Strange problem: wireless connection + ndiswrapper

[jubilee33]

First of all, thank you all for the very helpful instructions, tips and tricks. I used Mandrake Linux 9.0-9.2 a few years before and then stopped using it after I changed a notebook. Now I am using a Dell Inspiron 600m with Windows XP and Mandriva 2006 dual boot. I am still a newbie and have been really confused about the wireless connection problem.

 

My network card is Intel PRO/Wireless 2100 3a pci adapter and is working perfectly fine in Windows so there is no hardware failure. I read through ndiswrapper installation notes and many other sites and had no problem getting the driver to work. The network card is strangely recognized as 2100 3b but the driver is properly installed and the card recognized by Linux. And I had no problem using iwlist and iwconfig for all the configurations. Everything seems to be fine. I also used all of beesea's instructions on how to get wireless working with ndiswrapper (https://mandrivausers.org/index.php?showtopic=14972) and wlan0 is recognized, brought up at boot, AP found, essid and open WEP key properly set up. But there is no connection. Whenever I try to connect, nothing happens. I tried to ping the router and I got "network is unreachable". That's the only error I can see now after two days of struggle. I am already completely at a loss as to where to begin the investigation. If anyone can give me a little hint or help, maybe I am missing something really important here, I would really appreciate your help.

 

Thank you!

[ianw1974]

First, find out if the interface has an ip assigned:

 

ifconfig

 

network unreachable if you have an ip assigned, is normally due to problems with wep/wpa and the encryption not working correctly. I normally start with unsecured connections, and then add wep/wpa later. Makes it easier for making sure that wireless is working, before you complicate things by adding additional security.

[pmpatrick]

Also, when using ndiswrapper, WEP 128bit won't work for certain cards whereas WEP 64bit seems to work well for most. Finally, I think that card has a native linux driver available; if so you wouldn't need to use ndiswrapper. Something to investigate if you can't get it going. I suspect disabling WEP will get it working and WEP 64bit will probably work as well.

[jubilee33]

First, find out if the interface has an ip assigned:

 

ifconfig

 

network unreachable if you have an ip assigned, is normally due to problems with wep/wpa and the encryption not working correctly. I normally start with unsecured connections, and then add wep/wpa later. Makes it easier for making sure that wireless is working, before you complicate things by adding additional security.

 

 

I tried ifconfig and the result wasn't good. There was no assigned ip. I got 127.0.0.0 so I tried to assign an ip address but it stayed only for a second then it disappeared. Should I use MCC to create a wireless connection at all? In the wizard, I noticed there were two options available in terms of the driver for the network card. One was recognized as wlan0 (ipw2100) and the other was "use the driver with ndiswrapper". I tried both. Using ndiswrapper would not proceed to the end anyway because I got an error telling me that ndiswrapper wasn't functioning right (if this is indeed important, I will try it again and post the exact error message). So I ended up using iwconfig and the recognized wlan0 driver in the wizard. I can almost feel that there must be something amiss in what I did.

 

How can I assign an ip address correctly? I also tried using static ip in the wizard but it didn't help.

 

 

Also, when using ndiswrapper, WEP 128bit won't work for certain cards whereas WEP 64bit seems to work well for most. Finally, I think that card has a native linux driver available; if so you wouldn't need to use ndiswrapper. Something to investigate if you can't get it going. I suspect disabling WEP will get it working and WEP 64bit will probably work as well.

 

If I can find a native linux driver for the card, do I have to uninstall the current one used with ndiswrapper first? I will try disabling the WEP key if necessary. Also, should I disable the other Broadcom network card (wired and not used at this moment)? If so, how can I make sure that it won't come back? I already stopped it from loading at startup and deleted it in MCC but it reappeared in 2 minutes.

 

Thank you all!

[ianw1974]

You can easily make sure the ethernet (wired) doesn't come back, by doing an ifconfig to find out what interface it is, maybe eth0. Then go to:

 

/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts

 

and find the corresponding ifcfg-eth0 file or whatever the device is (eth1, eth2, etc). Edit the file and change:

 

onboot=yes

 

to:

 

onboot=no

 

then it'll never load, but you'll still have it available if you decide to use it at some point.

 

If you want to use the native driver, just remove ndiswrapper:

 

urpme ndiswrapper

 

and then configure accordingly.

