I've set up LibreELEC 12.0.2 on a RaspberryPi 2B (which has no onboard WiFi) with a USB WiFi dongle (Edimax EW-7811Un) for my grandparents.
The Pi connects to a Jellyfin server via OpenVPN, and when it works, it works great - however it sadly does not work often as the WiFi connection frequently breaks.
Similar to other threads I experience the same "Invalid Key" error.
I've written (and continuously expanded) this script to check and fix the WiFi and VPN connection which gets executed every 5m via cron:
#!/bin/bash
# Get the current time
timestamp() {
date "+%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S"
}
# Path to the failure count file
FAIL_COUNT_FILE="/tmp/wifi_fail_count"
# Threshold when to reboot
MAX_FAIL_COUNT=6 # Since the script is run every 5m, this corresponds to 30m
# Read the current fail count (default to 0 if file doesn't exist)
if [ -f "$FAIL_COUNT_FILE" ]; then
FAIL_COUNT=$(cat "$FAIL_COUNT_FILE")
else
FAIL_COUNT=0
fi
# Debug output of connmanctl services
echo "$(timestamp) - Current connman services:"
connmanctl services
# Check if the Wi-Fi is connected using connman
if ! connmanctl services | grep -q "\*AR"; then
echo "$(timestamp) - Wi-Fi is down. Attempting to reconnect..."
# Perform a Wi-Fi scan
echo "$(timestamp) - Scanning for available Wi-Fi networks..."
connmanctl scan wifi
sleep 5 # Allow time for scan to complete
echo "$(timestamp) - Available Wi-Fi networks:"
connmanctl services
# Restart the network service
systemctl restart connman
# Wait a few seconds to allow reconnection
sleep 10
# Check again if connected
if connmanctl services | grep -q "\*AR"; then
echo "$(timestamp) - Wi-Fi reconnected successfully."
echo 0 > "$FAIL_COUNT_FILE" # Reset counter
else
echo "$(timestamp) - Failed to reconnect Wi-Fi. Exiting."
FAIL_COUNT=$((FAIL_COUNT + 1))
echo "$FAIL_COUNT" > "$FAIL_COUNT_FILE"
echo "$(timestamp) - Failure count: $FAIL_COUNT"
if [ "$FAIL_COUNT" -ge "$MAX_FAIL_COUNT" ]; then
echo "$(timestamp) - Reached $MAX_FAIL_COUNT failed attempts. Rebooting..."
systemctl reboot
fi
exit 1
fi
else
echo "$(timestamp) - Wi-Fi is already connected."
echo 0 > "$FAIL_COUNT_FILE" # Reset counter
fi
# Check if the VPN is working
echo "$(timestamp) - Checking VPN connection..."
VPN_TEST_URL="https://jellyfin.url.some.tld"
curl -L --silent --fail $VPN_TEST_URL > /dev/null
if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then
echo "$(timestamp) - VPN connection is down. Restarting VPN..."
# Reconnect VPN
systemctl stop openvpn
script_type=down /storage/.config/openvpn/update-nameservers.sh
systemctl start openvpn
# Wait for VPN to reconnect
sleep 30
# Recheck VPN connection
curl -L --silent --fail $VPN_TEST_URL > /dev/null
if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then
echo "$(timestamp) - VPN reconnection failed."
else
echo "$(timestamp) - VPN reconnected successfully."
fi
else
echo "$(timestamp) - VPN is working correctly."
fi
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The output of that looks something like this (in the most extreme cases)
2025-04-09 12:50:00 - Current connman services:
*AR <TARGET-WIFI> wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Some wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Other wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Unrelated wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
WiFi wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Networks wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
From wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Random wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Neighbours wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
2025-04-09 12:50:00 - Wi-Fi is already connected.
2025-04-09 12:50:00 - Checking VPN connection...
2025-04-09 12:50:00 - VPN is working correctly.
2025-04-09 12:55:00 - Current connman services:
WiFi wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
From wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Random wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
2025-04-09 12:55:00 - Wi-Fi is down. Attempting to reconnect...
2025-04-09 12:55:00 - Scanning for available Wi-Fi networks...
