Wi-Fi Driver and Device Selection#

Overview#

CanMV’s network.WLAN is built on top of RT-Smart WLAN and NetMgmt. The current SDK includes Realtek RTL8189FTV/RTL8733BS, Broadcom brcmfmac, RW007, AIC8800 series, and ESP-Hosted drivers. The Python API does not directly call vendor drivers, but selects registered physical radios by USB, SDIO, or SPI transport type.

Whether a solution can be used directly depends on the target board firmware’s defconfig, interface wiring, module model, and coprocessor firmware. Drivers not enabled in the standard firmware require custom builds.

Warning

The currently released K230D standard firmware does not support network functionality. The K230D-related usage scenarios on this page fall within the scope of custom board-level and driver adaptation and cannot be directly applied to the standard firmware.

Supported Solutions#

Solution	Transport	CanMV Capability	Registered Model
RTL8189FTV	SDIO	2.4 GHz Wi-Fi 4, STA, SoftAP	`rtl8189ftv`
RTL8733BS	SDIO	Wi-Fi 4 with 5 GHz support, STA, SoftAP	`rtl8733bs`
Broadcom BCM43430A1	SDIO	2.4 GHz Wi-Fi 4, STA, SoftAP, single-channel concurrency	`BCM43430A1`
RW007	SPI Mode 0	STA, SoftAP	`rw007`
AIC8800/AIC8801, D80/D40/D80X2/DC/DW/DL	USB; AIC8801, D80, DC/DW/DL support SDIO	STA, SoftAP; USB composite device can optionally have BLE HCI	AIC specific model
ESP-Hosted-FG	SPI Full-Duplex, SDIO	ESP firmware manages connection and WPA	`esp-hosted-fg`
ESP-Hosted-NG	SPI Full-Duplex, SDIO	Host authentication path, can provide WLAN offload control device	`esp-hosted-ng`
ESP-Hosted-MCU	SPI Full-Duplex, Dual/Quad SPI Half-Duplex	RPC Wi-Fi, optional BLE HCI	`esp-hosted-mcu`

The wire protocols of ESP-Hosted-FG, NG, and MCU are not compatible. The host driver must match the firmware personality burned on the ESP side. ESP-Hosted-MCU currently does not have an RT-Smart SDIO backend.

The current brcmfmac port only ports Wi-Fi FullMAC functionality and does not provide Bluetooth HCI transport, so it cannot serve as a CanMV NimBLE controller. The retained legacy CYW43xx port similarly has Bluetooth disabled. For BLE configuration and usage, see NimBLE Bluetooth Low Energy.

Default Board-Level Configuration#

In the current source code:

k230_canmv_defconfig has brcmfmac and Realtek SDIO enabled;
Most CanMV defconfigs with on-board SDIO Wi-Fi have Realtek enabled, with RTL8189FTV selected by default; when using RTL8733BS, the Realtek module option must be changed;
k230_canmv_rtt_evb_defconfig has RW007 enabled;
k230_canmv_01studio_defconfig has AIC8800 USB and SDIO enabled;
k230_canmv_01studio_emmc_defconfig has AIC8800 USB enabled;
k230_canmv_lckfb_defconfig has AIC8800 USB enabled;
k230_canmv_v3p0_defconfig has AIC8800 SDIO enabled, with SDIO host 0 selected;
ESP-Hosted must be enabled in custom firmware according to actual wiring.

Board-level defaults only describe build configuration and cannot replace hardware verification. The same SDIO slot can compile drivers from multiple vendors at the same time, matched at runtime by SDIO manufacturer/product ID; however, the Realtek driver can only select either RTL8189FTV or RTL8733BS at a time internally.

AIC firmware is provided by a separate sub-repository in the manifest. After running repo sync, the following should exist:

src/rtsmart/rtsmart/kernel/bsp/maix3/drivers/extdrv/aic8800/firmware/

The build system installs the required files to /bin/firmware in the image. These binaries have independent vendor license terms. The current firmware is synced from AIC aic8800d_linux_sdk_V5.0_2026_0123_5f7be68d, corresponding to vendor repository commit df4c783b663eba1956579c681acd5e45f25c671d; the authoritative source is the README.md of the firmware sub-repository.

Custom Firmware Configuration#

First select the board-level configuration following Custom Firmware, then run make rtsmart-menuconfig or the corresponding container command.

