Root Wifi Dropout Problem Persists: Someone, Please Help!

[williamj1]

I'm getting really frustrated now. This problem is a real nuisance for me, as I use my Desire a lot solely for this purpose.

In my room, the wifi signal has always been pretty weak, generally only getting 1/2 bars. However, the connection is stable and still about 6mbps. This is never usually a problem for my Desire, it picks up the connection and everything works great. Stock Froyo, Sense Froyo, Sense Gingerbread, Sense V2 Gingerbread, Miui Froyo and Miui Gingerbread all operate flawlessly.

However, I now have a bit of a problem. It seems most Gingerbread AOSP ROM's cause the wifi to play up. I have tried GingerVillain, Oxygen, Redux and finally now my favourite CM7. The wifi constantly drops out and loses connection, and then takes a good 30+ seconds to reconnect. The dropouts can be as frequent as every few minutes, and generally it never lasts 4+ minutes in iplayer without losing connection. If I am just casually browsing, I don't notice. But when I am watching something on youtube or iplayer, the constant dropouts make the experience so horrible it isn't worth the effort.

What's more, there is some odd bug with the iplayer app where once a dropout happens, the audio and video goes out of sync and so on etc. All in all, it makes streaming video unusable, and this was a main reason for me buying a smartphone.

I really don't know what the problem is, but I really would appreciate some help. I would say it was a gingerbread problem, but as stated above, there are many gingerbread roms which don't cause me the same issue. Similarly, I've used an array of different radio's and kernals on each ROM. They make no difference. It depends purely on which ROM I am using. I've tried resetting the bt home hub, restoring it to factory, changing security type, moving it's position and so on. I'm pretty sure it's a ROM / Phone issue though as it works fine with other ROMS. Phone wise, I've set wifi policy to never and set a static IP address. It makes no difference. I still get wifi dropouts!

For reference sake, I'm using the latest stock Radio - 32.49.00.32U_5.11.05.27 and Kernal 2.6.37.4-cyanogenmod-82245..... and obviously CM7 7.0.2.

Please someone help? I'm actually considering upgrading just to solve this. It is absolutely doing my nut in, and I am totally out of ideas or solutions.
Thanks.

 

[mirrorimage]

I'm getting really frustrated now. This problem is a real nuisance for me, as I use my Desire a lot solely for this purpose.

In my room, the wifi signal has always been pretty weak, generally only getting 1/2 bars. However, the connection is stable and still about 6mbps. This is never usually a problem for my Desire, it picks up the connection and everything works great. Stock Froyo, Sense Froyo, Sense Gingerbread, Sense V2 Gingerbread, Miui Froyo and Miui Gingerbread all operate flawlessly.

However, I now have a bit of a problem. It seems most Gingerbread AOSP ROM's cause the wifi to play up. I have tried GingerVillain, Oxygen, Redux and finally now my favourite CM7. The wifi constantly drops out and loses connection, and then takes a good 30+ seconds to reconnect. The dropouts can be as frequent as every few minutes, and generally it never lasts 4+ minutes in iplayer without losing connection. If I am just casually browsing, I don't notice. But when I am watching something on youtube or iplayer, the constant dropouts make the experience so horrible it isn't worth the effort.

What's more, there is some odd bug with the iplayer app where once a dropout happens, the audio and video goes out of sync and so on etc. All in all, it makes streaming video unusable, and this was a main reason for me buying a smartphone.

I really don't know what the problem is, but I really would appreciate some help. I would say it was a gingerbread problem, but as stated above, there are many gingerbread roms which don't cause me the same issue. Similarly, I've used an array of different radio's and kernals on each ROM. They make no difference. It depends purely on which ROM I am using. I've tried resetting the bt home hub, restoring it to factory, changing security type, moving it's position and so on. I'm pretty sure it's a ROM / Phone issue though as it works fine with other ROMS. Phone wise, I've set wifi policy to never and set a static IP address. It makes no difference. I still get wifi dropouts!

For reference sake, I'm using the latest stock Radio - 32.49.00.32U_5.11.05.27 and Kernal 2.6.37.4-cyanogenmod-82245..... and obviously CM7 7.0.2.

Please someone help? I'm actually considering upgrading just to solve this. It is absolutely doing my nut in, and I am totally out of ideas or solutions.
Thanks.

