Use the Windows Mobile hotspot when your ESP32 C3 will not connect to any of your WIFI SSIDs

I spent two weeks troubleshooting ESP32 C3 network connectivity issues.  They worked a couple of times and then just never connected after that. I changed the firmware, erased nv memory, and tried about 10 different solutions found in the forums.  

In the end, the only reliable way to work with those particular ESPs was to create a mobile hotspot on my PC.  That works 100% of the time for me.  This is essentially Internet connection sharing even if it is only for the local network.

Getting the network working was important because the ES32 C3 doesn't support the file share mount for CircuitPython development.  I normally use rshell for MicroPython work but rshell isn't CircuitPython compatible.  So I really wanted the Web Workflow which requires a working network connection.

I farted around with a Seeed XIAO ESP32 C3 that wouldn't connect to the mobile hotspot.  It turns out that tiny device could only see my desktop if I attached the external wifi antenna.

I've got networks 

I have several routers to choose from.  None of the SSIDs have special characters. 
This is the list of those my IOT device can see via scan but cannot connect to.

Available WiFi networks:
        PityTheFool         RSSI: -40       Channel: 6
        PityTheFool         RSSI: -54       Channel: 6
        Fios-Router             RSSI: -44       Channel: 1
        Fios-Router-Guest       RSSI: -44       Channel: 1


Everything other than the ESP32 C3 can connect to both of my home routers.

WindowsYes
MacbookYes
Arduino EthernetYes
ESP8266 MicroPythonYes
ESP8266 ArduinoYes
Pico W MicroPythonYes
Pico W ArduinoYes
ESP32 C3 MicroPythonNo
ESP32 C3 ArduinoNo
ESP32 C3 CircuitPythonNo

Different Software

I tried different firmware/software
  1. Arduino: Failed
  2. MicroPython: Failed
  3. CircuitPython: Failed

Video coverage of this posting

Think differently

Use network connection sharing.  On windows the simplest way is to enable the mobile hotspot.

Create a new soft Hotspot / AP just for IoT dev work.

  1. Windows Key 
  2. Enter "Mobile HotSpot"
  3. Select the Mobile Hotspot
  4. Set the network name and password.  
  5. Select 2.4 GHz for the best compatibility.  IoT project boards that do 5 GHz  Wi-Fi aare rare.
  6. Put those credentials in your IoT application and restart it.

The Mobile hotspot management panel


Now we see the new Access Point and now we connect

The ESP32 C3 connects immediately to the mobile hotspot called python. 


Available WiFi networks:
        PityTheFool         RSSI: -40       Channel: 6
        PityTheFool         RSSI: -54       Channel: 6
        Fios-Router             RSSI: -44       Channel: 1
        Fios-Router-Guest       RSSI: -44       Channel: 1

        python                  RSSI: -79       Channel: 11


Negatives

  1. The IoT device gets a different address every time you turn the Mobile hotspot off and then back on
  2. Sometimes it turns itself off. There is a switch that turns it off when no devices are connected.  Disable that if you intend to power cycle devices.
  3. Not sure how you would do this on a Mac, probably Internet connection sharing.

Video

References

Revision History

Created 2023 01

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Understanding your WSL2 RAM and swap - Changing the default 50%-25%

Image
The Windows Subsystem for Linux operates as a virtual machine that can dynamically grow the amount of RAM to a maximum set at startup time.  Microsoft sets a default maximum RAM available to 50% of the physical memory and a swap-space that is 1/4 of the maximum WSL RAM.  You can scale those numbers up or down to allocate more or less RAM to the Linux instance. The first drawing shows the default WSL memory and swap space sizing. The images below show a developer machine that is running a dev environment in WSL2 and Docker Desktop.  Docker Desktop has two of its own WSL modules that need to be accounted for.  You can see that the memory would actually be oversubscribed, 3 x 50% if every VM used its maximum memory.  The actual amount of memory used is significantly smaller allowing every piece to fit. Click to Enlarge The second drawing shows the memory allocation on my 64GB laptop. WSL Linux defaults to a maximum RAM size of 5
Read more

Installing the RNDIS driver on Windows 11 to use USB Raspberry Pi as network attached

Image
I do a lot of my development and configuration via ssh into my Raspberry Pi Zero over the RNDIS connection. Some models of the Raspberry PIs can be configured with  gadget drivers  that let the Raspberry pi emulate different devices when plugged into computers via USB. My favorite gadget  is the network profile that makes a Raspberry Pi look like an RNDIS-attached network device.  All types of network services travel over an RNDIS device without knowing it is a USB hardware connection. A Raspberry Pi shows up as a Remote NDIS (RNDIS) device when you plug the Pi into a PC or Mac via a USB cable. The gadget  in the Windows Device Manager picture shows this RNDIS Gadget connectivity between a Windows machine and a Raspberry Pi. The Problem Windows 11 and Windows 10 no longer auto-installs the RNDIS driver that makes magic happen. Windows recognizes that the Raspberry Pi is some type of generic USB COM device. Manually running W indows Update  or  Update Driver  does  not  install the RNDI
Read more

DNS for Azure Point to Site (P2S) VPN - getting the internal IPs

Image
I wanted to access all my Azure resources without making any of them visible to the Internet.   The easiest give my local machine access to everything on my Azure Virtual Network (VNET) was to connect to it over VPN. It turns out creating Azure VPN gateways and connecting to Azure VPN endpoints is easy.  There are some subtleties in getting DNS name resolution to work that can confuse when first starting out. Setting the Stage There are a few ways to get to Azure endpoints and resources that are blocked from the internet.  We can  Create a Point-to-Site connection from our local machines to Azure Network Gateways Create a Site-to-Site network connection from our local networks to Azure Network Gateways. Use Bastion Hosts Use Cloud Shell Leave everything open to the internet. I chose a Point-to-Site (P2S) VPN connection that connects from my laptop to a VNet Gateway.  That joins my laptop
Read more