Unable to connect multiple OPI zeros to same WIFI

Simon · Published in 2017-5-28 00:39:06

Hi everybody!

I am having quite weird issues with my Orangepi Lites. For a project I got 5 of them, and flashed them with Armbian 5.20 (the camera did nor work with the current version thus I had to use this older build).

Each board can conenct to the wifi without problem (I entered the credentials into /etc/network/interfaces and it connects automatically at start), but I am unable to connect more than one Pi to the network at the same time. The second board that is booted is unable to join the network, or at least I am unable to reach it via ping/ssh.

Is there anything that I am possibly doing wrong? Besides setting the credentials in /etc/network/interfaces I also changed the hostname in the /etc/hostname file. I booted them up with a screen and keyboard attached and then setup the root password and first user.

I tried it a couple of times now, in pretty much every possible combination, but still only one device ever gets into the network.

I am happy for any hint on how to solve this or how to further investigate.

thanks,
Simon

Quattr00 · Published in 2017-5-28 03:40:32

I am not sure but I think the MAC address is the same for all Orange pi. If I am not mistaken there is a way to go around changing the MAC address of the other OPIs.

Google it you may find the solution.

Simon · Published in 2017-5-28 14:27:09

Edited by Simon at 2017-5-28 14:28

yes, the MAC address is set in the driver settings of the wifi chip when the driver is loaded. You can set it in /etc/modprope.d/8189fs.conf

It seems that the mac address is randomized during the first boot. At first I tried to simply clone a working install to all the other pies, but also noticed that the MAC address was identical. Thus I went the long route, installing each PI from the vanilla image, since I was not sure what other things are set during install and just changing the MAC might not be enough... Now they all have unique MAC addresses so this can probably be ruled out as a source of the problem...

nopnop2002 · Published in 2017-6-3 17:02:53

When you use more than 2 access points (Wifi router), please stop 1 access point.
It may be improved.

Simon · Published in 2017-6-8 21:24:16

I only use one access point/router and are trying to connect all the pies to this one access point.