Government issued HP Chromebooks are all dropping WiFi or not connecting

[Syman_a]

I have 27 DfE issued chromebooks on a Ruckus wifi network. I have had no connectivity issues at all.

[Michael]

All I can advise is the 6.0.45 controller and the 4.3.28.11361 firmware on AC Pro and AC Lite are absolutely fine, very little issues to report on.

 

I haven't tested the 6.1.71 controller as yet, I have no reason to.

 

The only other suggestion is create another SSID which is 2.4GHz only and see if this works with the Chromebooks.

[caffrey]

Have to say we've never had any issues whatsoever - we've also got some of the DfE HP Chromebooks and they're all fine too.

 

I'm wondering why some are having so many issues - are you using PSK or Radius? Unifi switches or a different brand?

 

Radius via NPS

 

DHCP is managed via the USG Pro

 

I've no idea where the fault lies but I get a lot of association failures and DHCP timeouts on the Unifi controller. It could even be a fault with our setup with SchoolsBroadband. This all worked all fine until just before lockdown last year so it could even be an issue with the latest IOS \ ChromeOS etc. Just reading around there are a lot of wifi issues with IOS at the mo

 

It could just be radius, the wpa2 network seems fine hence me thinking of just going the portal route to keep it simple

[Michael]

There were issues with early versions of iOS 14, but iOS 14.4 is absolutely fine with Ubiquiti.

[TwistedHelixis]

We have a very basic setup, no Radius, no Vlan, WiFI is set using WPA2.

 

I like the idea of setting up a new Wifi SID just with 2.4ghz but the school has decided to completly close over Easter, so something for after the break.

[Primus]

Interesting isn't it. We use a PSK network with our Chromebooks - the only devices that do. They all authenticate with Smoothwall using the Cloud Filter extension - previously Connect for Chromebooks.

 

As I said we've had no problems so maybe the issue is with Radius if the people with Radius are having the problem. That said we use Radius extensively with lots of other devices and don't see the issue there.

 

We're Smoothwall for the UTM, HPE for the core switch and Unifi switches and APs.

[caffrey]

It's frustrating as it's so random , difficult to pinpoint so reducing complexity might help. I went with radius to make it easier for the end user

 

It's somewhere along this path :-

 

Device has 169.254 before connecting,

 

Join WIFI wpa2 enterprise, user uses username and password

NPS authenticates user, sends accounting info to netsweeper for correct filtering group

If authenticated USG gives out IP address

 

USG has policy based routing to go through netsweeper so maybe there's an issue with routing, but it's odd how it works the majority of the time - it gets worse as the day goes on

 

First thing in the morning I could easily log on 20 school owned chromebooks in a row without a problem.

 

Sorry feel like I've kinda hijacked this thread

[TwistedHelixis]

So it looks like there is a known issue but with Google's side of things not UniFi.

 

[caffrey]

I read about that one, but then there's this https://old.reddit.com/r/Ubiquiti/comments/mlit54/problems_with_broadcastmulticast_traffic_on_uap/?sort=new It's getting hard to ascertain where problems lie nowadays Edited April 15, 2021 by caffrey

[TwistedHelixis]

So a little update,

 

The class took the Chromebooks to another class that has an end off life basic UniFi AP (not pro) and they all connected. So they connect to the old devices but not our new Pro devices.

 

Any idea what the difference could be. All AP's old & new are on the March 2021 firmware which was the last update before EOL for the older APs.

 

I have setup a new SSID that only has 2.5ghz enabled (5ghz disabled) and will see if that works.

[FN-GM]

So a little update,

 

The class took the Chromebooks to another class that has an end off life basic UniFi AP (not pro) and they all connected. So they connect to the old devices but not our new Pro devices.

 

Any idea what the difference could be. All AP's old & new are on the March 2021 firmware which was the last update before EOL for the older APs.

 

I have setup a new SSID that only has 2.5ghz enabled (5ghz disabled) and will see if that works.

 

Do you use WLAN groups please?

[TwistedHelixis]

Do you use WLAN groups please?/QUOTE]

No

[danielghares]

We had a similar issue on our site. We're running Ruckus R320 / R510 AP's, and when we initially unboxed the HP chromebooks most failed to join our PSK enrollment network with a 'disconnect-failure' error'. Tried so much to narrow down the cause but haven't got anywhere. Most seem ok now, but we still get the odd few with issues.

[TwistedHelixis]

So we are now at the point where most of them are working most of the time, but a few will drop the connection and not re connect for a while.

 

Not sure why the bulk of them just decided to start working all at the same time but i'll take the win.