For those who don’t want to read through this, the question being asked: Is there a software version out there that resolved the ethernet port lock up issue on the F300 when used as a back haul?
So we’ve been have a rash of F300 issues in the last 24 hours, in addition to the ongoing ones.
We have a 5 mile back haul link using 2 F300-25 that was completely stable for months and then started the issue where the ethernet side would simply cease functioning requiring a reboot. This happened on both the master and slave sided. We were running 4.4.3 at the time. We tried the “latest” software versions which did not fix the problem and actually made it worse, going from a failure every 7 to 10 days to 1 to 2 a day, and ended up rolling back to 4.4.3, which has been the most stable.
Today the master F300-25 began a series of reboots. We replaced the power supply, swapped to another cable, visually inspected everything and could find nothing wrong. The problem continued until the F300-25 breathed its last. No outside reason for the failure we can determine. We had an ice storm about 3 weeks ago, but weather has been great since and there was no lightning associated. There were some power surges but the unit is protected by an UPS, surge protector and well grounded. Hardware failures happen, right?
We had used our spare F300 on another back haul, so we took an F300-16 up as a temporary replacement, and restored the link, though obviously at a lower RSL. Throughput was still good. Problem solved until we get the replacement in.
About midnight, we were checking on everything and made a couple of tweaks to the configuration which caused the unit the “briefly” disconnect. 14 minutes later it had still not recovered so we rebooted the master AP, and it came up in a minute or so. We then noticed the F300-16 was spitting out a continuous red ERROR notification via the notification tab. It didn’t give any information simply 02:33:14 error. The syslog shows nothing but the unit was passing traffic. Checking around in the unit, rhe main radio configuration page is basically blank. About 15 minutes later is appeared to recover with the error message going away and the screen populated correctly. I do have screen capture of the event so I’m not crazy,.
So the purpose of this rant is that we have had continuous issues with the F300 line and we have not lit our epmp 3000 yet, so concerned on how that will go. The backhauls have NOT been stable. We had a short BH using F300-16 less than a quarter mile that began having the ethernet port lock up issues requiring a reboot and we tried software releases up through 4.5.6 (with 4.4.3 being the most stable) and finally threw in the towel and replaced it with the old F180 epmp 1000 running 3.5.6 (solid for almost 60 days now). That’s not an option with one of our primary BH links due to bandwidth requirements. We tend to be VERY conservative in trying new software releases but the epmp 3000 forced us to step up to the latest and greatest version to get support for the MU-MIMO omni.
We have two other F300-25 back haul links that continue to experience the ethernet lockup issue. Unless we have a LOT of bad hardware, logic would dictate it is software related.
We’re big Cambium fans and fully understand there are always bugs and challenges, but I do have to say our experience to date with the F300 product has been vastly underwhelming. The specs are great, but the stability is not. Reading through the forums it appears there are a continuous series of issues since 2018 and I can see a lot of frustration noted, ours now included. We are very small with a limited budget so the F300-25 seems an excellent solution for our BH needs, but…
So to the bottom line question: Though I’m not seeing it, Is there a software version that provides stability for the F300 lock up issue? We have tried every software version but the beta 4.6 RFC29. 4.4.3 has proven the most stable of the unstable, but weekly outages having to use watchdog reboots is unacceptable. Multiple daily outages even less so.
It appears the primary focus has been resolving the SM shedding issue with the epmp 3000 and 3000L. Haven’t seen much activity lately on the F300 ethernet port lock up issue.
We are going to try one last time with the latest BETA on a recently turned up BH link with F300-25s and see if that helps any. If the answer is no then we will most likely abandon the F300 as a back haul product and go with a proven Ubiquiti solution… Hopefully we can repurpose the F300 units as SM’s with the epmp 3000.
And before you ask, yes we’ve talked to Cambium and been told to either upgrade to the latest greatest software or replace the unit. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt.