USB Tethering via Verizon 8800L

Autonomous Machines Jetson & Embedded Systems Jetson Nano
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1

I’m attempting to get a Verizon 8800L hotspot working via USB tethering with the Jetson Nano. My success has only been partial. While I can get Internet access with it at times, here is the trouble I’ve encountered:

Issue #1:

  • After I connect the hotspot to the Nano via USB, it will work for an unspecified amount of time, however eventually it will stop working. When I connect the hotspot up to my Linux server (Ubuntu Mate 20.04) via USB, Internet access does not eventually cease.
  • For reference, here is what dmesg displays when the hotspot is connected to the Nano and it’s providing Internet access (I’ve modified what is displayed here for the MAC address, though the serial number is at appears in dmesg):
    [ 3093.516203] usb 2-1.3: new SuperSpeed USB device number 5 using tegra-xusb
    [ 3093.542855] usb 2-1.3: New USB device found, idVendor=1410, idProduct=b020
    [ 3093.542864] usb 2-1.3: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
    [ 3093.542870] usb 2-1.3: Product: MiFi 8800L
    [ 3093.542875] usb 2-1.3: Manufacturer: Novatel Wireless
    [ 3093.542881] usb 2-1.3: SerialNumber: 0123456789ABCDEF
    [ 3093.557338] cdc_ether 2-1.3:1.0 eth1: register 'cdc_ether' at usb-70090000.xusb-1.3, CDC Ethernet Device, 00:11:22:33:44:55
    [ 3093.559413] hid-generic 0003:1410:B020.0007: hidraw2: USB HID v1.01 Device [Novatel Wireless MiFi 8800L] on usb-70090000.xusb-1.3/input2
  • And here is what I noticed dmesg lists after Internet access stops working:
    cdc_ether2-1.3:1.0 eth1: kevent 12 may have been dropped

Issue #2:

  • The following is secondary to resolving the above. It seems that the applications I’m using to access the internet are “sluggish” and upload speeds are consistently less than anticipated. Specifics below.
  • I noticed when using Chromium, for example, pages don’t seem to fully load, or take longer to do so when connected via the hotspot. This occurs regardless of what site I visit or the type of content I’m trying to view, and continue to occur regardless of where the modem is located. This type trouble does not occur when the hotspot is connected to my Linux server, and it does not occur on the Nano when I’m connected via WiFi or Ethernet.
  • To get a better idea of what my downstream and upstream speeds are, I used speedtest-cli. After running it for at least ten iterations, I found that the upload in particular came in at less than 50% of what I was getting on my Linux server. To clarify, the modem was kept in the same spot when testing either computer, and I also specified the same server to use during the tests.

It’s possible my dmesg information is not complete and I can try and do a better job of obtaining it. That said, it gets a little difficult at times given the intermittent nature of the trouble.

I would greatly appreciate help in resolving these problems.

3

Hello,

Did you try the patch here?

4

Hi WayneWWW. Thanks for the reply.

I have not tried that patch. Apologies to ask this, but I’m a bit new to this aspect of updating the OS - would you be willing to share how this type of patch is applied?

5

Hello,

Such driver is the kernel driver. Thus, you need to rebuild the kernel.

  1. Please go to our download center page.
    Jetson Download Center | NVIDIA Developer

  2. You will need to find L4T_sources w.r.t your jetpack verson

  3. You shall see there is a kernel source tbz2 inside that big tarball.

  4. Document reference for how to build the kernel source

https://docs.nvidia.com/jetson/l4t/index.html#page/Tegra%20Linux%20Driver%20Package%20Development%20Guide/kernel_custom.html#

After kernel is done, you can use etherent or any other method to send the Image to device (tegra) side. And replacing the original one in /boot/Image. Then, reboot the device and it will take effect.

6

I’ll give it a try later today and report back.

7

This is still in progress. I have several concurrent projects going on with the Nano, and this one had to take a back seat for a bit. I’ll be returning to this in the future/near-future and will report back.