SDIO Common Board-Level Configuration#

Realtek, brcmfmac, CYW43xx, AIC8800 SDIO, and ESP-Hosted SDIO share the following board-level settings:

BSP_WIFI_SDIO_HOST_0=y              # or BSP_WIFI_SDIO_HOST_1
BSP_WIFI_SDIO_REG_ON_PIN=<gpio>     # -1 means use board-level fixed wiring
BSP_WIFI_SDIO_RESET_ACTIVE_LOW=y
BSP_WIFI_SDIO_RESET_PULSE_MS=200
BSP_WIFI_SDIO_POWER_UP_DELAY_MS=50

The selected host must have the corresponding RT_USING_SDIO0 or RT_USING_SDIO1 enabled. REG_ON, reset active level, and power-up delay must be set according to the schematic and module manual.

Realtek RTL8189FTV/RTL8733BS#

Enable RT_USING_REALTEK, and choose one of the two in the Realtek module options:

REALTEK_SDIO_RTL8189FTV=y
# REALTEK_SDIO_RTL8733BS=y

The SDIO ID of RTL8189FTV is 024c:f179, and RTL8733BS is 024c:b733. The driver binds devices by ID; if the wrong module is selected, WLAN will not be registered even if the SDIO bus discovers the card. Debug commands and driver logs can be enabled via REALTEK_INTERACTIVE_CMD and REALTEK_ENABLE_DEBUG respectively.

Broadcom brcmfmac#

Enable:

RT_USING_BRCMFMAC=y
BRCMFMAC_COUNTRY_CODE="CN"
BRCMFMAC_COUNTRY_REVISION=0
BRCMFMAC_BCM43430A1_NVRAM="nvram.txt"

The currently provided and verified target in the SDK is SDIO ID 02d0:a9a6, chip revision A1, with registered model BCM43430A1. The driver supports STA, SoftAP, and single-channel STA + SoftAP concurrency. During concurrent operation, SoftAP may briefly stop while STA is connected, and resumes on the STA’s channel after the connection is complete.

The build system installs firmware and NVRAM to /bin/firmware/brcmfmac in the image. The default nvram.txt is the K016-CW43 board-level calibration used by the K230 CanMV Linux SDK; only when the module and radio design match the AP6212A V1.0.2 calibration should BRCMFMAC_BCM43430A1_NVRAM be changed to nvram_ap6212.txt. NVRAM is board-level radio calibration data and cannot be swapped based solely on SDIO ID or chip model.

The driver mapping table also lists other Broadcom/Cypress chips, but the SDK currently does not include firmware, NVRAM, and optional CLM blobs for these targets. When adapting new modules, the corresponding Linux brcmfmac files must be provided and installed to the directory specified by BRCMFMAC_FIRMWARE_PATH.

The legacy RT_USING_CYW43XX is still available for existing custom configurations, but it is mutually exclusive with RT_USING_BRCMFMAC because both match the same Broadcom SDIO ID. New configurations should use brcmfmac.

RW007#

Enable RT_USING_RW007, and configure according to board-level wiring:

RW007_SPI_BUS_NAME="spi0"
RW007_SPI_MAX_HZ=25000000
RW007_RST_PIN=20
RW007_CS_PIN=63
RW007_INT_BUSY_PIN=62

The driver uses SPI Mode 0, 8-bit, single data line, and mounts the slave as wspi. The GPIOs above are only Kconfig defaults; when porting to other boards, the Reset, CS, and INT/BUSY pins must be verified.

AIC8800#

Enable:

RT_USING_AIC8800_WIFI=y
AIC8800_WIFI_TRANSPORT_USB=y        # USB network card
AIC8800_WIFI_TRANSPORT_SDIO=y       # SDIO module, can be enabled simultaneously with USB

2.4 GHz-only modules should disable AIC8800_WIFI_5GHZ. AIC8800D40L and D80 may use the same USB ID; D40L must enable AIC8800_WIFI_USB_LIMIT_40MHZ. USB BLE requires AIC8800_WIFI_BLE, and ENABLE_BLUETOOTH must also be enabled at the CanMV top level.

Firmware can be trimmed by series: AIC8800_WIFI_FIRMWARE_AIC8800, AIC8800_WIFI_FIRMWARE_D80, AIC8800_WIFI_FIRMWARE_D80X2, and AIC8800_WIFI_FIRMWARE_DC_DW. D80X2 currently only supports USB; DC/DW/DL share the aic8800DC directory, and DL does not have a separate device ID or firmware filename. The newly synced USB D80X2 firmware includes U03 and U05 revision files, and the driver automatically selects based on silicon revision.