[jubilee33]

Thank you Ian! Sorry for getting back late. I actually reinstalled Mandriva 2006 and did everything all over again very carefully. I encountered the same problem. This time it was a little different, though. When I used ifconfig, I cannot see wlan0. But when I booted Linux, wlan0 was brought up okay (verbose) and iwlist showed the correct ESSID, and other settings. How can I get to see wlan0 in ifconfig? (When I used ifconfig -a, I did see wlan0.) What's the different between ifconfig and ifconfig -a?

[ianw1974]

The -a command with ifconfig shows all interfaces, although normally it should have shown wlan0 if the device was up.

 

Can you post the results of the ifconfig -a but just the wlan0 results, so we can see if the interface is actually up correctly.

[jubilee33]

Sorry for getting back to you so late again. My another notebook just died on me completely and I bought a new one and the installation and everything took a couple of days.

 

Anyway, here is the result of "ifconfig -a" for wlan0 only.

 

wlan0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:04:23:8F:5B:42

BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1

RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0

TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0

collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000

RX bytes:0 (0.0 b ) TX bytes:0 (0.0 b )

Interrupt:5 Memory:fafef000-faff0000

 

I hope this will shed some light on this problem. I also have encountered the wireless connection problem in the new notebook that I just set up. I will post the question in "networking" since it is more appropriate, I suppose. Thank you very much.

Edited August 19, 2006 by jubilee33

[ianw1974]

The interface doesn't seem to be up, try:

 

ifup wlan0

 

but also, check /etc/modprobe.conf and add this line if it doesn't exist already:

 

alias net-pf-10 off

 

it disables ipv6 which is a common problem for network link problems.

[Ixthusdan]

Just out of curiosity, and certainly nothing against cli, but why are you not using MCC? I have used the wireless setup in MCC on several notebooks, both with native drivers and ndiswrapper, and it actually works! There are 2 steps. One must configure the adapter and then configure the connection. If done in this order, the gui works fine. My own notebook uses ndiswrapper, and the problem I encounter is anytime I hit the "wireless off" button by accident, I must manually restart the network. Otherwise, it runs fine.

[jubilee33]

Yes, I have tried both cli and mcc. I have encountered the same problem. I will try what Ian suggested and see what happens. At this point I do need someone to troubleshoot with me step by step as I don't know what else to do or where else to look. Thank you.

[jubilee33]

I already added the line in modprobe.conf. And below is the result when I tried "ifup wlan0".

 

ifup wlan0

 

SIOCSIFFLAGS: No such device

 

Determining IP information for wlan0...SIOCSIFFLAGS: No such device

SIOCSIFFLAGS: No such device

 

When I installed ndiswrapper I was in super user mode. I can only use "ndiswrapper -l" to check the status of the driver under superuser mode. The result was "hardware present, driver installed." Does this matter?

 

Which steps of the installation instruction (Ndiswrapper Installation) have to be done under superuser?

Edited August 20, 2006 by jubilee33

[ianw1974]

I usually do all steps under superuser, the best way to configure it really. What chipset is your card in your machine? Seems a little odd the interface isn't coming up.

 

First, do an lsmod and make sure ndiswrapper is loaded, if not, do:

 

modprobe ndiswrapper

 

then try bringing the wireless link up.

[jubilee33]

My chipset is Intel PRO/Wireless LAN 2100 3B Mini, which is strangely recognized as 2100 3A in Windows.

 

I did an lsmod and I saw ndiswrapper in the list but I wasn't sure whether it was actually loaded because it was used by 0 (what does it mean??). So I did "modprobe ndiswrapper" anyway. But I wasn't able to bring wlan0 up. I got the same result like yesterday, "no such device".

 

I used a driver that was made by IBM with the same pci id (8086:1043) and the chipset was Intel PRO/Wireless 2100 3B mini. I just saw a driver for Intel PRO/Wireless 2100 3A mini but the pci id didn't match at all. Do you think I should try this one out?

 

Or do you have another suggestion for me to continue troubleshooting (since the driver was already properly installed and recognized)?

[ianw1974]

Usually it's best to match the pciid, although I've never really done this myself. Mine is an atheros chipset ar5211 or something like that. All I did was download the driver for this card, and it just worked. I never checked the pci id to see if it matched anything in the ndiswrapper list.

 

So, I'd say, give it a go. You've nothing to lose and it could work. There's been a lot of people having problems trying to get the intel ones working, and most seem to use the native drivers, than the ndiswrapper ones but seems they can be a pain in the butt to get working, regardless of native or ndiswrapper.