Strange behaviour of Netgear WG511U on HP Omnibook XE3 GF

[branitar]

Before you try telling me to search first and look at the HOWTOs and stuff: I already did it.

I installed the pcmciautils, wpa_supplicant and I tried both the madwifi-driver and ndiswrapper with the windrivers.
The card is detected (shows up in ifconfig -a and iwconfig). But whenever I try starting it up (either via /etc/init.d/net.ath0 or via wpa_supplicant -D<ndiswrapper or madwifi> -iath0 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf -dd) or only try as much as removing and reinserting it it totally freezes up my system until I remove the card from the pcmcia-slot.

Any ideas? could be some problem with apci? (apm is not enabled)
Or have i missed some important setting?

[undrwater]

i've had a similar problem with an Orinoco card on the same laptop. I've gotten it started by loading nothing as default or boot except pcmcia. then do cardctl insert then do the init script /etc/init.d/net.ethx start.

I think it has something to do with the order that these things start, and possibly the chipset that these laptops use doesn't like the kernel driver.

Play around with the order that things start and see what you get.
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Open-mindedness is painful...

[branitar]

I tried it. But as soon as the yenta_socket and ath_pci (and related ath_* and wlan_* modules ) are loaded, my system freezes up.
If yenra_socket is loaded first it loads the other modules as soon as the card is inserted with pccardctl insert.
If yenta_socket is loaded last (even after all other modules are loaded) it crashes the system so i have to reboot to get it back working.
Are the ath_* and wlan_* modules created by the kernel, wpa_supplicant or even by the drivers? Is it possible that they are created by madwifi and I that I have to delete them in order to let ndiswrapper do its work?
Is there a possibilty at all to see which application (kernel, package, whatever) created a module?

[undrwater]

You know...most of those are kernel modules AFAIK, but I have them compiled into the kernel and run no modules.

I think I keep cardctl from running until the pcmcia init scripts have started. Really what worked for me was just messing around with which init started first.
_________________
Open-mindedness is painful...

[branitar]

well, i tried everything, even disabled coldplug and used pccardctl and then loaded all modulees by hand... but my system still froze up everytime. demsg gave me messages like "couldnt reset hardware..." or something like that.
i am using a different card now that is based on a prism54 chipset and it works fine (although it still doesnt connect to my router, but i guess thats an wpa_supplicant problem) so i guess its a problem of the driver with the atheros hardware.

[branitar]

Ok, I switched to a Prism54 based card (made by OvisLink) with the Wireless-Tools now everything works fine.
I guess i'll just wait half a year and then try again the WG511U with wpa_supplicant. Thanks for yourpatience.