Are you sure the hotspot is running from the dongle and not the on-board wifi? I'm using a Raspberry Pi 4B (8GB) in a heavy metal case, which weakens the 5ghz wifi signal to almost nothing. I have some USB 3.0 devices plugged in that jam the 2.4ghz signal. So I'm trying to use an external dongle (Panda PAU09N) to give me a reliable 5ghz connection. In wifi mode (connected to my router), it works fine. But when I try to switch back to hotspot (AP) mode, the output from the dongle stops, and I am left with only the very weak 5ghz signal that barely escapes the metal case.

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