Lenovo T14s AMD Gen 6 - Wi-Fi not working after the latest update F42

Ask Fedora
1

Hello,

I updated my Fedora 42 yesterday and the WiFi stopped working completely. It was a serious issue for me, because I don’t have easy access to cable connection.

This is the update that causes the problem:
https://bodhi.fedoraproject.org/updates/FEDORA-2025-737b451b33

F41 might have the same problem in the near future, but I cannot test it: FEDORA-2025-517905d210 — bugfix update for linux-firmware — Fedora Updates System

I found this BZ ticket with a report: 2365882 – atheros-firmware 20250509 breaks Qualcomm WCN785x WiFi (ath12k)

And managed to fix it like this:

$ sudo dnf downgrade atheros-firmware-20250311-1.fc42

So if anyone stumbles upon the same issue. Staying with the old version should help. But if you have Lenovo T14s AMD Gen 6, I would simple not update the machine for the next couple of days.

:waving_hand:

6 Likes
2

I also have a Lenovo ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 AMD and experiencing this exact issue. After updating a bunch of firmware packages on Monday evening, I rebooted and have no wifi adapter at all.

3

Same thing here on t14 AMD gen 5 with the Wi-Fi 7 chip. I recently upgraded to this laptop and the Wi-Fi has been a headache, the past weeks, the ath12k driver has been causing my whole system to completely lock up, and now it’s just not working at all.

FYI, downgrading atheros-firmware also worked for me.

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4

This is a known issue and a fix is being worked on. Meanwhile you need to go back (if you know how) to a firmware version where your card does work.

1 Like
7

That doesn’t seem to be the same issue.

8

What is the procedure for getting back to the current version once a fix is released if I downgrade now?

9

you just update normally, if you added the package to the exclude in dnf.conf then remove it from there so it can update.

3 Likes
10

That’s very helpful, thanks so much!

12

Thanks for posting this. Just adding my “me too”: fresh install of F42 on MSI Tomahawk X870E worked fine until first (mega) upload of binaries including firmware. WiFi (7)/Qualcomm chip now dead. I tried rolling back the firmware but of course I need the network to download the older bits :rofl:

Will connect by wire and see if I can’t get my wireless back (it was working so beautifully straight out of the box/off the Live USB).

The downgrade to atheros-firmware-20250311-1.fc42 has done the job for now.

1 Like
13

I can also recommend putting the package into a list of excluded, so that you can upgrade your system and still keep this one in the old version:

$ cat /etc/dnf/dnf.conf 
# see `man dnf.conf` for defaults and possible options

[main]
exclude=atheros-firmware
1 Like
14

Anyone know anything about when this will be fixed? Almost two weeks now seems nuts.

15

Same symptom on ThinkPad T14 Gen 5. Cannot use dnf since it uses Internet connection to download downgraded versions of packages.

rpm -qa | grep "atheros" shows atheros-firmware-20250509-1.fc42.noarch installed.

Wired connection doesn’t work either. Does anybody know if it is the same issue?

PS: I’ll leave this here in case somebody will find it through the search. In my case, with the system update there was an update for a VPN client. It enabled “Lockdown Mode” by default, preventing any connection to the outside. So, if you have VPN service installed, do not forget to check it too, it might save you couple of hours of debugging.

16

Firmware comes from the hardware vendor. Vendors are dealing with US tariff chaos and reducing staff, so we can expect to see more firmware bugs and longer or null responses when they are discovered. Some vendors are losing older staff to retirement and can’t easily replace the expertise that they lose.

From decades of Linux experience I have found it important to have alternative WiFi using a USB dongle with good linux support.

17

I hear you…do you have a recommendation for a wifi usb dongle with good linux support? I attempted to find one yesterday but the reviews all show they have problems with linux.

18

Wired connection should not be related.

As an alternative, you can download the RPM on different machine, transfer with usb stick and install RPM file using dnf (that works even without internet connection)

19

FTR I tried to upgrade kernel yesterday and the computer kept crashing with a giant stack trace. I recommend against buying this specific laptop. It has the worst linux compatibility I’ve experienced in the past 15 years.

Booting the old kernel and downgrade helped of course, otherwise I wouldn’t be writing this message :sweat_smile:

20

See: https://github.com/morrownr/USB-WiFi?tab=readme-ov-file.

I suspect this is a result of industry-wide problems keeping up with security issues and new hardware. For linux users who need a reliable system and can’t wait for vendors to fix issues, there is an ample supply of “reconditioned” systems being dumped by large enterprises moving to Windows 11 and reducing staff due to the chaotic tariff situation.

2 Likes
21

I’m on Fedora Silverblue 42 so I had to use the following command to downgrade the firmware package:

sudo rpm-ostree override replace https://kojipkgs.fedoraproject.org//packages/linux-firmware/20250311/1.fc42/noarch/atheros-firmware-20250311-1.fc42.noarch.rpm

After a reboot this fixed the issue for me.

If I run the following now:

rpm-ostree status

I see the following:

LocalOverrides: atheros-firmware 20250509-1.fc42 -> 20250311-1.fc42
22

Wish this would get resolved. Anyone know of an update on when we’ll be able to use our computers again?

23

You can check the bugzilla ticket for updates. It’s being worker on, but I don’t think it is a top prio for Qualcomm :person_shrugging: