[PATCH v1] hp_wmi causing rfkill soft blocked wifi

From: Jorge Lopez
Date: Fri Oct 28 2022 - 11:55:52 EST


After upgrading BIOS to U82 01.02.01 Rev.A, the console is flooded
strange char "^@" which printed out every second and makes login
nearly impossible. Also the below messages were shown both in console
and journal/dmesg every second:

usb 1-3: Device not responding to setup address.
usb 1-3: device not accepting address 4, error -71
usb 1-3: device descriptor read/all, error -71
usb usb1-port3: unable to enumerate USB device

Wifi is soft blocked by checking rfkill. When unblocked manually,
after few seconds it would be soft blocked again. So I was suspecting
something triggered rfkill to soft block wifi. At the end it was
fixed by removing hp_wmi module.

The root cause is the way hp-wmi driver handles command 1B on
post-2009 BIOS. In pre-2009 BIOS, command 1Bh return 0x4 to indicate
that BIOS no longer controls the power for the wireless devices.

Signed-off-by: Jorge Lopez <jorge.lopez2@xxxxxx>

---
Based on the latest platform-drivers-x86.git/for-next
---
drivers/platform/x86/hp-wmi.c | 11 +++++++++--
1 file changed, 9 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/drivers/platform/x86/hp-wmi.c b/drivers/platform/x86/hp-wmi.c
index 627a6d0eaf83..29cd4e437d97 100644
--- a/drivers/platform/x86/hp-wmi.c
+++ b/drivers/platform/x86/hp-wmi.c
@@ -1300,8 +1300,15 @@ static int __init hp_wmi_bios_setup(struct platform_device *device)
wwan_rfkill = NULL;
rfkill2_count = 0;

- if (hp_wmi_rfkill_setup(device))
- hp_wmi_rfkill2_setup(device);
+ /*
+ * In pre-2009 BIOS, command 1Bh return 0x4 to indicate that
+ * BIOS no longer controls the power for the wireless
+ * devices. All features supported by this command will no
+ * longer be supported.
+ */
+ if (!hp_wmi_bios_2009_later())
+ if (hp_wmi_rfkill_setup(device))
+ hp_wmi_rfkill2_setup(device);

err = hp_wmi_hwmon_init();

--
2.34.1