Low number of Wi-Fi concurrent connected users

math13

I have tried Moodlebox with m'y classroom today
Maximum connecté at thé same time : 12
I had to restart the Box several time to clear all connection
Student were really pleased to work on Moodle in à French lycée
Only organisation for the time being : People connecté-get thé job-disconnect
With organized Students i ll see if it works on the long run...
Feed back in one month ! Christie

Nicolas

math13 Thanks for this feedback. 👍

What Raspberry Pi model do you use? 3B or 3B+? Did you check that your power supply is a (very) good one? This should improve the number of concurrent users connected.

Ratna

@math13 Could you explain what you meant by "I had to restart the Box several time to clear all connection"?

Do you mean that the Wi-Fi connection of the devices kept on connecting to 'MoodleBox" or the Moodle site reported the students as logged in even after they have logged out?

math13

Nicolas 3B+just bought the lastest
How can i check the quality of power system as u say ?
I was plugged in a classroom
I notice Students with more modern mobile were connecting easierly
Can we also connecté wia RJ45 ?
Very good system anyway
Thanks for your answers
Christie Lycée Sarlat France

Nicolas

math13 How can i check the quality of power system as u say ?

Look at the red LED of the RPi. It should be always on. If this is not the case, then try to change it. The cable too are important. Your best bet is to buy the official one.

Ratna

math13 I was curious about "Students with more modern mobile were connecting easierly". Do you mean more than say 25 students were connected at the same time?

About the power requirements of the 3 B+, I have noticed that 3 B consumes less. I have a small (battery powered) USB power bank. Under similar conditions, about 15 connections, the 3 B+ LED starts blinking where as the 3 B is steady. I know, 3 B+ is also more powerful, which makes it less portable (for me).

P.S.. Sorry for walking in to a closed discussion!

Nicolas

I split this discussion, as the other was indeed solved. ~~Sorry, I did a mistake when splitting, so we have now 2 threads 😅 . Will see if I can fix it.~~

Fixed 😀

Ratna

@Nicolas Yes, something has happened. ;-P

As a quick hack, just changing the subject line of the other thread could save the situation, IMO.

dgachet

I have the same problem, Only 15 can connect with moodle box wifi. We have the rapberry adaptateur 5,2 V ; 2,5 A
how can you explain the low connection ?

dgachet

we have the 3B+

Nicolas

dgachet Can you see if the red LED blinks?

dgachet

there are 2 ligths , the first, redligth is always on ! it's not blinking ! the second , greenligth is blinking when I connect a PC

Nicolas

dgachet So everything seems OK. If the red LED begins to blink, especially when you've a lot of WiFi connected devices, this would mean there's something wrong. It's perfectly normal that the green LED blinks.

Ratna

dgachet The red LED is the power indicator. If it is steady your power supply (and the connecting cable) are sufficient.

I didn't have enough opportunities so far to estimate the maximum number of Wi-Fi clients per MoodleBox. The maximum I had was somewhere 13 participants - but in a very busy application. The students competed in an Active Quiz https://moodle.org/plugins/mod_activequiz. A Pi 3B (not B+) managed it, with one hiccup. Initially I thought we had exceeded the processing power of the Pi. But it could have been an undervoltage. I was not careful about the power pack then.

I'm also keen on finding this number, with Pi 3B and 3B+, since I will face this situation soon! I thought 25 being mentioned here (by the developer?).

Nicolas

Ratna I thought 25 being mentioned here (by the developer?).

But I'm not alone! https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/50162/maximum-wi-fi-clients-on-pi-3-hotspot

dgachet

do we change the raspberry's wifi driver to compensate for the low number of connected users ?

Nicolas

dgachet I don't know if this is possible.

But why do you think it would change anything? Do you have any evidence that the driver limits the number of clients?

Ratna

dgachet Did you see this discussion https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=36&sid=c9e7a3b665b9ed99ab28bf2fd6622c27&t=76604 linked to the StackExchange link earlier? It is very detailed but outdated since we are interested only in the built-in wi-fi chip of Pi 3B+. It would be great, if you could tackle the issue and raise the number of wi-fi connected devices of the MoodleBox!

Nicolas

For the sake of completeness: following several discussions of the Raspberry Pi forum and on the advice of the principal software engineer at Raspberry Pi, an issue was reported to the RPi Foundation for investigation, since such a limitation seems to be a bug.