Raspberry Pi Forums

Hello all, I've been troubleshooting a wi-fi issue I'm having and it's gotten to a very weird point. Randomly while using the Pi 4 my wi-fi will quit working and won't connect to anything this persists through restarts and power cycles but I have noticed if I leave it unplugged for 10 minutes to an hour it will work again for a while.

If I watch the available networks they'll show up for several seconds and then random ones will disappear (The 5g options first) from the list. I can click them and put in the key and it acts like it's beginning to connect but then drops. When this happens my Pi, as in the physical Pi hardware, emits an audible chirping noise at semi-regular intervals until I either disable wi-fi or shut off the Pi.

My setup is as follows
A Pi 4 4GB with Raspbian, the latest updates, and the firmware update that fixes the heat issue.
A single USB port in use with a wireless Logitech Keyboard/Mouse combo connector (this happens if I plug in a regular mouse/keyboard too)
A ugreen micro HDMI to HDMI adapter
A Canakit Pi 4 power adapter

Bumping for visibility (fell to the second page). It's fairly frustrating and I would like to get it resolved if possible. I can give any addition needed information or try to troubleshoot further with some guidance.

If not I completely understand and thank you for reading I'll switch back to ethernet in the meantime.

DirkS wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 06, 2019 8:59 pm

Bumping after just a few hours is really 'not done'.
You should wait at least 24hrs +

Sorry didn't realize that was the etiquette here. Figured no one actively looked at the second page.

Bumping after just a few hours is really 'not done'.
You should wait at least 24hrs +

And

Bumping for visibility

is even worse...

I don't have a Pi 4 myself, and I've never had this problem on a Pi. However, in general I can tell you that "chirping" can happen when a switch-mode power supply frequency swings through the audible range in response to a changing load, or a changing input voltage. All the recent Pi models include such a switching power supply on board to convert the +5V input to other voltages. The noise comes from a magnetostriction effect in the inductor core material. If so the noise would be coming from an area just above the USB-C power jack on a Pi 4.

So there may be a hardware fault on the board, or there might be an external device that sometimes draws too much power (USB HDD might do that) or the 5V supply to the Pi is not adequate and stable.

EDIT: actually reading your post to the end, I don't see any likely external hardware problems. You might see if a different power supply makes a difference and if not, it could be a hardware fault on the Pi board itself.

jbeale wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 06, 2019 10:12 pm

I don't have a Pi 4 myself, and I've never had this problem on a Pi. However, in general I can tell you that "chirping" can happen when a switch-mode power supply frequency swings through the audible range in response to a changing load, or a changing input voltage. All the recent Pi models include such a switching power supply on board to convert the +5V input to other voltages. The noise comes from a magnetostriction effect in the inductor core material. If so the noise would be coming from an area just above the USB-C power jack on a Pi 4.

So there may be a hardware fault on the board, or there might be an external device that sometimes draws too much power (USB HDD might do that) or the 5V supply to the Pi is not adequate and stable.

EDIT: actually reading your post to the end, I don't see any likely external hardware problems. You might see if a different power supply makes a difference and if not, it could be a hardware fault on the Pi board itself.

Thank you for the informative posts.

I have a cell phone power supply I can use for testing purposes. Other than that I really hope I don't have bad board would cost me more to ship it to the UK for a replacement than I paid for the board.

Edit: happens on 2 5v 3a power supplies and seems to have gotten worse as it's not even connecting intermittently now. I've re-connected the ethernet cable and am going to stick with that I guess.

So.. an rpi-upgrade (yes I know it was a last resort fix) fixed it?

edit: definitely fixed it been working consistently since