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PCMCIA Wireless cards and laptops


Guest kyle
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Anybody got ANY wirless pcmcia card to work om a laptop.

 

I've tried the following

Netgear MA401 (not the 401RA) version

 

Suse 8.1 -- not even recognized

Mandrake 9.1 Rc2 hangs after 2 mins

Mandrkare 9 hangs after 2 mins

Red hat 8 and redhat phoebe (beta 8.1) not reconizes.

 

Belkin 11 mps wireless card -- same problem as Netgear -- I suspect it's using some sort of Prism II driver with mods that make it inoperable.

 

USR robotics 22 mps wireless card -- all above distros don't even recognize

 

 

Orinoco Gold card ----- Magic this one works

 

BUT ONLY ON redhat 8, phoebe and mandrake 9.0

 

 

On Mandrake 9.1 RC2 -- I want to use this as I like the snazzier KDE etc.

 

even with no card in the slot I get Memory fail CS or something like that and the system keeps issuing console messages

 

 

So I'm torn between Mandrake 9.1 which I like the look of and it works fine on my desktop and red hat phoebe which doesn't run as fast as mandrake (at least not on my laptop) but the wireless card works --- and I NEED the wireless connection.

 

 

Nearly Windows free -- at last.

 

The Orinoco gold card seems to be the one that causes least problems but it's sure difficult to source them in the UK

 

 

I won't be bothering with Suse again -- if I can't even get the install program to load properly what chance of the actual distro being OK.

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Guest dturley

I use a Linksys WPC11 card with MD 8.2. Just install the wireless tools rpm. The follwoing isntructions were given in an ealier thread, I'll repeat so them are linked with this thread.

 

Create /etc/pcmcia/linksys_wpc11.conf containing:

 

card "Linksys WPC11"

manfid 0x0274, 0x1613

bind "orinoco_cs"

 

Then edit /etc/pcmcia/wireless.opts to have a section for the card. I used the "generic" sample that was there and set:

 

ESSID="myESSID"

MODE="Managed"

KEY="my_26_character_key"

 

Match the settings to your AP, and you are set.

 

HTH

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Guest palmor

I'm using the the same netgear card that you tried (ma401) with Mandrake 9.1 (final version) and it works like a charm. I had the card in the laptop when I did the Mandrake install and it just worked. All I had to do of course was setup my networking properties (ip address etc).

 

Oh I'm using a Dell CPx PIII 500, nothing special at all.

 

 

Hope that helps

John

 

Edit: I had the same card working with Mandrake 8.1. I had too use the Orinoco drivers to get it to work.

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  • 4 weeks later...
Guest ndeb

I know of orinoco silver 11Mbps wireless pcmcia card that works fine with IBM laptop on redhat 8.0 and 9. Also, a friend reported that on his laptop (running mandrake 9.1), the same card worked out-of-the-box.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Guest ROCCY

for details look at my response to the topic about the Cisco 350 and TP 390E.

 

FWIW, I had even less trouble with a Cisco 340 (in at initial install - delightful shock to have it picked up ;-) and the Xircom re-badged version of it, CWE-1120 - worked "automagically" after I updated it with my SSID and WEP key.

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  • 2 months later...
Anybody got ANY wirless pcmcia card to work om a laptop.

 

I've tried the following

Netgear MA401 (not the 401RA) version

 

OK.... I've gotten the above card running under MDK SuSE etc etc etc.

 

For mandrake the Entry in /etc/pcmcia/config looked something like.

 

card "NETGEAR MA401 11Mbps 802.11 WLAN Card"

version "NETGEAR MA401 Wireless PC", "Card", "Version 01.00"

bind "orinoco_cs"

 

This won't work...... So I started fooling around and tried to take it straight from

 

# cardctl ident

 

and I got.

 

card "Netgear MA401RA Wireless PC"

version "NETGEAR MA401RA Wireless PC", "Card", "ISL37300P", "Eval-RevA"

bind "orinoco_cs"

 

As my new entry for the file. Replaced it as above in the config file and then... restarted PCMCIA ... and poof. It works and it works well. WOO HOO.

 

James :lol:

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http://www.linux-mandrake.com/en/hardware.php3

That's the Mandrake compatibility database.

 

Oh god!! I just am praying the wireless card i get with my school laptop next year is compatible!!!! **GULP**

 

If it isn't!!! nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo. Oh well, too early to worry now. If it doesn't work now it might in kernel 2.6.

 

Welcome Nightwriter!! We got another James here too now!

 

James

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