Baffling wireless card problem

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

I've poured over tons of relative material and I still can't get my wireless card to work. I have a Dell Inspiron 8200 with a TrueMobile 1150 wireless card. My home network uses eth0. I've tried and followed all kinds of postings here and tips and guides elsewhere. At one point, it would actually give me 2 high beeps -- It doesn't even do that any more. I'm at a complete loss, any help would be greatly appreciated.

Sven Vermeulen · Posted: Fri Jan 24, 2003 7:30 am Post subject:

First make sure that all your pcmcia-configuration scripts/files are back how they were before. There have been too much occasions that ppl first try to solve their problems on their own (which is good) but forget the changes they made and thus made it impossible to have it working again.

Second, make sure the PCMCIA bus is detected. It should be noticeable in dmesg, or in /proc/bus/pcicard. Also make sure you have cardmgr running. This is the daemon that will notice that the pcmcia-card is inserted, and will load the appropriate module.

You can run cardmgr by just issuing it. It will automatically go in the background.

Insert the WLAN-card. If cardmgr doesn't find the appropriate module, it should emit a high-pitch beep and a low-pitch one. If it does find the appropriate module, 2 high-pitch beeps will be emitted.

If this doesn't happen (as you mentioned) try loading the wlan-module for your card manually. Checkout google.com/linux or other sources to know what the module is actually called.

If this doesn't help: what are the error msg's you get (anywhere)? What PCMCIA driver version are you using (cardctl -V)?

And with errors, not only the ones produced on the terminal/console, but also those in the logfiles (/var/log/messages depending on how you configged your syslogger) and dmesg.

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

How can I revert my scripts/files to their original state?

As for dmesg,

Linux PCMCIA Card Services 3.2.3
kernel build: 2.4.20 unknown
options: [pci] [cardbus] [apm]

cs: memory probe 0xa0000000-0xa0ffffff: clean.
init_module: prism2_cs.o: 0.1.16-pre7 Loaded
init_module: dev_info is: prism2_cs
prism2_cs: CardServices release does not match!
p80211.o: 0.1.16-pre7 Unloaded

By the way, my wireless card is built-in. I have tried using the wlan drivers, but that hasn't helped me any either. Also, how do I know what I should be using for nameservers, I'm trying to use wireless with dhcp.

heijs · Posted: Fri Jan 24, 2003 9:03 pm Post subject:

Did you compile PCMCIA in the kernel or as a kernel module or did you use the PCMCIA-cs modules?

If you did one, try the other modules

I hope this helps...

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

The PCMCIA bus is detected and cardmgr is running. I've even gone so far as to reinstall Gentoo; I still get the same problem. I have tried manually loading each module that can work with my card - wavelan_cs, wvlan_cs, and orinoco. I am using PCMCIA driver v3.2.3. I don't have PCMCIA compiled in the kernel. Also, when cardmgr starts, it seems to load hermes, orinoco, and orinoco_cs.

CrimsonScythe · Posted: Thu Feb 06, 2003 3:48 am Post subject:

cwizman:
I had a very similar problem, and read my a$$ off to find a remedy. My problem, however, turned out to be a rather strange one: as a last try, I swapped the antenna cable to the other connector on the card and voila, it worked!

Anyway, hopefully you have the 1150 card (there are no drivers for the 1180 card). To check if you in fact have the 1150 card, as root do this:

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

I do have three entries that say "CardBus bridge". I have, at one point in time, been able to load the modules (hermes, orinoco, orinoco_cs), but now I can't load orinoco_cs. Also, whenever I try to "use" eth1 or wlan0, it gives me an error about device not found. Any information about what kind & version kernel, built-in or pcmcia-cs modules, or how you get it to "see" eth1, would be very helpfull. Thanks!

CrimsonScythe · Posted: Fri Feb 07, 2003 8:12 am Post subject:

Good to hear! This is my important enabled setting in the kernel:
Network device support -> Wireless LAN (non-hamradio) -> Wireless LAN (non-hamradio) (CONFIG_NET_RADIO)

Note: I have NOT General Setup->PCMCIA/CardBus (CONFIG_PCMCIA) support enabled! That is taken care of by emerging pcmcia-cs after building the kernel. Emerging pcmcia-cs will also provide you with the hermes, orinoco, and orinoco_cs modules!

All you do next, is to include this in your /etc/modules.autoload file:

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

I've done what you suggested and found that it doesn't seem to find my eth1 at boot-up. I looked at dmesg and found no such information as you suggested. Also I can't seem to load orinoco_cs. I'm completely confused!

