R5 MkII Wi-fi issues?

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SwissFrank

1N 3 1V 1Ds I II III R R5
Dec 9, 2018
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#1
Finally got the MkII and it's showing lots of SSID's from the neighbors (I'm in an apartment building) but it's not showing mine. The old R5 shows all four of my SSIDs, and so do four smartphones and four laptops. None of the SSID's are "hidden."

The MkII IS showing several of the neighbors' SSIDs (typical cramped Japanese apartment building), as do my other devices. I can match them up one for one with what the MkII is showing, but it's not showing mine.

I've tried several different locations, such as my desk, right next to the router, right next to the repeater, and even in the exact spot the R5 original can see the SSIDs. I've tried swapping the locations of the two cameras and the old camera sees them and the new one doesn't even after swapping the positions.

MkII is on latest 1.0.1 firmware.
Router is a common brand here in Japan, Buffalo WSR-2533DHPL2, with latest firmware Ver.1.04
Repeater is TP-LINK RE305 hardware version 4.0 with latest firmware 1.0.23 Build 230418 Rel.60395n (7480)

Both have separate SSID's for 2.4GHz and 5GHz, so there's a total of four SSID's, any of which would suffice to get this working.
 
#2
Is the R5II configured for Japan? It might be set to a country that has a much more restricted spectrum, and your networks might be using channels outside that. Like channel 13 on 2.4GHz, that's legal here, but most of the devices I have than only support 2.4GHz refuse to scan that channel.

The R5II does support WPA3, so it should be able to both see and connect to 'modern' networks. So outside the spectrum issue I mentioned above, I don't know why your R5II only sees your neighbours WIFI.
 
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#3
Thanks for the interesting idea. Yes, I bought it from Canon Japan delivered to a Japanese address and it came up with Japanese menus. It is set for JST. Searching the manual I don't see any mention of setting the country of operation, nor do I see it menu-diving. Let me know if you know of something along those lines.

My WiFi is 5+ years old and describes itself as "WPA/WPA2-mixed mode PSK". The R5 MkI can see it fine, as old laptops going back to like 2011.
 
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#4
I am having a similar issue with my new R1 which I just got yesterday. No matter how much I try it will not see by mobile router and its network. All my other cameras (R3, R5 Mk1) see it fine so there is nothing wrong with the network. The R1 also sees my home WIFI just fine and was able to connect to my mobile phone's network. So the wifi on the camera is working.

I suspect it is a firmware bug.
 
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#5
Sounds identical to mine.

Canon's phone support here in Japan mentioned in passing that the hardware is identical to the R5. That was a disappointment as I'd hoped the MkII would upgrade most things a little bit. But yeah, if the hardware is identical, then the firmware MUST be the culprit. And, the phone support seemed mystified, which means that it's not a common phenomenon, e.g. that they stopped supporting an old version of WiFi protocol, something they'd know about and mention right away.
 
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#7
CampanellaFoto said:
and was able to connect to my mobile phone's network
Click to expand...
The rest of your report says you can see some Wi-Fi but not others.

Your phone connection would be Bluetooth, though, right? It would "make sense" if a camera could do Bluetooth but not Wi-Fi, so the fact that your phone works wouldn't be a surprise at all. But the fact that the mobile router works and the home router doesn't is bizarre.
 
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#9
koenkooi said:
For the networks that aren't visible to the R5II, which channels are they on and how wide are those channels?
Click to expand...
Hmmm, I don't know anything about these channel numbers but my 2.4GHz SSID's are both on ch9 and 5GHz both on ch100. Any chance they're interfering with each other? I tried re-setting one 5GHz to a different channel but once it rebooted, no luck, still not visible to the MkII.
 
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#10
SwissFrank said:
Hmmm, I don't know anything about these channel numbers but my 2.4GHz SSID's are both on ch9 and 5GHz both on ch100. Any chance they're interfering with each other? I tried re-setting one 5GHz to a different channel but once it rebooted, no luck, still not visible to the MkII.
Click to expand...
Channel 9 shouldn’t be an issue, but you could move it to a full channel, like 1, 6 or 11:
1732961589391.jpeg
Channel 100 is in the DFS range, but as you say, the R5 can see it. Moving it out of DFS could help, e.g. channel 36-48:
1732961735002.png

As for rebooting the router, if you pick a channel in the DFS range, the router needs to scan it for interference first, that can take a few minutes. On my access points at home I can see it take 10 minutes from time to time, usually in situations where a new toy won’t connect to wifi :)

The above chart is for north America, but unii 1 and 2 match Europe, I suspect they match Japan as well.

Combining all that with a company that isn’t know for robust wireless hardware (RT flashes…), this becomes a frustrating problem to solve.
 