Have you checked the wifi sleep policy? It's automatically set to shut off when the screen darkens.... I'm sure it's not this, but it'd be worth a whack.

 

[williamj1]

Have you checked the wifi sleep policy? It's automatically set to shut off when the screen darkens.... I'm sure it's not this, but it'd be worth a whack.

Yup it's always been set to sleep never. Not just for this, but also because I only use it at night really as at work in the day where 3G is good, so I turn it off when not using it.

 

[mirrorimage]

Yup it's always been set to sleep never. Not just for this, but also because I only use it at night really as at work in the day where 3G is good, so I turn it off when not using it.

Could it be your router? Have you tried it in other wifi areas?
Try accessing the hubs page and check the connections; make sure you have allowed consistent connection to multiple devices. (Sounds mental, but I too had a similar issue with the missus Nokia e72)

 

[williamj1]

Could it be your router? Have you tried it in other wifi areas?
Try accessing the hubs page and check the connections; make sure you have allowed consistent connection to multiple devices. (Sounds mental, but I too had a similar issue with the missus Nokia e72)

I've never tried streaming for long periods with other routers other than the odd youtube clip. But like I said, it can sometimes go for 4+ minutes ok so I might not notice, and you wouldn't when casually browsing.

I had sort of presumed it wasn't a router problem, as the other roms perform the same tasks flawlessly and the ps3 when played online requires constant connection and it's fine. I'll take a look though in the hub setting page thing though. Was your problem with a bt home hub too?

 

[SUroot]

Did you ever try flashing the leaked sense 2.3 drivers and RIL from the link in my Sig/

 

[williamj1]

Could it be your router? Have you tried it in other wifi areas?
Try accessing the hubs page and check the connections; make sure you have allowed consistent connection to multiple devices. (Sounds mental, but I too had a similar issue with the missus Nokia e72)

Where in the bthomehub.home page do I find this setting?

Did you ever try flashing the leaked sense 2.3 drivers and RIL from the link in my Sig/

Nope, was I meant to?

When I used the leaked GB sense ROM's (EddyOS & Leedroid), I didn't have this problem and it was great, so this might be worth a try.

What do you mean drivers?
And what is a RIL? I know it is a key part of android that connects it to the networks, but I never understood the difference between it and a radio etc?


Edit: Just a thought.
Would changing the rooter to Wifi B/G instead of B/G/N make a difference? Speedwise it won't as connection is only about 6-8mbps anyway, but will range suffer?

 

[Hadron]

There's a slightly tecchie description of a RIL here, but the first couple of sentences will probably do. That thread also has a collection of other RILs to choose from - the one I'm using (link in my sig) comes from a post later in the thread.

The advice from later posts in that thread seems to be that the "HM" RILs are for Sense ROMs and the "G" ones for AOSP, but I'm fairly sure that the one SUroot refers to, as part of that driver+ril package he has linked, is actually an HM, and people do seem to be using this successfully with AOSP ROMs.

But your mileage may vary. I've tried the leaked driver+RIL package with my phone (on GV2.0 and 2.1) and have had catastrophic problems with my mobile connection (with 3 different radios), while others using the same ROM, radio and kernel have found it worked fine. Not worked out what is different yet - guess I should check my download is OK. But I fixed it by flashing a different RIL over it (so keeping the other updated drivers) and that's working fine for me.

Anyway, bottom line is give it a try. Nandroid first and you can always revert - it's not like the radio, which is outside of the ROM.

 

[williamj1]

Anyway, bottom line is give it a try. Nandroid first and you can always revert - it's not like the radio, which is outside of the ROM.

Thanks, a few questions...

1.So if I nandroid now, it will backup my current RIL and Drivers? Meaning if all goes to pot, I can revert back to my current (tempermental ) ones?

2. Do I flash that ZIP just like a rom or radio?

3. Does that ZIP have both the RIL and drivers? No need to flash 2 things just that 1 ZIP?

4. Do you think flashing that will solve my wifi problems?

 

[Hadron]

Thanks, a few questions...

1.So if I nandroid now, it will backup my current RIL and Drivers? Meaning if all goes to pot, I can revert back to my current (tempermental ) ones?

Yes.