CrimsonScythe · Posted: Sat Feb 08, 2003 3:35 am Post subject:

Weird! I have to say it doesn't sound good. Are you able to load other modules? (I know, stupid question.) Is the card properly snapped into the slot? What kernel are you running?

-- Thomas
_________________
If we weren't supposed to eat animals, then why are they made of meat?

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

Every thing else (besides a second mouse via USB) works perfectly. The card is an internal Truemobile 1150, so it should be properly snapped into the slot

. I'm running the gentoo kernel 2.4.20.

CrimsonScythe · Posted: Sat Feb 08, 2003 4:11 am Post subject:

OK

I'm running a Vanilla sources 2.4.19-r10 kernel, because the gentoo sources kernel gave me a LOT of ext3 errors. (With every reboot.)
Do you know if the cardmanager gets properly started? If not, I guess the card won't show up... And do you know if there is any chance the card or bus is damaged?

-- Thomas

(BTW, what's the problem with the mouse?)
_________________
If we weren't supposed to eat animals, then why are they made of meat?

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

If I type cardmgr, I get a message 'device or resource busy'. If I type cardctl ident, I get a message 'TrueMobile 1150 Series PC Card ... Function: 6 (network)'. I'm guessing that cardmanager is loading correctly, right? Also, I've had this laptop for only 4 months, so that card shouldn't be damaged. Plus, (awhile back), I had the card working on slackware, but I haven't got the slightest clue how I did it. As for the kernel, a few days ago I was running vanilla 2.4.20, so I don't think it's anything specifically related to the Gentoo kernel.

As for the mouse (remember I'm running a Dell laptop), I wanted to occasionally use my USB mouse with it. I tried to set it up as the second mouse - it didn't work. Funny though, it works as a second mouse when I use my USB-PS2 converter!

CrimsonScythe · Posted: Sat Feb 08, 2003 4:41 am Post subject:

Hmm... I get:

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

This is an abbreviated output for insmod orinoco_cs:

unresolved symbol orinoco_reinit_firmware
unresolved symbol __orinoco_down
unresolved symbol __orinoco_up

As for your mouse tip, I'm currently recompiling my kernel, so I'll try that later.

CrimsonScythe · Posted: Sat Feb 08, 2003 4:58 am Post subject:

Which pcmcia-cs is it that you have? I have 3.2.1-r3. Maybe this is a pcmcia-cs vs kernel issue?

-- Thomas
_________________
If we weren't supposed to eat animals, then why are they made of meat?

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

My pcmcia-cs version is 3.2.3-r1. I have also tried it with and without the pcmcia-cs-drivers.

CrimsonScythe · Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2003 6:29 am Post subject:

Have you tried to downgrade to pcmcia-cs 3.2.1-r3? At least just for the fun of it?

--Thomas
_________________
If we weren't supposed to eat animals, then why are they made of meat?

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

After months (literally!!), I have FINALLY gotten my wireless card to work in Gentoo!

My problems primarily resided with configuring the kernel properly. During the numerous times I installed pcmcia-cs, I never really paid much attention to the little message it displayed after it finished installing. I happened to see it, so I read it and followed it carefully. I removed the PCMCIA/Cardbus support from GENERAL, made sure Wireless Lan/Non Hamradio was on, and unchecked the modules underneath that Wireless Lan section. (I think my problem was having either some modules "on" or having the PCMCIA turned on). After that, it still gave me a high-beep -> low-beep. But, I saw that it was loading prism2_cs when it loaded cardmgr. I dug around in my "/etc/pcmcia" files and changed "prism2_cs" to "hermes", "orinoco", "orinoco_cs". That got me two high beeps

. The network STILL didn't work. After about an hour of digging around and trying numerous things (won't get into that :wink:

), I removed the lines corresponding to eth1 in my "/etc/conf.d/net" file except for iface_eth1="dhcp". And, finally, the wireless network came to life!!

Thanks for all your help!

cwizman · n00b Joined: 28 Nov 2002 Posts: 29

I got the USB mouse to work too. It must be my lucky day!

CrimsonScythe · Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2003 2:32 am Post subject:

Good to hear

Yeah, I mentioned that I had no pcmcia support compiled into the kernel

The stuff you had to do in /etc/pcmcia was done automatically on my computer, thanks god...

I also had a great day! I had problems with a randomly crashing xfree and got it solved

-- Thomas
_________________
If we weren't supposed to eat animals, then why are they made of meat?