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#11
Many thanks. Never heard any of this. I note my repeater is choosing the same channels as the base and I don't seem to be able to alter that so I'll just unplug it.

I'll then try 36-48 for the 5GHz. (149-165 are not available in Japan; that seems to be the only difference.)

Neighbors are using 1, 6, and 11. I can try them but I guess 5GHz is preferable anyway. I don't need 4 or even 2 SSIDs. Just one would be nice.
 
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#12
I have seen this before when you have a device that is limited in spectrum (channels). I think they have the right thoughts on this, try a different channel base to see. Another thing that might be throwing it off, do you have "odd" special characters in your SSID? if so, change it to regular text only to test.
 
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#13
SwissFrank said:
The rest of your report says you can see some Wi-Fi but not others.

Your phone connection would be Bluetooth, though, right? It would "make sense" if a camera could do Bluetooth but not Wi-Fi, so the fact that your phone works wouldn't be a surprise at all. But the fact that the mobile router works and the home router doesn't is bizarre.
Click to expand...

No, I specifically tested connecting to my iPhone's personal hotspot as I wanted to make sure the WiFi was working. I also tested connecting to my phone by Bluetooth and that worked as well.
 
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#14
CampanellaFoto said:
No, I specifically tested connecting to my iPhone's personal hotspot as I wanted to make sure the WiFi was working. I also tested connecting to my phone by Bluetooth and that worked as well.
Click to expand...
I didn't realize iPhones are WiFi bases! I found mine in the Settings and turned it on and could connect with my MkI. (MkII battery is charging.) It's not able to find EOS Utility running on my PC, but that's not that important at this point. I'll see if the MkII can see the phone's SSID tomorrow.
 
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#15
OldDudePhotog said:
I have seen this before when you have a device that is limited in spectrum (channels). I think they have the right thoughts on this, try a different channel base to see. Another thing that might be throwing it off, do you have "odd" special characters in your SSID? if so, change it to regular text only to test.
Click to expand...
Thanks, Old Dude! The SSID's are just alpha (two) and alpha plus underscore (two). I'm happy to connect to the SSID's without underscores, but none of the four are appearing. I'll try the "full channel" idea tomorrow, have to go to bed now!
 
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#16
SwissFrank said:
Thanks, Old Dude! The SSID's are just alpha (two) and alpha plus underscore (two). I'm happy to connect to the SSID's without underscores, but none of the four are appearing. I'll try the "full channel" idea tomorrow, have to go to bed now!
Click to expand...
Another thing to try is to just manually enter the SSID as it is broadcast if you have not tried this yet. It is essentially the same workflow as if you were not broadcasting the SSID (hidden network) and would work if it is going to work at all. I saw something like this when a friend if mine was hosting a friend from Ireland, her laptop could not see SSIDs on certain channels, added a USB WNIC allowed her laptop to connect to wifi for the few weeks she was here.
 
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#17
OldDudePhotog said:
Another thing to try is to just manually enter the SSID as it is broadcast if you have not tried this yet. It is essentially the same workflow as if you were not broadcasting the SSID (hidden network) and would work if it is going to work at all.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the reminder! However, did try that many times. Tried every security option. Tried all the SSIDs.
 
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#18
TOTAL DISASTER!!! :-D

OK, so while trying to get the R5 MkII to recognize ANY of my wi-fi SSID's, I tried all the excellent advice you guys have sent my way. I've upgraded the router and repeater to the latest firmware. I've reassigned channels. I tried my iPhone hot-spot (which the MkII DID recognize, which is good to know, but doesn't actually help me practically.)

So while I was working last night, suddenly it seemed like my NAS (big disk array on my LAN) died. All my Word's and Excel's started freaking out. PC's ipconfig reported the usual network was down replaced by... something I didn't recognize. The PC couldn't log into the admin pages of the router, repeater, disk array, or connect with the Linux computer, laptops etc. Tried rebooting the PC. Tried rebooting the router. All dead. All my photos, all my everything... gone.

But the internet still worked at least.

I was thinking about what it could be. One laptop could talk to the disk array fine so nothing lost after all. But how many changes did I make that I'd have to back out?

I opened up my iPhone to check for SMS, and it was still on the Personal Hotspot page. Well, I don't need that I guess, and the split second I turned it off, the PC came back to life.

Basically the main computer had decided to use the iPhone as its internet connection when I plugged in the USB to charge the phone, and dropped its connection to the LAN...

I'm an old guy and this was like a top 5 computer yikes for me in my life.

I have an appointment for the main Canon service center in Ginza (the Fifth Avenue of Tokyo) Friday afternoon, but I can just try a walk-in too, which worked for me last week when I verified the flash shoe connector cover really was supposed to be that hard to get off.
 
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