Maestro not working with wifi

Burch - K4QXX

Just got my Maestro and it is un-usable on wifi.  I have connected to both 2.4 and 5GHZ.  The wifi indicator is green with full bars and then it goes to yellow and drops audio.  Flex 6700 runs fine on Laptop on both 2.4 and 5GHZ.  Any ideas?

ctate243

Burch,

Try turning your Maestro off with a quick push on the right side of the power button, and turn on again  and see if it seems stable after doing that  vs being persistently unusable.  We did see some intermittent issues like this occasionally during testing.  often times a restart like this solved it.  Also recommend using 5 gig if your signal strength supports it.  Note that the bars are not a wifi strength indicator but rather a flex connection quality meter.  Various things can affect this such as packet loss, etc..

Jim Gilliam

Does the Maestro have an external WiFi antenna port or is it all internal?

Burch - K4QXX

I have tried using 5ghz and 2.4ghz and the same issue.  I can't even get it to work with a CAT5 connection.  It's like the port is not active.  Plugged directly into router and no network.

Just turned on my 9 year old laptop and ran SSDR on wifi for 10 minutes and 0 packet drops so I know my router is working fine.

I just turned on Maestro again and it's already dropped 20 packets in a minute or two and dropped audio.  Bummer.... ;(

ctate243

Do you get a link light on Maestro when you plug into the router?

Burch - K4QXX

Nope.  It's like to Ethernet port is dead as well. 

ctate243

hmm thats a problem.. do you have a switch or a different port you can check or maybe an alternate cable as well?  also prior to testing hard wired make sure you forget your wireless network on the wireless page, some times Maestro will default to that even with a lan cable plugged in.  If you still cannot get a link plugged into a known good network link I would open up a support ticket.

Burch - K4QXX

I take that back, I tried another cable and it's working with the Ethernet port now.  Wifi still doesn't work though.  What a bummer!

Burch - K4QXX

The wifi works fine for a few seconds and all bars are green.  Then it goes to 1 red bar or 2 yellow bars and the audio drops and the panadapter stutters.  It's up and down like that.  So far is seems to run OK on Ethernet.  All bars stay green and no audio drops and no packet drops.

ctate243

Well the good news is you are up and running.  depending on your qth with all the wifi devices out there signal quality can be a real challenge.  I realize that SSDR may work but Maestro may requite a bit more breathing room (in my personal observations) in its initial release.  May be worth trying to find a clearer channel for 5 gig if you have not looked into that.  best of luck!

Burch - K4QXX

I just used two different laptops with SSDR on both 2.4 and 5GHZ and they both run fine.  I can only see two neighbors wifi at my location and they are both 2.4GHZ so it's not a signal quality issue.  I have a couple wifi analyzers I ran and my location is about the best you can hope for.  The only 5ghz signal I see is my own router.  It's not a router problem as I am trying Maestro about 5 feet from my router right now and it's dropping like crazy.

ctate243

I have a similar setup with my router right in the shack.  I had some issues when it was across the house, but moving it close solved my issues.  I guess personally it it were me I would try a channel change, check both 5.3 and 5.8 and see if you can find a place where it possibly may perform better. Maybe give that a shot and see how it goes.  what kind of router are you using?

Burch Akin

With my wifi analyzer, I am already using the best channel.  Changing channels has no affect anyway as I have tried.

Al K0VM

Burch,
  After your quaility drops on wifi, does it recover if you leave it run for a while ??
When I have had the drop, it has recoverd for me and then run fine after that..

AL, K0VM

Burch Akin

I ran it for 15-20 minutes and it continually drops.  Might be fine for 30 seconds or so but I can't go a minute without it dropping and the screen stuttering. 

Burch Akin

I guess I will need to put in a helpdesk ticket.  I just tried a spare router and have the same problem.  The audio seems OK when I use a CAT5 cable and directly connect to the router, but I still get a bunch of packet drops even hardwired.  I can run my 6700 all day on the computer hard wired and not get a single drop.  

