Onion Omega 2/2+/2S+ access point slow without external wifi network

William Gerhard

All,

I'm try to fix an issue I am having with really any Omega 2/2+/2S+ I own. Basically everything works fine when the Onion Omega 2/2+/2S+ is powered on in my apartment and connected to my home wifi. I can connect to Omega 2/2+/2S+ access point with my laptop, and ssh into the device with no lag. As soon as the Omega 2/2+/2S+ is outside my apartment and is no longer connected to an existing wireless network, I can still connect to the access point with my lap and ssh into the device, but it is incredibly slow. I will get the same performance as if I was back in my apartment for a brief period of time, and then it will become unresponsive and I have to wait a minute or more before the ssh terminal will update.
I'm assuming this behavior is due to the Omega 2/2+/2S+ searching for a network for it to connect too, but I'm not sure. Is there any way to disable that functionality to test? While I would call myself acceptably versed in Linux, I have not played with the OpenWRT enough to fully understand the UCI configurations or the proper way to make this change.

Any advice?

-Will

Edit: I realized I forgot to mention I am using firmware B200 and B221

György Farkas

@William-Gerhard On firmwares with Warp Core (v0.2.0 b175 and above)

you can disable the WiFi station on CLI with these commands:
(ie. disconnect from a WiFi network and Omega2 will not try to scan or connect to any WiFi)
uci set wireless.sta.disabled='1'; uci commit wireless; wifi
you can enable the earlier configured WiFi station with these commands:
(ie.(re)connect to a WiFi network)
uci set wireless.sta.disabled='0'; uci commit wireless; wifi

William Gerhard

@György-Farkas said in Onion Omega 2/2+/2S+ access point slow without external wifi network:

uci set wireless.sta.disabled='1'; uci commit wireless; wifi

Thank you very much for the reply! But those commands seem to disable the WiFi all together. I need a standalone WiFi network for the project I am working on. I am trying to disable the second virtual interface on the Omega that connects to another network while leaving the first virtual interface, the Omega's WAN, since the Omega seem to work poorly when there is no external network to connect to. Hopefully that makes sense.

William Gerhard

I'm hoping someone with more experience than I has some ideas on what is going on. First I tried following the Onion Omega's own documentation The Omega as a Router but running the command

uci set wireless.@wifi-iface[0].ApCliEnable=0; uci commit wireless; wifi

(which supposedly disables the ApCli device which is used to wirelessly connect to an existing router) does cause me to disconnect from the existing network and I still have internet through the omega. The only way to disconnect from external WiFi network is to is to turn off the virtual interface wwan using

ifdown wwan

However even with wwan disables and ApCli device supposedly disabled, if I turn off my home networks wifi router and ssh into the Omega2 through its wireless AP, the session is still laggy. If I turn my wireless network back on, even though the Omega2 does not report internet connectivity; and wwan and ApCli device are still disabled; the lag goes away.

What configuration option am I missing?

György Farkas

@William-Gerhard said in Onion Omega 2/2+/2S+ access point slow without external wifi network:

@György-Farkas said in Onion Omega 2/2+/2S+ access point slow without external wifi network:

uci set wireless.sta.disabled='1'; uci commit wireless; wifi

But those commands seem to disable the WiFi all together.

No, these commands disable an Omega2's WiFi client (station) only.
The AP of the same Omega2 continues to work except for the period while its WiFi subsystem restarts (due to the wifi command).
Check it please!

William Gerhard

@György-Farkas Interesting, I did check on an Omega 2+ running 0.3.2 b200 and executing the command did nothing. I power cycled it, and the LED blinked through the start up pattern but the Omega-XXXX network never appeared. Now that Omega 2+ will not even start and has discoloration on the shield near the U.FL port.

I just reran the commands on an Omega 2 running firmware 0.3.2 b222 and it worked! There was no lag when the local wifi router was disconnected. Thank you very much!