"Use as Hotspot" no longer working

[m-s-a]

Hello,
I used to use my Linuxmint 18.3 Laptop as hotspot for my iphone and kindle devices.
All of a sudden, (starting a few weeks ago) this is no longer working.

The devices can still see the hotspot, the password prompt still succeeds, but then it takes a long time for the WiFi icon on the iphone to show up.
When it finally does, any kind of network connection that I make on the phone (e.g. browse to some website) times out.
Kindle has the same kind off issue - password accepted but then no connection can be established.

How do I start troubleshooting this?

Thank you in advance!
Mark

[doug619]

Were you able to solve this? I am having issues that may be similar.

I used to successfully use my Linux Mint 18.x laptop as a hotspot (Internet connection via EasyTether USB tethering). I recently built a new installation of LM 19 and can no longer connect to the hotspot that I enable with the "Use as Hotspot" button in Network Settings. The hotspot created has a different password than what it used to be and I have entered that new password when trying to connect.

I have noticed that the security type is WEP which is different from WPA/WPA2 previously, but don't see a way to change it which may be the cause of my inability to connect to the hotspot and I would very much like to do for security reasons.

Does anyone have any guidance or suggestions?

Doug

[m-s-a]

No, not really. All of a sudden it started working again, like nothing ever happened.
Then a few months later, it stopped again... Now I'm waiting for it to just flip back again to working without problems
Not exactly a scientifically sound approach, I'm afraid...

[doug619]

Were you able to solve this? I am having issues that may be similar.

I used to successfully use my Linux Mint 18.x laptop as a hotspot (Internet connection via EasyTether USB tethering). I recently built a new installation of LM 19 and can no longer connect to the hotspot that I enable with the "Use as Hotspot" button in Network Settings. The hotspot created has a different password than what it used to be and I have entered that new password when trying to connect.

I have noticed that the security type is WEP which is different from WPA/WPA2 previously, but don't see a way to change it which may be the cause of my inability to connect to the hotspot and I would very much like to do for security reasons.

Does anyone have any guidance or suggestions?

Doug

Does anyone know why the security type (when using my LM 19 laptop as a hotspot) is defaulting to WEP? Is there a way to change it to WPA/WPA2?

Doug

[gm10]

Does anyone know why the security type (when using my LM 19 laptop as a hotspot) is defaulting to WEP? Is there a way to change it to WPA/WPA2?

See the Wi-Fi Security tab in the connection's settings.

[doug619]

Thanks for that suggestion. Only seems to offer WEP though, no option for WPA/WPA2.

Doug

[gm10]

Thanks for that suggestion. Only seems to offer WEP though, no option for WPA/WPA2.

Should look like this in LM19.x:

nm-wpa.png (18.25 KiB) Viewed 2108 times

[doug619]

On my LM19 I only see the first two WEP options.

Doug

[gm10]

Probably a driver/firmware issue with your specific hardware then, try with a different wireless device if you can.

[doug619]

Thanks. I'll probably try upgrading to LM 19.1. This was a fresh install of LM 19 on 13Dec2018. A software upgrade on 2Feb2019 included Linux kernel 4.15.0.45.47.

Doug

[gm10]

The upgrade from 19 to 19.1 won't affect this, but you can try a 4.18-series kernel from Update Manager > View > Linux kernels.

[m-s-a]

No, not really. All of a sudden it started working again, like nothing ever happened.
Then a few months later, it stopped again... Now I'm waiting for it to just flip back again to working without problems
Not exactly a scientifically sound approach, I'm afraid...

I just found a potential fix for my original problem: I went into "Network Connections" and deleted the entry for the hotspot. Then I clicked the "Use as hotspot..." button under "Network settings" again, which created a new Hotspot with a new password. This new one is working without issues...

[TGPB]

I'm running 19.2 mate and EasyTether Pro with success. I want to hotspot my computer to share this connection. I looked in network connections and don't see a hotspot option.

[m-s-a]

You will probably get more helpful replies faster if you start your own post rather than adding to a really old one like this that was about something else...