board-2.bin

[pgupta at hindutool.com]

Mr. Valo,
 

Thank you for responding to my email.

I purchased a wifi 7 2.4Ghz, 5Ghz, and 6Ghz directly from compex:

https://shop.compex.com.sg/products


Pair of 6Ghz Wifi 7 (they are only sold as a pair)

https://shop.compex.com.sg/product-page/wlw7000e6


Pair of 2.4Ghz AND 5Ghz Wifi 7:

https://shop.compex.com.sg/product-page/wlw7000e5


These are M.2 E-Key and 4x4 MIMO antenna modules, I am building 2 routers using Dell R730xd machines. Because I have two 6GHz modules, one will go in each machine.  I have some old Compex wifi 5 modules that I will put in one of the servers, while the other server will house NEW 2.4, 5, and 6 Ghz Wifi 7 modules.

There is no M.2 E-Key connectors on these machines (as it is generic older generation hardware), so I am using an M.2 E-Key to PCIe riser cable from ADT link to convert the M.2 E-Key to PCIe:

https://www.adt.link/product/R15V4.html  (I will need three of these, one for each module)


This will allow connection of the wifi module to the PCIe bus.  I specifically chose this machine because it has 3 x16 PCIe 3.0, and 3 x8 Pcie 3.0

To maximize throughput, these modules need to be connected to a PCIe 3.0 bus per Compex

Because these modules only need a x1 connection to the PCIe bus, all three x8 slots will be used for each of the 3 wifi modules.

You can purchase a premade board and wifi module bundle from Compex for around $1200, but used my own server hardware because I wanted to customize my WAN and LAN interfaces, and use all three modules in ONE machine (no pre-made board can do this from what I have researched), so I only purchased the modules only instead of a pre-made board and modules.

I have pictures of this evolving setup and there are specific reasons for choosing this machine.  Keep in mind these modules require an external 5V power supply which will be supplied by 5V SATA power connectors - I am still trying to figure this out, but these WiFi 7 modules do come with power connectors soldered onto the board unlike the previous generation where you had to solder on power contacts yourself.

If you are interested, I can take pictures for you so that you can see first hand how the setup looks.  I can guarantee the cables work since I am able to detect the wireless modules via lspci and lshw commands as it successfully connects to.. and is powered by... the PCIe bus.  I just cannot get the firmware (board-2.bin) to load.

Interestingly, I had brief success with the firmware loading on Ubuntu 23.10, during some trials, but it was one time and I have been unable to recreate this.  I'm not sure what I did to get it to work.

One final note, this router is using a server platform as it will house 3 wifi modules (2.4/5/6 wifi 7), a 2x 100GBe ethernet LAN, 4x 10GB LAN (for a separate subnet), 2x 10GB WAN inputs, and 100GB Inifinband connectivity to an Inifiniband switch.  It will also house VMs for reverse proxy and VPN so it had 2x Xeon E5-26790 V4 and 128GB DDR4 ECC RAM.  This unit is completely modular and any part can be upgraded at any time. This is why I went with this setup.  All of this is contained in one machine, no separate access point - the wifi is built into the router just like a residential router.  The antennas will be connected directly to the server via u.fl to SMA connectors for each card (each card having 4 antennas for a total of 12 antennas connected to the machine).



A few more points, the .zst files appear to be some sort of new compression technology that the stock Ubuntu 24.04 ships with.  The files are in this format by default in the WCN directory under /lib/firmware/ath12k.  There are NO .bin files.

Also Interestingly, the ath12k driver is also in this format "ath12k.ko.zst" in the modules section and decompressing it to the .ko extension seems to disable the driver. This is confirmed using "modinfo ath12k"

Again, sorry for the long winded description.  I work as an Emergency room physician by trade, so I am not always near my machines and can only work on this project in my free time.  This wireless module is the last hurdle.

All of this is very confusing compared to the ath10k which seemed so much more straightforward.

All the best, and thank you so much for your reply.  I can forward the contacts from compex that I spoke with if you so desire.

I wanted to respond to your email as I am grateful you have taken time out of your schedule to reply to my message. I do have some questions regarding the specifics of rebuilding the kernel, but will address that in  a separate email so that noobs like me won't have to go through this. 

