Raspberry Pi 2 Wifi (nl80211, cheap dongle)

[bradwiggo]

I have a Raspberry Pi 2 with a cheap USB WiFi dongle. Using `wifi.sh` says no wifi devices found, and `iw wlan0` says `nl80211 not found.`

Does anybody know how I can load the driver for my wifi chip. I tried all the "firmware-xxx" packages.

Running piCore 15

[Rich]

Hi bradwiggo
Welcome to the forum.

The first thing to do is run lsusb provided by usbutils.tcz. That will
allow you to post the VID:PID (xxxx:yyyy) of the device so its
chipset can be identified.

[bradwiggo]

Hi bradwiggo
Welcome to the forum.

The first thing to do is run lsusb provided by usbutils.tcz. That will
allow you to post the VID:PID (xxxx:yyyy) of the device so its
chipset can be identified.

Code: [Select]

Bus 001 Device 004: ID 148f:7601 Ralink Techology, Corp. MT7601U Wireless Adapter

Same output when plugging the adapter into my laptop

Tried the `firmware-ralink` and `firmware-mediatek`, neither seemed to work unfortunately

[Rich]

Hi bradwiggo

... Tried the `firmware-ralink` and `firmware-mediatek`, neither seemed to work unfortunately

They both contain the firmware for your device. Keep the firmware-ralink
and remove the firmware-mediatek. The ralink extension is much smaller
than the mediatek (41K vs 9.3M).

... Using `wifi.sh` says no wifi devices found, ...

Do you have all of the dependencies for wifi installed:

Code: [Select]

wireless_tools.tcz
wireless-KERNEL.tcz
regdb.tcz
wpa_supplicant.tcz
libnl.tcz
openssl.tcz
ca-certificates.tcz
readline.tcz
ncurses.tczwireless-KERNEL.tcz  contains the driver for your device (mt7601u.ko).

You need the .tcz, .tcz.md5.txt, and the .tcz.dep (if it exists) files for each extension.

[bradwiggo]

Hi bradwiggo

... Tried the `firmware-ralink` and `firmware-mediatek`, neither seemed to work unfortunately

They both contain the firmware for your device. Keep the firmware-ralink
and remove the firmware-mediatek. The ralink extension is much smaller
than the mediatek (41K vs 9.3M).

... Using `wifi.sh` says no wifi devices found, ...

Do you have all of the dependencies for wifi installed:

Code: [Select]

wireless_tools.tcz
wireless-KERNEL.tcz
regdb.tcz
wpa_supplicant.tcz
libnl.tcz
openssl.tcz
ca-certificates.tcz
readline.tcz
ncurses.tczwireless-KERNEL.tcz  contains the driver for your device (mt7601u.ko).

You need the .tcz, .tcz.md5.txt, and the .tcz.dep (if it exists) files for each extension.

I didn't have the dependencies installed properly before, I'd forgotten the .dep files. However it's unfortunately still not working. The WiFi adapter still isn't showing up. ifconfig doesn't show any "wlan0" device

dmesg shows the following:

Code: [Select]

mt7601u 1-1.2:1.0: ASIC revision: 7610001 MAC revision: 76010500
mt7601u 1-1.2:1.0: Direct firmware load for mt7601u.bin failed with error -2
mt7601u: probe of 1-1.2:1.0 failed with error -2
usbcore: registered new interface driver mt7601u

Edit: It works if I put the .tcz files in onboot.lst. Why doesn't it work when I manually load them? They are at the bottom of onboot.lst, so surely there should be no difference

[Juanito]

The firmware extension needs to be loaded first.

You can check with dmesg if the firmware has been found and loaded.

[Rich]

Hi bradwiggo

... Why doesn't it work when I manually load them? ...

Try it like this:

Code: [Select]

tce-load -i firmware-ralink
tce-load -i wifi
Or like this:

Code: [Select]

tce-load -i firmware-ralink wifi

[bradwiggo]

Hi bradwiggo
Welcome to the forum.

