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Forum Discussion
WPA3 not working on 6GHz in Windows 11
I would have put the Model in the appropriate field, but it wasn't available in the selection list.
I have a Nighthawk AXE11000(RAXE500) router with firmware version V1.0.7.68_2.0.35, and four PCs with Intel AX210 WiFi 6E adapters. Prior to Windows 11, I was using the 22.50 drivers from Intel as they allowed Windows 10 to connect to the 6GHz band using the Enhanced Open security option(I added MAC address filtering for extra security). Windows 11(and soon Windows 10 21H2) introduced Hash2Element support which is supposed to make WPA3 Personal security work on the 6GHz band. Now that all of my PCs are upgraded to Windows 11, I updated the WiFi drivers to the latest version(22.80.1.1) and tried enabling WPA3. When I do that, the PCs can't hold onto the connection for more than a couple of minutes. I can immediately reconnect, though I have to re-enter the password, and it drops again within minutes. I've since switched back to Enhanced Open, and they can once again hold a connection on the 6GHz band just fine. On the 5GHz band, they can hold a connection with WPA2 just fine. I can't use WPA3, because there is no "WPA2 + WPA3" option like on my previous Nighthawk router(I really HATE that the option to allow both was taken away), and I have some devices that have trouble connecting on that band if I enable WPA3 only.
I do not know if this is a problem with the Netgear router, the Intel WiFi adapter, or with Windows itself. I intend to contact all three support departments, and I fully expect a round robin of finger pointing. But I'm going to keep pestering until this issue is resolved. Has anyone else been experiencing something similar?
23 Replies
Windows 11 has been having a wide range of issues, along with many regressions where issues that were long since fixed on windows 10, have returned on windows 11 even though windows 11 uses a ton of code from windows 10. It has been a mess, for example on windows 10, Microsoft had 6GHz working for some time, and then released updates that broke it again. On windows 11, they added more support for WPA3, but broke many other network related things, such as handling of mapped network drives, WiFi connections when coming out of standby, WiFi connections when coming out of hibernation, and much more.
The WPA2 + WPA3 options were removed since they caused compatibility issues as well as not offering much protection over WPA2 because of downgrade attacks. Beyond that, for the 6GHz band, the standard mandates WPA3.
The WAP2/WPA3 issue isn't my main concern, my main concern is why WAP3 isn't working for me on the 6GHz band, when Enhanced Open works just fine. For the record, I *have* used WPA3 on 5Ghz before, and my PCs that supported it worked fine. I stick to WPA2 because I have other devices that connect on 5GHz but don't work with WPA3. I'm fine leaving 5GHz at WPA2. But WPA3 not working on 6GHz when what was specifically one of the things Win 11 and Win 10 21H2 were supposed to add support for. I'm glad the RAXE500 supports MAC address filtering so I can add some protection to the Enhanced Open setting, but I'd still like to now why WPA3 is not working.
The 6GHz WPA3 issues on windows 11 is largely an issue with windows 11. It has been a long running issue where some builds will have it work fine and others will break it again. Though on other devices, for example smartphones with WiFi 6e support, WPA3 on the 6GHz band works great. Intel has long since added full support for WPA3 on the 6GHz band, On windows 10, for a while they had support for 6gHz but incomplete WPA3 support unless you used an insider build, they then did something with subsequent updates where some systems would no longer see 6GHz APs at all, and on fresh installs, none seem to see 6GHz APs. Windows 11 while is has better 6GHz support, connection reliability has been an issue.
This has been the worst OS launch since windows vista. PS, upgrades from windows 10 to 11 have been far worse than fresh installs of windows 11, it has gotten to a point where many are recommending that people disable TPM (if they are not actively using it for things like bitlocker) in the bios to prevent an accidential upgrade until the user is fully ready to try it.
Just curious, have you tried using v22.70.x of the Intel WiFi driver?
pdegan2814 wrote:
I would have put the Model in the appropriate field, but it wasn't available in the selection list.
I have a Nighthawk AXE11000(RAXE500) router with firmware version V1.0.7.68_2.0.35, and four PCs with Intel AX210 WiFi 6E adapters. Prior to Windows 11, I was using the 22.50 drivers from Intel as they allowed Windows 10 to connect to the 6GHz band using the Enhanced Open security option(I added MAC address filtering for extra security). Windows 11(and soon Windows 10 21H2) introduced Hash2Element support which is supposed to make WPA3 Personal security work on the 6GHz band. Now that all of my PCs are upgraded to Windows 11, I updated the WiFi drivers to the latest version(22.80.1.1) and tried enabling WPA3. When I do that, the PCs can't hold onto the connection for more than a couple of minutes. I can immediately reconnect, though I have to re-enter the password, and it drops again within minutes. I've since switched back to Enhanced Open, and they can once again hold a connection on the 6GHz band just fine. On the 5GHz band, they can hold a connection with WPA2 just fine. I can't use WPA3, because there is no "WPA2 + WPA3" option like on my previous Nighthawk router(I really HATE that the option to allow both was taken away), and I have some devices that have trouble connecting on that band if I enable WPA3 only.
I do not know if this is a problem with the Netgear router, the Intel WiFi adapter, or with Windows itself. I intend to contact all three support departments, and I fully expect a round robin of finger pointing. But I'm going to keep pestering until this issue is resolved. Has anyone else been experiencing something similar?
And same IS using WPA3 currently.
Intel will encourage you to upgrade the OS to WIN11 which would definitely support 6GHZ WPA3-SAE and OWE mode.
Altsai wrote:Intel will encourage you to upgrade the OS to WIN11 which would definitely support 6GHZ WPA3-SAE and OWE mode.
Please look at the thread topic and my original post. I AM in Windows 11, and WPA3 is not working on 6GHz. That's why I made the post. So far, Microsoft is blaming Intel and Netgear. Intel is blaming my motherboard chipset(despite the fact all four systems are using different motherboards with different chipsets, including an X570 and B550). No one can explain how my four different PCs can use 6GHz in OWE mode but not WPA3. They are able to authenticate when WAP3 is on, and the connection works. But within a few minutes it's dropped.