2. Do I flash that ZIP just like a rom or radio?

Yes

3. Does that ZIP have both the RIL and drivers? No need to flash 2 things just that 1 ZIP?

The one from SUroot's sig has both.

4. Do you think flashing that will solve my wifi problems?

It might - it did make a small but noticable improvement to my WiFi signal strength.

Edit: The copy of that .zip I had on my sd card did differ from the one from SUroot's link (binary comparison, so can't tell you what was different). Hopefully the reason it didn't work for me is in that difference, but as my current setup is working fine I might not test immediately.

 

[mirrorimage]

I've never tried streaming for long periods with other routers other than the odd youtube clip. But like I said, it can sometimes go for 4+ minutes ok so I might not notice, and you wouldn't when casually browsing.

I had sort of presumed it wasn't a router problem, as the other roms perform the same tasks flawlessly and the ps3 when played online requires constant connection and it's fine. I'll take a look though in the hub setting page thing though. Was your problem with a bt home hub too?

I don't use BT; O2 broadband (which is pish), but an issue with maximum number of users on the router. I did a change around, changed the channel (from channel 6 to 11) and it seemed to sort it.

 

[InfernalByte]

However, I now have a bit of a problem. It seems most Gingerbread AOSP ROM's cause the wifi to play up. I have tried GingerVillain, Oxygen, Redux and finally now my favourite CM7. The wifi constantly drops out and loses connection, and then takes a good 30+ seconds to reconnect. The dropouts can be as frequent as every few minutes, and generally it never lasts 4+ minutes in iplayer without losing connection. If I am just casually browsing, I don't notice. But when I am watching something on youtube or iplayer, the constant dropouts make the experience so horrible it isn't worth the effort.



For reference sake, I'm using the latest stock Radio - 32.49.00.32U_5.11.05.27 and Kernal 2.6.37.4-cyanogenmod-82245..... and obviously CM7 7.0.2.

Please someone help? I'm actually considering upgrading just to solve this. It is absolutely doing my nut in, and I am totally out of ideas or solutions.
Thanks.

Have you tried a different kernel? Try one just to see if the wifi behaves differently. I tink it will!

[KERNEL-2.6.37.6]vorkKernel-CFS-BFQ-AXI-SVS-OC/UV[140411] - xda-developers

 

[williamj1]

Have you tried a different kernel? Try one just to see if the wifi behaves differently. I tink it will!

[KERNEL-2.6.37.6]vorkKernel-CFS-BFQ-AXI-SVS-OC/UV[140411] - xda-developers

Is a kernal backed up in a nandroid? Otherwise what if the one you post doesn't work and I want the kernal I used before back?

 

[Hadron]

Yes, it's backed-up by the nandroid.

Reflashing the ROM (without wipe) would also reset the kernel (assuming you are using the ROM's default kernel, but if you aren't you'd just flash your current one again so I think that's a good assumption).

 

[williamj1]

Yes, it's backed-up by the nandroid.

Reflashing the ROM (without wipe) would also reset the kernel (assuming you are using the ROM's default kernel, but if you aren't you'd just flash your current one again so I think that's a good assumption).

Not up for reflashing. Means I have to set up homescreens etc again. If it doesn't go well, i'll just restore my nandroid from last night (done before I installed the new drivers and so on). But they made no difference so that's fine. And I haven't changed anything since then other than texts, which I'll backup now.

Just out of interest, what is this Evoilett 1.4 Evks thing you and SU use? Seen quite a few with it? Isn't it a better Kernal?

 

[Hadron]

The kernel name in my sig is also a link to the XDA thread.

It's an android kernel, originally derived from the DeFrost/GingerVillain kernels, with some tweaks for battery life (a number of which are now more widely available). It's based on linux kernel 2.6.35, so a little older than most GB kernels (typically 2.6.37 or 38 now), but a bit less battery drain and avoids the slow USB transfers that a lot of newer kernels had.

Bottom line is I've found it very stable, with a few user customisations (e.g. custom VDD levels) and no drawbacks. Every now and then I try out an alternative, usually the GV HAVS one, but keep coming back to it.

 

[williamj1]

The kernel name in my sig is also a link to the XDA thread.

It's an android kernel, originally derived from the DeFrost/GingerVillain kernels, with some tweaks for battery life (a number of which are now more widely available). It's based on linux kernel 2.6.35, so a little older than most GB kernels (typically 2.6.37 or 38 now), but a bit less battery drain and avoids the slow USB transfers that a lot of newer kernels had.

