Chromebooks not longer connect to SSID when Auto-connect enabled.

[Janx1975]

Hi,

 

Been tearing my hair out on this one since July to no avail with the following:

 

 

• Received a consignment of new chromebooks - none would provision on existing network, thought they were the issue - took one home and setup fine.
  
• Next day the above chromebook back in school would not connect to the network.
  
• Other existing chromebooks started having similar issues - which has built up to the whole school.
  
• Got third line support testing the network and ports and Smoothwall with filtering - both checked out ok and pointed to Google.
  
• Raised issue with Google but they have put me on the backburner for the last 5 weeks
  

 

 

After troubleshooting and having a play around I could see that when the SSID was set to "Auto connect" in the Google Admin panel ( Devices>Networks>Wi-Fi> SSID Name) the chromebooks would be stuck on the "Connect to Network" page - but showing that the SSID was "connected" in green.

 

Puzzled I unchecked this and when I manually entered the password in the chromebook connected perfectly.

 

I created a new test SSID and connected to this fine too - but as soon as I checked "auto connect" in the Google Admin the same issues abound.

 

Powerwashing some chromebooks allows me to get some of them working, but with 300+ chromebooks this would take up too much time to resolve manually, especially as I am now an ICT-Team of ONE.

 

 

Randomly the chromebook will show the problem as "DCHP lookup failed" or "proxy" or "DNS" but these have all been OK'd by third line support.

 

Does anyone have any insight into why this is occuring, if it happened to you or know where I should be looking until Google ever respond?

 

They just had me updating chrome OS on a test working and test failed chromebook but not really looking into my issue.

 

With students back this week its been a nightmare.

Edited September 12, 2022 by Janx1975

[psydii]

When did you last update the firmware on your Wifi APs?

 

Every so often we see this sort of thing (though we are mainly Windows) after there have been windows / driver updates or a new model of laptop on to the wifi.

 

For us, when we see this sort of thing, wifi ap firmware update fixes the issue. That said, we usually have been running / testing the devices for a month or two before we try the firmware, so if the problem is very new, and your APs are fairly up to date, it may be a month or two before you find a firmware that fixes the problem.

[Janx1975]

...When did you last update the firmware on your Wifi APs?...

 

Hi psydii - All access points are up to date. They are TP-LINK EAP225's (dont ask! lol) but they are up to date.

[psydii]

Looks like firmware on those updated in August... maybe try the reverse of the advice and roll it back? Don't forget to roll it forward again if it doesn't fix the problem.

 

 

That said, if Google are engaged, they maybe pushing telemetry and experimental drivers on your chromebook to troubleshoot - so changing the network firmware out from under them may disrupt their investigation.

[Janx1975]

I am not sure the issue is the AP's - like I say, if I untick the Auto-Connect to SSID within the Google Admin console, the chromebooks can join the SSID and test SSID after entering the password with no problem - so not a network issue in my mind?

 

The issue is that this should be an automatic joining to the connection without the need to enter that networks password.