I changed my network password and when trying to reconnect my Bond Bridge, it wouldn’t connect. I decided to forget the Bond and add it back. I first reset it with a safety pin, restarted all my network equipment, and then started the process to add a Bond.
I get all the way through the process:
the app sees the bond
it connects to the bond’s network
allows me to name the device
see and allows me to choose my wifi network, BUT…
it says that my network is insecure and doesn’t show the lock icon, but I proceed anyway
says “waiting for bond bridge to come online”, BUT…
it always fails.
I’ve reset the bond numerous times, restarted my router, my ONT, and my firewall. I even tried changing my password back, just got the heck of it. Nothing works. I tried to use another phone, and that didn’t help. All of these things worked with the bond before, so I have no idea why it’s struggling suddenly.
I haven’t yet, but I did read many of those other posts to make sure there didn’t seem to be any relevant fixes (like the channel >11 one you linked), and followed all recommended troubleshooting - which is why I mentioned rebooting everything often, since that seemed to be a common tip. It’s just weird that the bond sees my wifi SSID as insecure, because that prevents me from ever supplying a password - which is almost certainly why it fails to connect as the final step. I’m sure I’ve done something stupid, just don’t know what!
It seems like every time I read about smart home/ wifi issues (Bond or otherwise), I learn some new nuance. If you stumble across a solution or the Bond help is able to point you in a useful direction, I’d like to read about it here (and have it available to add to the community issues+ solutions).
@crash6565, I’m curious what firmware version you are running on your Bridge. I was under the impression that “WPA3 Personal” support is available since Bond firmware version v4.0.
The suggestion to drop to WPA2 seems reasonable though. At least worth a try.
I’m on 4.7.3.1 and @drunkpirate seem correct. I can confirm toggling wpa3 off/on immediately makes a difference. With wpa3 on, the Bonds (I tried regular and pro) think that I’m trying to connect to an unsecured network and don’t give me the option to provide a password - which then causes them to fail to connect at a later step. Turning wpa3 off shows my network as secure, prompts for password, and connects as expected.
I originally thought it could have had something to do with my network equipment, because I changed from Eero to Aruba IO, but the root cause was simply that I had wpa3 OFF for my Eero network and ON for Aruba. When I just try turning it ON in Eero, the bad Bond behavior happens (I still have an Eero network running alongside the Aruba one for testing some things.)
Newest firmware. Tested 3 different wireless systems (Eero, Unifi, Orbi) and all produce the same results with WPA3.
The only hit I could find mentioning WPA3 is this one (Does bond support wpa2/wpa3 security), so it seems that WPA3 is not yet supported…and not really mentioned anywhere.
@merck WPA3 is already the default security method for all 3 of those systems I mentioned above (though, not older models). I’m an IT guy who works for an MSP. I see stuff like this all the time and I have the expertise to figure it out. However, it’s going to be exceedingly difficult for normal folk to figure out the issue and even more difficult to get it changed. Olibra should address this sooner rather than later, no matter how much of a firmware change is required.
Lastly, I also tested by inputting the SSID and password manually into Bond during the setup. It fails, but wireshark logs show the Bond sending malformed packets of gobbledygook to the Unifi system. Interestingly, the manual method is the only method that showed any packets being sent to the Unifi’s at all.
Thanks for the context, good to know that this is really becoming a much bigger issue with WPA3 going default, so we really do need to get a fix for this in the FW. As I said WPA3 support was reportedly in the driver we are now using, but we will need to take a deeper dive here. Good thing is, we can deliver fw updates before the wifi connection direct from the app so once we have a fix it is not a noticeable extra step for users.
That’s great news. As someone who deals with companies that routinely refuse to fix software bugs like this, I really appreciate it. It’s nice to see an executive that actually cares about its customers’ experience!
I’ve bought about 80 of these for clients all around Southern Cal and will continue to recommend your products.
A quick test here (with a Verizon LTE-Wifi box in my home) finds that my Bond Bridge Pro still connects when I force WPA3. Our team will dig in and see what we can see with newer name-brand APs as you mention.