Bottom line is I've found it very stable, with a few user customisations (e.g. custom VDD levels) and no drawbacks. Every now and then I try out an alternative, usually the GV HAVS one, but keep coming back to it.

I'm not following. So far, I have been linked to two different kernals.

1. [AOSP Kernel] 07/04/11 ManU 1.4 - 2.6.35 based battery efficient kernels - xda-developers (Yours)
2.[KERNEL-2.6.37.6]vorkKernel-CFS-BFQ-AXI-SVS-OC/UV[140411] - xda-developers

Which do I pick? Also, there are multiple on each page?

 

[anoniemouse]

Try the latest radio available 32.56.00.32U_5.17.05.08
its available from this thread on xda http://androidforums.com/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=2616977
looks like you can get it direct from my link too

 

[Hadron]

I'm not following. So far, I have been linked to two different kernals.

1. [AOSP Kernel] 07/04/11 ManU 1.4 - 2.6.35 based battery efficient kernels - xda-developers (Yours)
2.[KERNEL-2.6.37.6]vorkKernel-CFS-BFQ-AXI-SVS-OC/UV[140411] - xda-developers

Which do I pick? Also, there are multiple on each page?

I'm not so familiar with Benee's thread, but for the ManU one I'd recommend HAVS-AXI unless your phone doesn't like HAVS. Then there's just GB and Froyo versions to pick, as far as I remember.

As for ManU vs Vork, try both and see which works best for you.

 

[williamj1]

I'm not so familiar with Benee's thread, but for the ManU one I'd recommend HAVS-AXI unless your phone doesn't like HAVS. Then there's just GB and Froyo versions to pick, as far as I remember.

As for ManU vs Vork, try both and see which works best for you.

What is HAVs? I haven't a scoobie if I have it! I'm not a noob, and I'm getting better, but I've never mastered kernals yet!

 

[Hadron]

HAVS = Hybrid Adaptive Voltage Scaling. If you've not installed a custom kernel you've probably not tried it, as most ROMs stock kernels are SVS (Static Voltage Scaling).

The difference is that SVS kernels have a single cpu voltage for each frequency. HAVS have a range for each frequency, and adjust within that range according to need (driven by temperature as I understand it). HAVS generally can run at lower voltages, and thus should in principle use less power, but not all handsets are stable with them (though most are).

 

[williamj1]

I tried the kernal you suggested (havs-axi-cfs gingerbread version).

Thanks for your (and everyone else) help so far.

Unfortunately, it seems to have made no difference. Still getting wifi dropouts frequently.

Seeing as no one else seems to have this issue, I'm increasingly thinking its my router. But why then would it work perfectly on some roms? I don't get it.

 

[Sak01]

I feel your pain. I posted this thread nearly a month ago about a similar problem but no solution so far.

I've tried:
- Upgrading to the latest radio and downgrading to the 2nd latest
- Eviollet's kernels, both HAVS-AXI and HAVS
- Changing the channel on my router
- Changing security on my router from wpa to wep and back again
- Wifi policy to never
- Tried it at others' houses - doesn't seem to be a problem in the short time I have tried it

The thing is I've been using GV throughout so having read your thread I'll try a different ROM. And if that doesn't work, it will have to be a new router.

 

[williamj1]

Well at least I know its not just me. Out of interest, what hub are you using?

I'm going to try changing to WEP, and if that fails, I'll be digging out tthe old netgear. Trouble is the signal goes about 1 metre.

Sighs

 

[Hadron]

I tried the kernal you suggested (havs-axi-cfs gingerbread version).

Thanks for your (and everyone else) help so far.

Unfortunately, it seems to have made no difference. Still getting wifi dropouts frequently.

You could try the kernel that InfernalByte suggested. And have you tried a RIL update yet?

Otherwise I'm out of phone-based suggestions as well.

Edit: If you do try updating RILs, it's worth knowing what RIL you had originally in case there is a problem and you need to revert (though restoring from a nandroid will do that for you). There's a little app here that can be used to check this. You can find other RILs in this XDA thread, and the one I'm using (which isn't the one in the leak SUroot links) is linked in my sig.