I have been following your github every since ath10k a few years back, and your firmware was instrumental in helping me get my home wired/wifi router project off the ground.  My current wifi router is actually a desktop using mini-pcie wifi modules attached directly to the desktop PCIe bus.

Prashant Gupta MD/MPH


On Mon, 20 May 2024 12:54:18 +0300, Kalle Valo <kvalo at kernel.org> wrote:

>> "pgupta at hindutool.com" writes:
>>
>> > I have been reading through the various posts, and while I found
>> > someone who reported the exact same problem, I was unable to find a
>> > response from anyone who could present a solution
>> >
>> > I have a Compex WLW7000E6
>>
>> Any recommendations from where it would be easiest to order such board?
>> I'm based in Europe and would like to get one.
>>
>> Is the board otherwise plug&play to an M.2 E-key slot or does it need
>> something special?
>>
>> > and am using the latest kernel version 6.8.0-31-generic (ubuntu 24.04
>> > LTS)
>>
>> BTW in general we don't support distro kernels:
>>
>> https://linux-regtracking.leemhuis.info/post/frequent-reasons-why-linux-kernel-bug-reports-are-ignored/#your-kernel-was-apparently-built-by-a-linux-distributor-or-hardware-vendor

>>
>> > Despite having the requisite files in /lib/firmware/ath12k/QCN9274/hw2.0:
>> >
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 8241152 May 19 23:47 amss.bin
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2821564 May 20 00:03 amss.bin.zst
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 382856 May 20 00:03 board-2.bin
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   21517 May 20 00:03 board-2.bin.zst
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root  421888 May 19 23:47 m3.bin
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root  139662 May 20 00:03 m3.bin.zst
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   10699 May 20 00:03 Notice.txt.zst
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   24310 May 19 23:47 regdb.bin
>> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root    3187 May 19 23:47 regdb.bin.zst
>> >
>> > I continue to receive the following errors:
>> >
>> > [    5.885930] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: BAR 0 [mem
>> > 0xc8000000-0xc81fffff 64bit]: assigned
>> > [    5.886287] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: MSI vectors: 16
>> > [    5.886294] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: Hardware name: qcn9274 hw2.0
>> > [    6.745247] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: memory type 10 not supported
>> > [    6.750101] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: chip_id 0x0 chip_family 0xb
>> > board_id 0xff soc_id 0x401a2200
>> > [    6.750110] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: fw_version 0x10098b57
>> > fw_build_timestamp 2022-09-19 18:18 fw_build_id
>> > QC_IMAGE_VERSION_STRING=WLAN.WBE.1.0-02903-QCAHKSWPL_SILICONZ-1
>> > [    6.761065] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: failed to fetch board data for
>> > bus=pci,qmi-chip-id=0,qmi-board-id=255 from
>> > ath12k/QCN9274/hw2.0/board-2.bin
>> > [    6.761212] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: failed to fetch board-2.bin or
>> > board.bin from QCN9274/hw2.0
>> > [    6.761247] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: qmi failed to load bdf:
>> > [    6.761250] ath12k_pci 0000:83:00.0: qmi failed to load board data file:-2
>>
>> This means that board-2.bin is missing the board file for your device.
>> For AP devices like QCN9274 board files handling is difficult, usually
>> Device Tree is the only way to get automatic board file loading working.
>>
>> Did you get any software with your the board? Do you know if the board
>> is calibrated or not?
>>
>> Can you run:
>>
>> find /lib/firmware/ath12k/ -type f | xargs md5sum
>>
>> Also read:
>>
>> https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/users/drivers/ath12k/bugreport

>>
>> > but he zst files were copied over from the WCN7850 directory.
>>
>> I do not know what these zst files are. And don't copy anything from
>> WCN7850 directory, the files are not compatible. The best is to run
>> 'make install' within ath12k-firmware.git repository, manually fixing
>> files will end up into problems.
>>
>> --
>> https://patchwork.kernel.org/project/linux-wireless/list/

>>
>> https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/developers/documentation/submittingpatches