I’m encountering a critical bug with the GL-X1200 router and I’m curious if anyone else has been experiencing the same thing. I can very quickly cripple the default 5G WiFi network by simply connecting between 5-10 devices to the network. Once broken, any devices already connected to the 5G no longer reach the internet (or resolve the router’s ip) and any new devices attempting to connect are rejected for failed authentication (with correct security info being sent).
Here’s my repro steps:
- Take brand new GL-X1200 out of the box.
- Plug in an ethernet cable to the WAN port (the private network we are plugging into is running 10.x.x.x so no chance of conflicts).
- Turn on the router
- Begin connecting devices to the default GL-X1200-xxx-5G WiFi (iPads, iPhones, Android phones, and laptops are what I was connecting)
- This has varied for me but somewhere between 5-10 devices suddenly things break and connected devices no longer can access the internet (or resolve the router’s ip), and no new devices can connect.
Digging a little deeper it appears to be an issue with hostapd. Looking at hostapd logs it looks like handshaking is continually failing as I start seeing this in the logs:
Thu Jan 16 01:20:21 2020 daemon.debug hostapd: wlan0: STA xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx WPA: sending 1/4 msg of 4-Way Handshake
Thu Jan 16 01:20:22 2020 daemon.debug hostapd: wlan0: STA xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx WPA: EAPOL-Key timeout
Thu Jan 16 01:20:22 2020 daemon.debug hostapd: wlan0: STA xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx WPA: PTKSTART: Retry limit 4 reached
The issue can be resolved by running the following command on the 5G wlan interface:
hostapd_cli -i wlan0 disable
hostapd_cli -i wlan0 enable
However, while this fixes things it’s only a matter of time before the issues reappears. Keeping around 5-10 devices connected the issue usually reappears within about 10-20 minutes. And that’s without connecting/disconnecting any devices.
Interesting to note is that the 2.4G WiFi does not have this issue. That network remains fully functional no matter how many devices I try connecting. When the 5G network is broken I can connect just fine to 2.4G and access the internet as expected.
These are brand new GL-X1200 devices that are running the 3.027 firmware.
Seems to me like this should effect anyone running these devices. Curious if anyone else has encountered this. Happy to provide more details. Help!