Intel WiFi 6 AX203 running at about half speed

[danielMinty]

Hello all,

Nice to meet you!
I'm new to the forums so I hope I've followed the rules.

The wifi connection on my Lenovo laptop seems to be running at about half the speed expected. It's about 1 week old.
When copying large files (2-4 GB for example) I'm getting a sustained throughput of about 40-43 MB/sec but am expecting at least twice that rate.
I'm copying to/from a local NAS which has a gigabit LAN connection. I have two TP-Link routers in my home and getting the same speed via both.
On wifi connections from other devices I'm able to achieve 90+ MB/sec doing the same task. I've test 3 other devices/configs in my household.

I've test the Lenovo laptop/wifi card in question on a live session of Nobara and KDE Neon 6 and able to get sustained rates of 90-95 MB/sec.

Here in Mint the Adapter settings in the Network manager report Link Speed 1200 Mb/s and signal strength 'Excellent'.
Update Manager says system is up to date. Update Manager confirms I'm using kernel 6.5.0-26.
I manually updated to this latest kernel and I used the 'edge' edition to install Mint on this machine.

Driver Manager says No Drivers Needed.

Seeing in other posts that the following command (dmesg | grep iwlwifi) helped diagnose issues, I've run it and pasted the results below, hope it is of use :

Code: Select all

[    5.780973] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
[    5.786257] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: Detected crf-id 0x1300504, cnv-id 0x80400 wfpm id 0x80000030
[    5.786299] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: PCI dev 51f1/0274, rev=0x370, rfid=0x10a100
[    5.788796] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: api flags index 2 larger than supported by driver
[    5.788805] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: TLV_FW_FSEQ_VERSION: FSEQ Version: 0.0.2.41
[    5.789296] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: loaded firmware version 83.e8f84e98.0 so-a0-hr-b0-83.ucode op_mode iwlmvm
[    5.970009] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: Detected Intel(R) Wi-Fi 6 AX203, REV=0x370
[    5.978578] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: WRT: Invalid buffer destination
[    6.082998] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: WFPM_UMAC_PD_NOTIFICATION: 0x20
[    6.083048] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: WFPM_LMAC2_PD_NOTIFICATION: 0x1f
[    6.083096] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: WFPM_AUTH_KEY_0: 0x90
[    6.083148] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: CNVI_SCU_SEQ_DATA_DW9: 0x10
[    6.083200] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: Detected RF HR B3, rfid=0x10a100
[    6.084376] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: RFIm is deactivated, reason = 4
[    6.094371] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: RFIm is deactivated, reason = 4
[    6.149596] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: base HW address: (Redacted......)
[    6.196176] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3 wlp0s20f3: renamed from wlan0
[    8.275888] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: WRT: Invalid buffer destination
[    8.379886] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: WFPM_UMAC_PD_NOTIFICATION: 0x20
[    8.379943] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: WFPM_LMAC2_PD_NOTIFICATION: 0x1f
[    8.379952] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: WFPM_AUTH_KEY_0: 0x90
[    8.379961] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: CNVI_SCU_SEQ_DATA_DW9: 0x10
[    8.381618] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: RFIm is deactivated, reason = 4
[    8.457422] iwlwifi 0000:00:14.3: Registered PHC clock: iwlwifi-PTP, with index: 1

I've done numerous searches on various search engines but have not found anything quite related to my issue.
Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Regards

[sleeper12]

Just a hunch, what does this show:

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iwconfig

[danielMinty]

Hi sleeper12,
Thanks.
This is the output:

lo no wireless extensions.

enp0s31f6 no wireless extensions.

wlp0s20f3 IEEE 802.11 ESSID:"TP-Link_093C"
Mode:Managed Frequency:5.18 GHz Access Point: (-----------------)
Bit Rate=1.0806 Gb/s Tx-Power=20 dBm
Retry short limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Power Management:on
Link Quality=70/70 Signal level=-37 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:91 Missed beacon:0

[Pjotr]

The hunch of sleeper12 proved to be correct. Try this:
https://easylinuxtipsproject.blogspot.c ... ml#ID2.1.1
(item 2.1.1)

[sleeper12]

Yep, what he said.

[danielMinty]

Hey Pjotr,
Thanks for that. I've followed those instructions. Ran the command suggested and rebooted.
Looks like power management on the wifi card is now off.