Scan completed for wifi
2025-04-09 12:55:07 - Available Wi-Fi networks:
2025-04-09 12:55:17 - Failed to reconnect Wi-Fi. Exiting.
2025-04-09 12:55:17 - Failure count: 1
2025-04-09 13:00:00 - Current connman services:
2025-04-09 13:00:00 - Wi-Fi is down. Attempting to reconnect...
2025-04-09 13:00:00 - Scanning for available Wi-Fi networks...
Scan completed for wifi
2025-04-09 13:00:07 - Available Wi-Fi networks:
2025-04-09 13:00:17 - Failed to reconnect Wi-Fi. Exiting.
2025-04-09 13:00:17 - Failure count: 2
2025-04-09 13:05:00 - Current connman services:
2025-04-09 13:05:00 - Wi-Fi is down. Attempting to reconnect...
2025-04-09 13:05:00 - Scanning for available Wi-Fi networks...
Scan completed for wifi
2025-04-09 13:05:07 - Available Wi-Fi networks:
2025-04-09 13:05:17 - Failed to reconnect Wi-Fi. Exiting.
2025-04-09 13:05:17 - Failure count: 3
2025-04-09 13:10:00 - Current connman services:
2025-04-09 13:10:00 - Wi-Fi is down. Attempting to reconnect...
2025-04-09 13:10:00 - Scanning for available Wi-Fi networks...
Scan completed for wifi
2025-04-09 13:10:07 - Available Wi-Fi networks:
2025-04-09 13:10:17 - Failed to reconnect Wi-Fi. Exiting.
2025-04-09 13:10:17 - Failure count: 4
2025-04-09 13:15:00 - Current connman services:
2025-04-09 13:15:00 - Wi-Fi is down. Attempting to reconnect...
2025-04-09 13:15:00 - Scanning for available Wi-Fi networks...
Scan completed for wifi
2025-04-09 13:15:07 - Available Wi-Fi networks:
2025-04-09 13:15:17 - Failed to reconnect Wi-Fi. Exiting.
2025-04-09 13:15:17 - Failure count: 5
2025-04-09 13:20:00 - Current connman services:
2025-04-09 13:20:00 - Wi-Fi is down. Attempting to reconnect...
2025-04-09 13:20:00 - Scanning for available Wi-Fi networks...
Scan completed for wifi
2025-04-09 13:20:07 - Available Wi-Fi networks:
2025-04-09 13:20:17 - Failed to reconnect Wi-Fi. Exiting.
2025-04-09 13:20:17 - Failure count: 6
2025-04-09 13:20:17 - Reached 6 failed attempts. Rebooting...
2025-04-09 13:25:00 - Current connman services:
*AR <TARGET-WIFI> wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Some wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Other wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Unrelated wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
WiFi wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Networks wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
From wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Random wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Neighbours wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
Now wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
More wifi_74da386e443b_..._managed_psk
2025-04-09 13:25:00 - Wi-Fi is already connected.
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As you can see, connmanctl scan wifi and a subsequent systemctl restart connman do not always fix the issue, only rebooting does in this case.
I've also seen various mentions about this issue being related to poor reception (with the suggestion to use a USB dongle - which I already do) and that moving the WiFi client closer to the access point helped. While I don't want to dismiss that outright, I am rather skeptical that this is (purely) related to range/reception issues because I've seen all of below:
- when the connection is present the dB value is "good" and it's fast enough to stream HD movies (~30 Mbit/s in my case)
- sometimes suddenly no WiFi networks are found and 5-10m later everything is back to normal
- sometimes WiFi networks from further away are found, but not the closer "target WiFI"
- no other clients experience connection issues
- mentions of it working in previous LE versions (where wpa_supplicant was used)
- mentions of the same hardware working fine under RaspberryPi OS (and others)
I've found that in another thread iwctl was used to do the reconnect. Is there any (significant) difference between the iwctl and connmanctl?
Is there anything I can (still) do to improve the WiFi reliability except for buying something like this?
For now I am looking for a quickish solution to make my grandparents happy, but in the long run I am eager to help debug/improve the issue. Although I think it makes more sense to continue this thread instead.
Thanks in advance for all the help!