The current SDIO driver matches the following devices:

Chip Series	SDIO Function and ID	Description
AIC8801	function 1: `5449:0145`	Wi-Fi data and control share function 1
AIC8800D80	function 1: `c8a1:0082`	Currently only Wi-Fi function is used
AIC8800DC/DW/DL	function 1: `c8a1:c08d`; function 2: `c8a1:c18d`	Both functions must be enumerated simultaneously; function 2 is used for control/message transport, not Bluetooth HCI

The SDIO Wi-Fi slot of k230_canmv_01studio_defconfig uses host 1, REG_ON GPIO is 53, and AIC USB and SDIO transport are enabled; k230_canmv_v3p0_defconfig uses SDIO host 0. AIC8800DC is a 2.4 GHz-only module; custom configurations using this card should disable AIC8800_WIFI_5GHZ.

When building USB and SDIO transport simultaneously, the DC/DW/DL SDIO firmware is installed at /bin/firmware/sdio/aic8800DC; when only building SDIO, it is installed at /bin/firmware/aic8800DC. After the driver reads the chip ID and U02 revision, it automatically selects the normal or H version patch, patch table, and calibration firmware; do not use same-named USB firmware to overwrite these files. Both USB and SDIO perform matching DPD calibration according to vendor procedures; calibration failure terminates initialization, and there is no Kconfig option to skip calibration.

The default value changes after DC/DW/DL transport update are: AIC8800_WIFI_POWER_SAVE changed from enabled to disabled; AIC8800_WIFI_DATA_RX_URBS changed from 5 to 4 for descriptor DMA, and 20 for other modes; the previously implicitly enabled AIC8800_WIFI_USB_TX_AGGREGATION is now disabled; AIC8800_WIFI_SDIO_TX_AGGREGATE_WAIT_MS changed from 1 ms to 0 ms. Board-level defconfigs that depend on old power or throughput configurations should explicitly set the corresponding options. AIC8800_WIFI_DATA_TX_URBS remains 2 by default and should not be blindly increased just for throughput.

clock=50000 kHz in SDIO logs is the host bus clock, not the Wi-Fi radio bandwidth. ME capabilities ... max-bw=80 MHz only indicates capability; the association channel ... width=80 MHz after association indicates that 80 MHz is actually used for this connection. Throughput testing should cover 30~60 seconds and record results per second or in segments, to avoid mistaking the short-term rate ramp-up after association for DPD or bus failure.

ESP-Hosted-FG/NG#

Enable RT_USING_ESP_HOSTED_WIFI, select FG or NG, then select SPI Full-Duplex or SDIO. SPI mode, frequency, checksum, Handshake/Data Ready levels, and pins must match the ESP firmware. SDIO also requires the manufacturer/product ID actually published by the slave. The current FG/NG ports do not register a BLE HCI controller with CanMV.

ESP-Hosted-MCU#

Enable RT_USING_ESP_HOSTED_MCU, and select SPI Full-Duplex or SPI Half-Duplex. Half-Duplex uses 2/4 bidirectional data lines and does not support 1-line mode. After enabling ESP_HOSTED_BLE, then enable CanMV ENABLE_BLUETOOTH, and MicroPython NimBLE can use the dynamically registered /dev/hciN controller.

For all ESP-Hosted solutions, a controllable Reset should be connected preferentially. When Reset is not connected, restarting only the K230 or ESP side may cause the transport session to become out of sync.

Python Device Selection#

The second parameter of network.WLAN selects the transport:

import network

auto_sta = network.WLAN(network.STA_IF, network.WLAN_AUTO)
usb_sta = network.WLAN(network.STA_IF, network.WLAN_USB)
sdio_sta = network.WLAN(network.STA_IF, network.WLAN_SDIO)
spi_ap = network.WLAN(network.AP_IF, network.WLAN_SPI)

Corresponding constants:

Constant	Transport and Applicable Driver
`network.WLAN_AUTO`	Keep the currently available radio, otherwise select in the order SDIO, SPI, USB
`network.WLAN_USB`	AIC8800 USB
`network.WLAN_SDIO`	RTL8189FTV, RTL8733BS, Broadcom BCM43430A1, AIC8800, ESP-Hosted-FG/NG
`network.WLAN_SPI`	RW007, ESP-Hosted-FG/NG/MCU

This parameter selects the transport type, not the vendor model. Typically use WLAN_AUTO; only fix the type when multiple Wi-Fi devices coexist and the application genuinely depends on a specific bus. The current Python API cannot distinguish between two different models present on the same transport.

