5Ghz wifi is being extremely spotty

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1

Every time I start my System 5Ghz wifi is not available and I have to restart for access points to show up. Sometimes even after a restart it gets stuck on configuring interfaces and then fails and stops showing 5Ghz networks

output of inxi -Nn

Network:
  Device-1: Qualcomm WCN785x Wi-Fi 7 320MHz 2x2 [FastConnect 7800]
    driver: ath12k_pci
  IF: wlp7s0 state: up mac: 82:de:4b:84:47:ca
  Device-2: Realtek RTL8126 5GbE driver: r8169
  IF: enp8s0 state: down mac: 34:5a:60:52:ab:03

output of journalctl --no-hostname -b -g wifi

where shroom5 is my 5Ghz point and shroom2 is 2.4

Nov 24 19:46:20 kernel: DMI: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. MS-7E51/MAG X870 TOMAHAWK WIFI (MS-7E51), BIOS 1.A44 04/24/2025
Nov 24 19:46:34 NetworkManager[1370]: <info>  [1763993794.4180] Read config: /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf, /usr/lib/NetworkManager/conf.d/{20-connectivity-fedora.conf,22-wifi-mac-addr.conf,99-nvme-nbft-no-ignore-carrier.conf}
Nov 24 19:46:34 NetworkManager[1370]: <info>  [1763993794.4277] Loaded device plugin: NMWifiFactory (/usr/lib64/NetworkManager/1.54.0-2.fc43/libnm-device-plugin-wifi.so)
Nov 24 19:47:32 NetworkManager[1370]: <info>  [1763993852.9204] device (wlp7s0): Activation: (wifi) access point 'shroom5' has security, but secrets are required.
Nov 24 19:47:35 NetworkManager[1370]: <info>  [1763993855.0205] device (wlp7s0): Activation: (wifi) access point 'shroom5' has security, but secrets are required.
Nov 24 19:47:35 NetworkManager[1370]: <info>  [1763993855.4231] device (wlp7s0): Activation: (wifi) connection 'shroom5' has security, and secrets exist.  No new secrets needed.
Nov 24 19:48:00 NetworkManager[1370]: <warn>  [1763993880.8984] device (wlp7s0): Activation: (wifi) association took too long, failing activation
Nov 24 19:48:07 NetworkManager[1370]: <info>  [1763993887.2202] device (wlp7s0): Activation: (wifi) access point 'shroom2' has security, but secrets are required.
Nov 24 19:48:07 NetworkManager[1370]: <info>  [1763993887.2322] device (wlp7s0): Activation: (wifi) connection 'shroom2' has security, and secrets exist.  No new secrets needed.
Nov 24 19:48:07 NetworkManager[1370]: <info>  [1763993887.5906] device (wlp7s0): Activation: (wifi) Stage 2 of 5 (Device Configure) successful. Connected to wireless network "shroom2"
Nov 24 19:50:25 packagekitd[2645]: Failed to get cache filename for iwlwifi-mld-firmware
Nov 24 19:50:25 packagekitd[2645]: Failed to get cache filename for iwlwifi-mvm-firmware
Nov 24 19:50:25 packagekitd[2645]: Failed to get cache filename for iwlwifi-dvm-firmware
2

Sometimes things get a bit confused in the configs. It is often possible to recover by “forgetting” the connection then making a new connection to the same hotspot AP.

If that does not work it is also worth knowing that several of the Qualcomm devices have been found to be incompatible with linux and a simple replacement with one that is better supported by linux has solved the issues. The Intel devices almost all are supported 100%, but there are others choices as well.

3

Seems to be a driver side issue. Reloading the ath12k drivers seems to be a better solution than restarting for now.

can be done as so
$sudo modprobe -r ath12k

$sudo modprobe ath12k_pci

The weird bit is that after an attempted connection to a 5Ghz point fails it is unabale to rediscover or see 5Ghz points.

4

Just saying
These problems never seem to appear with intel wifi interfaces.

I had a Qualcomm card that was doing similar with no logs or other indications but causing a total freeze of the system. It turned out the wifi link was repeatedly dropping while the processor was waiting for a reply from a remote server causing a hang and cpu crash. I was not able to identify the cause of the crashes until after I had already replaced processor, mobo, and RAM when the actual fix was replacing a $25 wifi card.

1 Like
5

Issue fixed itself for now closing marking as solved for now