Dennis HilkLinux diagnosticsDE

Wi-Fi adapters

MediaTek MT7921 USB family

An MT7921 family over USB, sharing firmware names with the PCIe family while using a different host transport.

Editorial source review: Share public profileOpen in the identification tool
On this page
  1. Overview & identity
  2. Driver & binding
  3. Firmware
  4. Read-only diagnostics
  5. Limitations & related issues
  6. References

Overview & identity

The curated USB identity is 0e8d:7961. It is a checked family candidate and does not name a unique marketed adapter.

Curated identifiers
usb 0e8d:7961

A numeric match establishes a candidate family within the reviewed evidence. Marketing names, board variants, subsystem conditions and successful operation remain separate questions.

Driver & binding

mt7921u is the USB candidate; the source entry additionally matches interface ff/ff/ff. It must not be substituted by the mt7921e PCIe transport.

  • mt7921u — kernel driver/module candidate

Detected, bound, operational: learn the difference

Firmware

Host-loaded firmware required

Names are copied only as short source-backed identifiers. They are not an installation recipe; verify the exact host request and successful loading.

Checked examples or filename branches, not a complete installation list:

  • mediatek/WIFI_RAM_CODE_MT7961_1.bin
  • mediatek/WIFI_MT7961_patch_mcu_1_2_hdr.bin

Inspect firmware packaging on your distribution

Read-only diagnostics

Run one displayed command at a time. Replace uppercase placeholders with the affected device, interface or module from your own output. Commands are never executed here. Read-only output can still contain private identifiers.

Read USB interface binding

lsusb -t

Locate the port of this adapter in the USB tree. Driver identifies an interface binding; a vendor/device pair alone does not. Reading the tree normally needs no root privileges.

Read firmware metadata

modinfo -F firmware MODULE

Replace MODULE with mt7921u or the actual candidate module in your report. Metadata lists declared filenames; it does not prove a file was loaded. This query needs no root privileges.

Read existing Wi-Fi association

iw dev INTERFACE link

Replace INTERFACE with the wireless interface from iw dev. Association and rate are observations, not a throughput or firmware test. This query normally needs no root privileges.

Limitations & related issues

USB product 0e8d:7961 and PCI 14c3:7961 are different bus identities despite the shared device number. Neither identifies a unique retail enclosure.

These guides are linked for relevant observations, not as known defects of every device in this family.

Choose a hardware diagnostic workflow · Inspect a log excerpt in Fix Lab

References

Source review records a checked implementation or document, not a reproduced hardware test. Version-specific tables do not establish a minimum kernel or guaranteed operation.