Jd Dupuy

Same issue here. WIFI shows connected but will not run or connect to radio. Okay on direct CAT Cable Connection. Can't figure out why so many of us having the same problem with WIFI Connection. I can't operate outside on the patio for now.

[Deleted User]

So much for all that Alpha Testing.

Steve K9ZW

@Steven - think about this Steven, the community is designed to attract problems to get them fixed.  

Let the process work a bit and we may all be surprised (hopefully good).

Deriding the Alpha Team because a few folk are experiencing issues and before anyone from FRS has even had a look at their problems isn't a fair to the Alpha Team.

You might complain about FRS, but please get off the backs of an all volunteer alpha team who certainly haven't given known problems a pass.

73

Steve
K9ZW

Burch Akin

Update!  I guess the 3rd time is a charm.  I just tested a 3rd router (Netgear R6300) but I set it up as an access point instead of a router and hooked it to my current router (Asus RT-AC87U) and the Maestro has been running with 2 pan adapters for 10 minutes with no audio dropouts and so far zero dropped packets.  I have my fingers crossed. 

Tim - W4TME

The antenna is internal.

Tim - W4TME

I am glad to hear you have had some success with a different device.  We have found in testing that not all wifi routers are created equal.  Some work, others not so much.

Gerald-K5SDR

We had a similar experience this weekend when we were getting ready to do a demo for the PVRC club meeting at Virginia Tech.  We were using an old single band router that N4HY brought with him.  We were getting so many dropped packets that we ran to best buy to buy a new Asus dual band router.  By the way, 2 GHz QRM was massive on all channels at that location.  Perfect 5 GHz operation with the new router.

See below where K2XX is rag chewing on 40m CW using battery power and wireless on 5 GHz.

Jd Dupuy

It sure does not like my Google Fiber router. Fast as heck connection on WIFI for all my devices except the Maestro. Taking it to my other house to see what result I get there. Report back on results.

Burch Akin

My Asus router was expensive and works great on 2.4 and 5GHZ on all my other devices.  But Maestro does not like it.  My old Netgear router (setup as an access point) works great with Maestro on 5GHZ.  I have been running it now for 30 minutes with two pan adapters with no packet drops.  Very happy now!

Paul Christensen, W9AC

Wi-Fi working fine here with Maestro connected to an Apple Airport Express (AE). The AE is connected to a Comcast/Xfinity router port.  Little difference in performance between the AE or hard-wired with an Ethernet cable. The connection has been rock-solid for the last 10 hours.

On a different matter, I did some comparative audio testing this evening and found that receive audio with headphones plugged into Maestro sounds like a lossy-compression CODEC is being used.  Maestro receive audio is not as clear as the audio path at the Flex 6700 headphone jack. The difference is especially apparent with binaural audio active.  Not sure of the CODEC type being used in the Maestro connection back to the main Flex hardware.  Possibly a lossy CODEC is being used to conserve data bandwidth?

Paul, W9AC

ctate243

Burch this is quite interesting, I hooked up a router in AP mode as well and got a boost in wifi performance as well.  Some of this network stuff is kind of a challenge.  So glad to hear you have a solution

Bob- W5TX

Butch do you by chance have a computer running on your network with both Ethernet and wireless active? I have had some instances where router seems to get confused and data rate got very slow and I believe error prone. Verizon suggested turning only one connection on a device, either Ethernet or wireless and problem disappeared. I assume it was a router issue of some sort. ISP connection is 75Mb fiber.

Bob- W5TX

Sorry, Burch not butch **** completion software.

Bill -VA3WTB

Yep there you go Steven, if you read on you will find that they found the problem, and It was not the Maestro. Not every one has the same set up, and it could take time to to locate a problem. Looks like the alpha team did a great job.

ctate243

Although its not supposed to happen unless invoked by the user by bridging in a configuration like this I suppose this could cause a network loop that could cause a bit of router hassle..  If anything all these maestro's ma require us all to do a little network house cleaning :-)