The first thing to do is run lsusb provided by usbutils.tcz. That will
allow you to post the VID:PID (xxxx:yyyy) of the device so its
chipset can be identified.

Do you know if this WiFi adapter/chipset would work in PiCore/has a driver package: "TL-WN823N"

[Rich]

Hi bradwiggo
While it is likely that device is supported, posting the
result of lsusb for an actual device is the best way to
know for sure.

Tp-link has used several different chipsets for this device.

[bradwiggo]

Hi bradwiggo
While it is likely that device is supported, posting the
result of lsusb for an actual device is the best way to
know for sure.

Tp-link has used several different chipsets for this device.

Thanks, looking at buying one from Amazon.

Do you know if these models are supported?

Edimax EW-7811Un V2 (seems to use rt8192cu)
TP-Link Archer T2U Nano (uses rtl8812au according to AskUbuntu)
TP-Link Archer T3U Nano (AC1300) (I think it uses rtl88x2bu)
TP-Link Archer T2UB Nano (TL-WN725N) (rtl8188eu according to AskUbuntu)

(or is there a list somewhere, don't want to spam questions)

[Paul_123]

Those are all drastically different devices.  What 802.11 standard are you looking for  (g,n,ac,ax ?)

This is probably the best list out there.  https://github.com/morrownr/USB-WiFi/blob/main/home/USB_WiFi_Adapters_that_are_supported_with_Linux_in-kernel_drivers.md

[Rich]

Hi bradwiggo

... Do you know if these models are supported?

Edimax EW-7811Un V2 (seems to use rt8192cu) ...

I think you meant rtl8192cu. Spelling, punctuation, and
capitalization matter.

... (or is there a list somewhere, don't want to spam questions)

If you have network access on your pi, you can ask it.
Here is an example from TC10 x86:

Code: [Select]

tc@E310:~$ provides.sh rtl8192cu
firmware-rtlwifi.tcz
wireless-4.19.10-tinycore64.tcz
wireless-4.19.10-tinycore.tcz
Or on any machine with a web browser, go to:
http://tinycorelinux.net/15.x/armhf/tcz/provides.db

Search the page for rtl8192cu. Then page up until
you get to the .tcz that supplies it.
The first entries found will be firmware.
Later entries will be drivers from a different .tcz.

[bradwiggo]

Those are all drastically different devices.  What 802.11 standard are you looking for  (g,n,ac,ax ?)

This is probably the best list out there.  https://github.com/morrownr/USB-WiFi/blob/main/home/USB_WiFi_Adapters_that_are_supported_with_Linux_in-kernel_drivers.md

Just something to connect the Pi to WiFi, the mt7601u one did work when loading the modules in the correct order, but the adapter itself is a bit shit and the connection kept dropping. Probably because it's really cheap, so looking to buy a better one.
Not PiCore's fault, same thing happened on Debian.
I'll check provides.sh and see which ones are available.
Buying them on Amazon so can always return if it doesn't work, will report back with results.

[bradwiggo]

Hi bradwiggo
While it is likely that device is supported, posting the
result of lsusb for an actual device is the best way to
know for sure.

Tp-link has used several different chipsets for this device.

I noticed for rtl8192eu there are three firmware files:

lib/firmware/rtlwifi/rtl8192eu_ap_wowlan.bin
lib/firmware/rtlwifi/rtl8192eu_wowlan.bin
lib/firmware/rtlwifi/rtl8192eu_nic.bin

for most others there is just rtlXXXXXXfw.bin

Is there something different about that module?

[Rich]

Hi bradwiggo
This is just guesswork:
lib/firmware/rtlwifi/rtl8192eu_nic.bin Might refer to an actual Network Interface Card (non USB)?
lib/firmware/rtlwifi/rtl8192eu_ap_wowlan.bin Possibly allows the device to act as an Access Point?

When all is said and done, the driver selects which firmware to use.
Q. How do you know that?
A. I've seen firmware show up as a dependency when running modinfo on a driver.