WiFi on the Pi 4 even possible?

[supremesonicbrazil]

EDIT: so by irony of destiny or something, I tried using a wireless USB dongle in place of the Pi's built-in wifi and the problem's gone. I don't want this thread to go to waste though, so here's my streaming_log.txt if anyone wants to crack this on their own, in case you reach the same problem as I did: link[pastebin.com]
Did a quick 10-minute playtest with the Pi's built-in wifi, on 2.4GHz, under the same conditions stated below.

I'm posting this here because I'm at my wits' end. I bought a Pi 4 (4GB model) just to use Steam Link in it and it seems that every 60 seconds (yes I've actually counted, it's a systematic issue) the network spikes for a few seconds and goes back to normal, like this: screenshot[i.imgur.com]

I've been testing this for days and checked out almost everything I could think of:

• Tried both 2.4GHz (channel 11, 20MHz) and 5GHz (channel 36, 40MHz) bands, higher and/or less congested channels don't make any difference, and I'm literally at 1.5m away from my router (specifically for testing purposes) and there's nothing blocking the signal, so signal strength, distance and interference don't seem to be the problem
  
• Tried all the quality options (Fast, Balanced, Smooth), HEVC on/off, capped resolution/frame rates (went as far as 720p@30FPS, from native 1080p@60FPS), no difference on any of those
  
• I'm using a Steam Controller with the dongle plugged in (can't test Bluetooth since the Pi app doesn't support it, also can't test with other controllers because it's the only one I have)
  
• Switched between HDMI0 and HDMI1, even bought some heatsinks thinking it could be temperature issues (even though I'm on stock clocks and nowhere near thermal throttling), no difference either
  
• Everything is updated to the latest version already (Steam Beta, Steam Link app, Raspbian, the SC firmware, etc.)
  
• It's not the game's "heaviness" either, it happens equally with GRIP Combat Racing as it happens with The Binding of Isaac, and also happens when idling in Big Picture, which is enough for me to take that for granted
  
• The Android and Linux Flatpak apps don't hang up at all, they're completely smooth (tested on my phone, a random TV box I had lying around, and my work laptop, all of them at 2.4GHz even), so I think it's safe to say it's not my network's capacity either
  
• I did test with a wired connection on the Pi 4 and it's as smooth as the previous point, but I'm leaving that as the absolute last resort if this can't be solved (mostly because I'll probably have to pull a 10-20m Ethernet cable across my house and through the ceiling)
  
• My dad suggested there could be a cronjob/watchdog or something in Raspbian enabled by default which could make this happen, but I highly doubt it given Raspbian is as light as a feather

By process of elimination there's only two things I can think of now:

• I've hit the reverse silicon lottery and my Pi 4 has some obscure physical issue with the WiFi chip that makes it gag systematically every minute (which wouldn't be noticeable on a lighter scenario like watching a YouTube video)
  
• The Pi version of the Steam Link app has some obscure edge case bug specifically on the Pi 4, which the other apps and/or Pi models don't have (I don't have a Pi 3B+ or earlier to test whether this is the case)

I asked around on Reddit days ago and got no significant responses so far, so I guess the last thing I could try is seek guidance from Valve or anyone here with a more thorough knowledge of the Steam Link. If there's any need for more technical details (system specs, logs, etc.) please let me know.

[supremesonicbrazil]

Originally posted by Xenophobe:

I don't use wifi on the pi (specifically got it because I can turn wifi/BT off unlike the hardware link), but posting a pastebin link of your /steam/logs/streaming_log.txt and streaming_log.previous.txt files may help others help you.

I've had a spark in my mind and decided to use one of those cheapo wireless USB dongles instead of using the Pi's built-in wifi. Put it in, compiled the drivers, shut off the built-in interface with ifconfig... believe it or not the problem's gone. I guess the Pi's antenna just can't physically handle too much info at once and ends up de-syncing hard for a while until it catches up, while a proper, bigger antenna can take care of.

Regardless of this though, I'll be sure to have a look at the logs and post them here later on for if other people end up having the same problem someday. I'll edit the post as well.

[supremesonicbrazil]

Edited the post with a pastebin link to my streaming_log.txt file.

[Revi]

did you sudo raspi-config and setup the country? raspberry pi os disables wifi until you select a county in raspi-config.

[supremesonicbrazil]

Originally posted by Revi:

did you sudo raspi-config and setup the country? raspberry pi os disables wifi until you select a county in raspi-config.

Yes, I did the initial setup on Raspbian as soon as the Pi arrived.

[Thor]

yes works great on raspberry pi os 32bit on a rpi4 4gb with a wifi tplink t4u(driver here https://github.com/morrownr/88x2bu.git ) since the pi's wifi chips has some big latency issues....

works great even with hevc its my default now....

PS: dont forget to disable the onboard wifi in config.txt

[Kite]

The issue is the wifi icon in the top right corner of the desktop. The wifi "app" in the title bar does a scan every 60s to look for APs, and every scan drops the connection just enough to affect streaming.

Luckily, there is a fix: disable it!

In console, run (change vim.tiny to nano if you prefer):

sudo vim.tiny /etc/xdg/lxsession/LXDE-pi/autostart

And either comment out this line (by putting a # in front of the line), to make it look like:

#@lxpanel --profile LXDE-pi

OR change it to be the "non-pi" version of LXDE, by removing the "-pi" bit so that it looks like:

@lxpanel --profile LXDE"

The desktop will end up looking different.. I haven't explored other ways to just disable the AP scanning because if you enable steamlink autostart you don't even need to see/use the desktop anyway.. but there you go :)