop I had before this one, which was mechanically fine but I had to replace because it couldn't cope with running an updated version of Windows - but, of course, can still run Linux!

[AndyMH]

If you do happen to see this, is there any point disabling the Fast Start-Up in Windows if I've set this up so Linux gets priority over Windows?

Yes, with fast start enabled, windows never really shuts down (to give the illusion of fast bootup). It leaves its file systems locked = read only to linux, so you cannot write to C: from mint. It can also lock some devices and cause the problems you are experiencing.