Lenovo Chromebooks spontaneously rebooting when roaming - Identifi 3825/3935 network

[Keith_Obermeier]

Recently Upgraded network to AC. Using 3825 and 3935 APs on a 10.31.03.0012 v2110 controller, NAC based portal, bridge at AP topology. Wired transport on Extreme/Enterasys switches. We are finding that any Lenovo N22 chromebook running ChromeOS 59 or higher will experience kernel panic reboots when in vicinity of specific locations in the building. I have multi-edited all of the APs in the related regions of the building and made certain that they all are configured identically.

We have been reformatting the chromebooks (2000 of them) to ChromeOS to mitigate the problem. Obviously there is a bug in CrOS v59 and v60 causing this, but I can't explain why there are locations in the building we can go to and repeatably reproduce the problem. I kid you not, walk down the hallway holding a Chromebook, and as soon as you enter Mrs. Jones's classroom your Chromebook is going to crash, and keep on crash-looping on reboot until you walk away. Needless to say, Mrs. Jones is getting pretty frustrated!

As an aside, the Wifi nic in these is a Intel 7265. CrOS 58 released in early summer. Soon after CrOS 58 Intel released a nic update (19.60) that addressed a bug related to loss of network when roaming. If CrOS builds with the Intel driver 58 and 59 would likely have this code.

There is light at the end of the tunnel, in that the beta channel v61 CrOS appears to be more stable. But who wants to migrate 2000 chromebooks to a beta channel? Me neither.

I have a bug report opened with Google (https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=765424). My best guess is that the crashes happen in locations where roaming would be more likely, but that is a *guess*. Anyone have any suggestions for what to look for on the wifi side that can cause location based OS crashes?

[Keith_Obermeier]

Diederik, What is you Google Case ID? I will try to get my case tied to yours

[Diederik_Kuijpe]

Experiencing the same issue. Dell 3120s and 3180s, Chrome OS 59 & 60. Extreme Wireless C25 with AP3825s.

I'm happy I found another user with this issue, just to prove I'm not crazy.

This does look to be a ChromeOS issue. The easiest workaround is to reboot the AP, but it will reoccur eventually.

I've cases open with GTAC and Google Cloud support.

[Keith_Obermeier]

just proofread my original note, and for clarification, version 59 and 60 have the problem. we are downgrading to CrOS 58 to resolve. CrOS 59 was released early summer, probably with 19.60 rev intel driver.

[Keith_Obermeier]

I've been putting the ball in Google's court. I just don't have a feel about how the localization is triggering this.

We have about 10 wifi black holes in the district that I know of so far. One today was in a Lecture Hall that has 4 3935 APs. In other cases it's been rooms at the edge of the network where they are not surrounded by aps. (end of a wing).

My Google contact has rolled this into another bug report having to do with unenrollment on the platform image for lenovos on v58-59. I've finally convinced her that this is a separate issue, so I hope get my own engineer to take my case now.

[Doug]

Thanks Keith. You could try contacting the GTAC and have them do a config review.