Unfortunately the transfers are still around 40-43 GB/sec

Here is the output now...

lo no wireless extensions.
enp0s31f6 no wireless extensions.
wlp0s20f3 IEEE 802.11 ESSID:"TP-Link_093C"
Mode:Managed Frequency:5.18 GHz Access Point: ------------
Bit Rate=1.1342 Gb/s Tx-Power=20 dBm
Retry short limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Power Management:off
Link Quality=70/70 Signal level=-38 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:57 Missed beacon:0

[Pjotr]

OK, what does this command say:

Code: Select all

inxi -Fxxxxpmrz

[danielMinty]

Hey,
Here's the result:
Thanks


System:
Kernel: 6.5.0-26-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: N/A
Desktop: Cinnamon 6.0.4 tk: GTK 3.24.33 wm: muffin vt: 7 dm: LightDM 1.30.0
Distro: Linux Mint 21.3 Virginia base: Ubuntu 22.04 jammy
Machine:
Type: Laptop System: LENOVO product: 21KH v: ThinkBook 16 G6 IRL
serial: <superuser required> Chassis: type: 10 v: ThinkBook 16 G6 IRL
serial: <superuser required>
Mobo: LENOVO model: LNVNB161216 v: NO DPK serial: <superuser required>
UEFI: LENOVO v: MMCN34WW date: 01/05/2024
Battery:
ID-1: BAT0 charge: 38.2 Wh (50.5%) condition: 75.6/71.0 Wh (106.4%)
volts: 15.4 min: 15.4 model: SMP L22M4PE1 type: Li-poly serial: <filter>
status: Discharging cycles: 3
Memory:
RAM: total: 30.87 GiB used: 2.6 GiB (8.4%)
RAM Report:
permissions: Unable to run dmidecode. Root privileges required.
CPU:
Info: 14-core (6-mt/8-st) model: 13th Gen Intel Core i7-13700H bits: 64
type: MST AMCP smt: enabled arch: N/A rev: 2 cache: L1: 1.2 MiB
L2: 11.5 MiB L3: 24 MiB
Speed (MHz): avg: 462 high: 729 min/max: 400/4800:5000:3700 cores: 1: 400
2: 400 3: 400 4: 400 5: 723 6: 400 7: 729 8: 400 9: 400 10: 700 11: 652
12: 400 13: 400 14: 400 15: 406 16: 400 17: 400 18: 400 19: 434 20: 400
bogomips: 116736
Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Graphics:
Device-1: Intel Raptor Lake-P [Iris Xe Graphics] vendor: Lenovo
driver: i915 v: kernel ports: active: eDP-1
empty: DP-1, DP-2, DP-3, DP-4, HDMI-A-1 bus-ID: 00:02.0
chip-ID: 8086:a7a0 class-ID: 0300
Device-2: Acer Integrated Camera type: USB driver: uvcvideo bus-ID: 3-6:2
chip-ID: 5986:215f class-ID: fe01 serial: <filter>
Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 1.21.1.4 driver: X: loaded: modesetting
unloaded: fbdev,vesa gpu: i915 display-ID: :0 screens: 1
Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1200 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x317mm (20.0x12.5")
s-diag: 599mm (23.6")
Monitor-1: eDP-1 model: BOE Display res: 1920x1200 hz: 60 dpi: 141
size: 345x215mm (13.6x8.5") diag: 407mm (16") modes: 1920x1200
OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel Graphics (RPL-P)
v: 4.6 Mesa 23.2.1-1ubuntu3.1~22.04.2 direct render: Yes
Audio:
Device-1: Intel Raptor Lake-P/U/H cAVS vendor: Lenovo
driver: sof-audio-pci-intel-tgl bus-ID: 00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:51ca
class-ID: 0401
Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k6.5.0-26-generic running: yes
Sound Server-2: PulseAudio v: 15.99.1 running: yes
Sound Server-3: PipeWire v: 0.3.48 running: yes
Network:
Device-1: Intel Raptor Lake PCH CNVi WiFi driver: iwlwifi v: kernel
bus-ID: 00:14.3 chip-ID: 8086:51f1 class-ID: 0280
IF: wlp0s20f3 state: up mac: <filter>
Device-2: Intel Ethernet I219-V vendor: Lenovo driver: e1000e v: kernel
port: N/A bus-ID: 00:1f.6 chip-ID: 8086:0dc6 class-ID: 0200
IF: enp0s31f6 state: down mac: <filter>
Bluetooth:
Device-1: Intel AX201 Bluetooth type: USB driver: btusb v: 0.8
bus-ID: 3-10:4 chip-ID: 8087:0026 class-ID: e001
Report: hciconfig ID: hci0 rfk-id: 2 state: up address: <filter>
bt-v: 3.0 lmp-v: 5.2 sub-v: 356b hci-v: 5.2 rev: 356b
Drives:
Local Storage: total: 953.87 GiB used: 38.35 GiB (4.0%)
ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: SK Hynix model: HFS001TEJ4X112N
size: 953.87 GiB speed: 63.2 Gb/s lanes: 4 type: SSD serial: <filter>
rev: 51040C31 temp: 37.9 C scheme: GPT
Partition:
ID-1: / size: 937.33 GiB used: 38.34 GiB (4.1%) fs: ext4
dev: /dev/nvme0n1p2
ID-2: /boot/efi size: 511 MiB used: 15.3 MiB (3.0%) fs: vfat
dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1
Swap:
ID-1: swap-1 type: file size: 2 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2
file: /swapfile
Sensors:
System Temperatures: cpu: 44.0 C mobo: 39.0 C
Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
Repos:
Packages: 2236 apt: 2222 flatpak: 14
No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list
Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mediaelch-mediaelch-stable-jammy.list
1: deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/mediaelch-mediaelch-stable-jammy.gpg] https://ppa.launchpadcontent.net/mediae ... ble/ubuntu jammy main
Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list
1: deb http://packages.linuxmint.com virginia main upstream import backport
2: deb http://mirror.us-ny2.kamatera.com/ubuntu jammy main restricted universe multiverse
3: deb http://mirror.us-ny2.kamatera.com/ubuntu jammy-updates main restricted universe multiverse
4: deb http://mirror.us-ny2.kamatera.com/ubuntu jammy-backports main restricted universe multiverse
5: deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ jammy-security main restricted universe multiverse
Info:
Processes: 387 Uptime: 9m wakeups: 20885 Init: systemd v: 249 runlevel: 5
Compilers: gcc: 11.4.0 alt: 11/12 Shell: Bash v: 5.1.16
running-in: gnome-terminal inxi: 3.3.13