Connect and query the dynamic netdev:

import network
import time

sta = network.WLAN(network.STA_IF, network.WLAN_AUTO)
if not sta.active(True):
    raise RuntimeError("Wi-Fi device unavailable")

sta.connect("TEST", "12345678")
deadline = time.time() + 20
while not sta.isconnected() and time.time() < deadline:
    time.sleep_ms(200)

print(network.get_dev_list())
print(sta.netdev_name())
print(sta.ifconfig())

The network interface name is usually wlanN/wlanNap, but N is determined by probe order. Do not hardcode wlan0 in scripts.

Security Mode Limitations#

brcmfmac supports open networks and WPA/WPA2 Personal; WPA3-SAE is supported only when the firmware reports SAE capability. After switching Broadcom/Cypress modules or firmware, re-verify scanning, STA encrypted connection, SoftAP, and concurrent mode.
Realtek, legacy CYW43xx, and RW007 security modes depend on the vendor driver and module firmware; re-verify scanning, STA encrypted connection, and SoftAP when switching modules.
AIC8800 STA ordinary WPA/WPA2 Personal can be completed by the built-in authentication path; restricted WPA3-SAE uses group 19, and does not support SAE H2E and Enterprise/802.1X.
AIC8800 SoftAP supports open networks and WPA2-PSK/CCMP, and does not support WPA3, Enterprise, WPS, DFS/CAC, or dynamic VLAN.
The actual security capabilities of ESP-Hosted-FG are provided by the ESP firmware.
ESP-Hosted-NG can use the built-in ordinary WPA/WPA2 STA and open/WPA2 SoftAP paths; other security modes require a full user-space supplicant.
The actual capabilities of ESP-Hosted-MCU depend on the ESP chip, ESP-IDF, and slave compilation configuration.

Verification and Troubleshooting#

network.get_dev_list() has no WLAN: check whether the firmware enables the corresponding driver, interface power, SDIO host/REG_ON, RW007 SPI pins, AIC firmware files, or ESP transport ready logs.
Realtek not registered: verify the SDIO ID, and confirm whether RTL8189FTV or RTL8733BS is selected.
brcmfmac reports firmware or NVRAM missing: confirm /bin/firmware/brcmfmac exists in the image, and verify BRCMFMAC_BCM43430A1_NVRAM matches the actual board.
RW007 not registered: verify SPI bus, Mode 0, maximum frequency, CS, Reset, and INT/BUSY.
active(True) returns False: no device is currently available for the specified transport; first change to network.WLAN_AUTO.
AIC8800DC/DW/DL shows no driver for SDIO function: confirm the image contains the new AIC SDIO driver, and confirm that both functions c8a1:c08d and c8a1:c18d are enumerated.
AIC8800DC/DW/DL firmware initialization fails: check whether /bin/firmware/sdio/aic8800DC (when both USB and SDIO are enabled) or /bin/firmware/aic8800DC (SDIO only) is complete; if logs clearly show DPD calibration failure, also check power supply, reset timing, and the actual silicon revision.
AIC D40 connection rate is abnormal: check AIC8800_WIFI_USB_LIMIT_40MHZ.
ESP cannot initialize: prioritize checking firmware personality, SPI mode, checksum, pins, and HS/DR active level.
Associated but cannot access the network: first check whether ifconfig() has obtained a non-zero IP and gateway, then test the LAN gateway, and finally troubleshoot DNS and the public network.

The Python interface and complete examples are in network module API and wireless network examples.

Wi-Fi Driver and Device Selection

Contents

Wi-Fi Driver and Device Selection#

Overview#

Supported Solutions#

Default Board-Level Configuration#

Custom Firmware Configuration#

SDIO Common Board-Level Configuration#

Realtek RTL8189FTV/RTL8733BS#

Broadcom brcmfmac#

RW007#

AIC8800#

ESP-Hosted-FG/NG#

ESP-Hosted-MCU#

Python Device Selection#

Security Mode Limitations#

Verification and Troubleshooting#