How to Fix an Unstable Wireless Connection

Wi-Fi adapter driver of my notebook is RTL8821CE.
Now the Wi-Fi signal is unstable, the icon on the panel turns into a question mark, level 1, 2, 3 & 4 respectively at all times.

My notebook is dual booted installation of Windows 10 Home and Fedora 34 Workstation Edition.
It has been being unstable like this for a few days after the latest upgrades.

Help me please.

In the picture, my smartphone and Fedora 34 connects to the same router.
This shot shows the unequal level of both equipments.

The reason might be that each device uses another WLAN.
2,4 GHz has a wider range than 5 GHz WLAN.

So sometimes, when a device switches from 5 to 2,4 GHz or the other way round, you may lose connectivity. If you device is on the edge of the 5 GHz network, you may encounter this scenario repetitively.

If your other device only supports 2,4 GHz, it would not participate in this problem.

One way to fix such switching between WLANs could be to give every WLAN its own WLAN-ID.
Another way would be to disable the 5GHZ WLAN completely.

At least you can try to disable the 5 GHz Net and see what happens.

If the situation improves, you may leave it this way or you could think about using a repeater.
However, repeater must be placed carefully in order to not to disturb each other.

2 Likes

I have a different WLAN id set for each band. That way I can select which band I connect to, since there is a definite difference in the reliable ranges for each band.

1 Like

On the other hand, it is stable in Windows 10.

And I have another notebook with the same brand and model with dual boots,Windows 10 and Fedora 34 Workstation Edition. There is no problem in Fedora 34 like this.

Do you really believe all software and OSes and hardware behave the same at all times?

You are claiming that everything in windows and linux and android is 100% the same on all the different hardware you have and wonder why you see different results.

This is the real world. Not everything is the same. You have been given a fix that works for many and as yet you have not even hinted that you tried the fix to see if it resolves your issue. Instead you continue to make claims that it works here but does not work there and ask why

People wonder why a 1000baseT network connection with auto-negotiate at both ends has problems as well and sometimes is only working at 10baseT speeds. There are easy fixes, just be willing to try what was suggested.

Can you try connecting this device (or other devices in the same area) using cable instead of wifi? The less traffic you see on wifi, the better the connection.

If you have control over the router (or wifi base station), can you try putting it to a different place, i.e.:

  • not close to plates or structures of metal
  • close to where you want to use the wifi
  • in a height above 1.5m within the room
    ?

Please note that in addition to the very good comments by @huben, your smartphone may have a better wifi chip or antenna than your laptop.

As others suggested, please verify that you’re using the same band in all cases before you start making comparisons. How far are you from the wireless access point? Can you show the relevant kernel messages for the wireless driver?

Today I placed my notebook next to the router.
Wi-Fi signal on Windows was strong and stable.
WiFiSignalOnWindows10
On the other hand, Wi-Fi signal on Fedora 34 was unstable, it fluctuated all the time.
WiFiSignalOnFedora34

This problem came after I did Windows updates previously.

1 Like