[Pjotr]

Try this:
https://easylinuxtipsproject.blogspot.c ... i.html#ID4
(items 4 and 5)

[danielMinty]

Hi Pjotr,
Thanks a lot for your help.
I followed items 4 and 5 below. When I restarted the issue was more or less the same unfortunately.
If anything the back-ported drivers were a tad slower. averaging 38-40 instead of 40-43 with the previous ones from earlier today.

I also tried item 6 in your article below. I installed the upstream driver and restarted.
It also didn't provide any better speed, averaging around 40 Mb/sec.

It seems quite odd that it doesn't seem many other people have had this issue.
I thought the Intel wifi chipset I'm using (AX203) is quite a common one?

Try this:
https://easylinuxtipsproject.blogspot.c ... i.html#ID4
(items 4 and 5)

[Pjotr]

You might still try this:
https://easylinuxtipsproject.blogspot.c ... i.html#ID3
(item 3)

[danielMinty]

Hi again,

Thanks again Pjotr for your continued help.
Unfortunately this didn't improve the throughput speed.
I didn't think my wifi chip was a new generation and Lenovo uses this wifi chip quite extensively in their Intel 13th gen configurations. Bit of a bummer I can get full speed.

Do you think it might improve in a future kernel update?

Thank you again

You might still try this:
https://easylinuxtipsproject.blogspot.c ... i.html#ID3
(item 3)

[Pjotr]

Do you think it might improve in a future kernel update?

Could be.... Just for laughs, you can give the daily build of Xubuntu 24.04 a spin (just the live session should do):
https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/xubuntu/daily-live/current/

It should give you an indication of what to expect from Mint 22 (due in July or thereabouts).

[danielMinty]

Okay, that sounds interesting. I'll do try a live session...
Thanks Pjotr

Do you think it might improve in a future kernel update?

Could be.... Just for laughs, you can give the daily build of Xubuntu 24.04 a spin (just the live session should do):
https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/xubuntu/daily-live/current/

It should give you an indication of what to expect from Mint 22 (due in July or thereabouts).

[danielMinty]

Hi Pjotr,

I tried that, looks like I'm getting the same 38-40 MB/s on xubuntu 24.04.

Something has me confused, when I do an internet speed test with speedtest.net for example, it is reporting around 85 MB/sec.
I thought perhaps that was because it was a synthetic test scenario.

My issue is that on my local network, via SMB from my Synology NAS, I'm only able to achieve 40MB/s on my Mint set up.
When using a live session of Nobara or KDE Neon (on this same lappy), I'm able to transfer large files from my NAS via SMB at 80-85 MS/s

Is it therefore possible that my wifi interface/drivers are fine after all but I'm seeing an issue with something else in my Mint installation?
Is it possible there is an issue with how my Mint install is handling traffic from/to my NAS?
Sorry that I don't know how to phrase my question because the technical aspects are beyond me.

I just thought I'd try to download a large file over http from a remote server. I used https://www.thinkbroadband.com/download
and downloaded the 1GB file on that page. Mint/Firefox was reporting it was downloading at 85 MB/sec!!!

This is all beyond my comprehension as a beginner, but does this allude to something else I could try and troubleshoot perhaps?
Again any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks again.

Okay, that sounds interesting. I'll do try a live session...
Thanks Pjotr

Do you think it might improve in a future kernel update?

Could be.... Just for laughs, you can give the daily build of Xubuntu 24.04 a spin (just the live session should do):
https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/xubuntu/daily-live/current/

It should give you an indication of what to expect from Mint 22 (due in July or thereabouts).