Re: RTL8723BS driver doesn't work for,me but I can help testing

From: Martin Blumenstingl
Date: Sat May 16 2020 - 14:04:05 EST

Hi Tobias,

On Thu, May 7, 2020 at 10:57 AM Tobias Baumann <017623705678@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Hello Community
>
> I was referred to you by Martin. I have an older Android TV box that
> runs for over 3 years with Armbian Linux (Debian Jessie Headless Kernel
> 3.10.99). I'm looking forward to the new kernels and I'm glad that older
> hardware is still supported.
> Together with Oleg(balbes150) and Martin(xdarklight) I am testing the
> new kernel 5.x for ARM ( Amlogic S812 / Meson8m2 ) . Martin has written
> a patch for the SDIO controller in the last days so that also Wifi
> module and MMC are recognized. I could now successfully load the driver
> module RTLWIFI from the kernel. But unfortunately the card is only
> listed on the desktop as "not ready" or in the terminal (iwlist) as "no
> scan result". In the dmesg/lsmod RTLWIFI->RTL8723bs is loaded and the
> module is loaded with version v4.3.5.5_12290.20140916_BTCOEX20140507-4E40 .
>
>
> I would like to ask you to check the driver because even in kernel
> 3.10.99 a newer version (v4.3.16_13854.20150410_BTCOEX20150119-5844) is
> loaded and also at github are hard kernels ( version 2017 Kernel 4.9>)
> and ap17 and thirdyouth (v5.2.17.1_26955.20180307_COEX20180201-6f52).
> More recent ones can also be found - these have already been
> successfully tested with Debian 10. i hope that this may solve the
> problem with my Linux box.
>
> I would appreciate feedback on this request or information about
> debugging . My Linux box is also available for testing purposes
I just tried this on one of my Meson8b boards to see if it's some
problem with the MMC controller driver (meson-mx-sdio).
Here are my steps:
- (boot the board)
- ip link set up dev wlan0
- (wait until that finishes, it takes a while because it seems to load
the wifi firmware)
- iw dev wlan0 scan
- (wait a few seconds, then it shows many 2.4GHz wifi networks)
- wpa_passphrase MY_24GHz_WIFI_SSID > /tmp/wpa_supplicant_conf
- (enter the passphrase and press CTRL-D)
- wpa_supplicant -iwlan0 -c/tmp/wpa_supplicant.conf -Dnl80211 &
- (wait a couple more seconds for it to connect)
- dhcpcd wlan0
- then I ran iperf3, see the attached result
- then I ran dmesg | grep -Ei "(rtl8723bs|wlan0)", see the attached result

with these commands wifi is working "fine" for me.
my definition of fine: it connects to my AP and traffic can flow.
transfer speeds are on the low side (with 15Mbit/s and 5Mbit/s) but I
have no reference (for example from a vendor kernel) so I can't say if
that's to be expected.

I am not sure about any "desktop" tools and their behavior because I
don't use these.
can you please try the steps above and attach the output of the
"failing" commands (together with the dmesg output)?


Best regards,
Martin
# iperf3 -c 192.168.1.100
Connecting to host 192.168.1.100, port 5201
[ 5] local 192.168.1.175 port 50082 connected to 192.168.1.100 port 5201
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr Cwnd
[ 5] 0.00-1.00 sec 922 KBytes 7.55 Mbits/sec 0 105 KBytes
[ 5] 1.00-2.01 sec 1.12 MBytes 9.32 Mbits/sec 0 153 KBytes
[ 5] 2.01-3.00 sec 1.18 MBytes 9.95 Mbits/sec 0 206 KBytes
[ 5] 3.00-4.18 sec 1.43 MBytes 10.2 Mbits/sec 0 270 KBytes
[ 5] 4.18-5.00 sec 1.68 MBytes 17.1 Mbits/sec 0 342 KBytes
[ 5] 5.00-6.10 sec 1.93 MBytes 14.6 Mbits/sec 0 426 KBytes
[ 5] 6.10-7.00 sec 1.86 MBytes 17.4 Mbits/sec 0 433 KBytes
[ 5] 7.00-8.00 sec 2.73 MBytes 22.9 Mbits/sec 0 433 KBytes
[ 5] 8.00-9.00 sec 2.80 MBytes 23.5 Mbits/sec 0 433 KBytes
[ 5] 9.00-10.00 sec 2.80 MBytes 23.5 Mbits/sec 0 433 KBytes
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 18.4 MBytes 15.5 Mbits/sec 0 sender
[ 5] 0.00-10.22 sec 17.5 MBytes 14.4 Mbits/sec receiver

iperf Done.
# iperf3 -c 192.168.1.100 -R
Connecting to host 192.168.1.100, port 5201
Reverse mode, remote host 192.168.1.100 is sending
[ 5] local 192.168.1.175 port 50086 connected to 192.168.1.100 port 5201
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate
[ 5] 0.00-1.00 sec 584 KBytes 4.76 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 1.00-2.04 sec 509 KBytes 4.02 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 2.04-3.00 sec 549 KBytes 4.68 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 3.00-4.00 sec 962 KBytes 7.88 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 4.00-5.00 sec 749 KBytes 6.15 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 5.00-6.00 sec 1.29 MBytes 10.8 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 6.00-7.00 sec 427 KBytes 3.51 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 7.00-8.01 sec 451 KBytes 3.65 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 8.01-9.00 sec 601 KBytes 5.00 Mbits/sec
[ 5] 9.00-10.00 sec 638 KBytes 5.20 Mbits/sec
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr
[ 5] 0.00-10.27 sec 6.90 MBytes 5.64 Mbits/sec 8 sender
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 6.63 MBytes 5.56 Mbits/sec receiver

iperf Done.
#
[ 2.441488] RTL8723BS: module init start
[ 2.442185] RTL8723BS: rtl8723bs v4.3.5.5_12290.20140916_BTCOEX20140507-4E40
[ 2.451163] RTL8723BS: rtl8723bs BT-Coex version = BTCOEX20140507-4E40
[ 2.455802] RTL8723BS: module init ret =0
[ 16.478830] RTL8723BS: rtw_ndev_init(wlan0)
[ 37.209857] rtl8723bs: acquire FW from file:rtlwifi/rtl8723bs_nic.bin
[ 337.807664] RTL8723BS: rtw_set_802_11_connect(wlan0) fw_state = 0x00000008
[ 338.346190] RTL8723BS: start auth
[ 338.377146] RTL8723BS: auth success, start assoc
[ 338.389241] RTL8723BS: rtw_cfg80211_indicate_connect(wlan0) BSS not found !!
[ 338.395555] RTL8723BS: assoc success
[ 338.733671] RTL8723BS: send eapol packet
[ 338.754114] RTL8723BS: send eapol packet
[ 338.758611] RTL8723BS: set pairwise key camid:4, addr:de:ad:be:ee:ff:00, kid:0, type:AES
[ 338.768897] RTL8723BS: set group key camid:5, addr:de:ad:be:ee:ff:00, kid:1, type:AES
[ 339.103764] IPv6: ADDRCONF(NETDEV_CHANGE): wlan0: link becomes ready