D-Link DWL-520 (Wireless) working in 2.4 but not in 2.6

drache777 · 05-25-2006, 11:37 AM

*********************SOLVED*****************************

See final post for solution.

I'm running my Slackware 10.2 with recently updated 2.6 kernel.
Out of the box 2.4 (the default kernel for Slack 10.2) ran my wireless perfectly with a simple dhcpcd eth2. After building my 2.6.16.18 kernel, it doesn't detect my wireless as eth2 anymore. It gives an interface for wifi0 and wlan0, both of which are somehow connected.

I run

Code:

iwconfig wifi0 essid NETGEAR

and iwconfig returns that both of them are trying to hop on Netgear.

if I

Code:

 dhcpcd wifi0

, it doesn't connect.

If I

Code:

 dhcpcd wlan0

, it takes about 5 minutes for it to realize that nothing is happening and going back to a blank prompt.

Figure I've had some problem like this before, so I hop back to 2.4 and download version 1.4 of ndiswrapper (worked a long time ago back in slack 10.1 and newest ndiswrapper wouldn't compile). I go back to my 2.6 kernel, build, properly install my PRISMNIC.INF from the cd it is on, run the -m and -a commands for ndiswrapper and nothing is changed.

Code:

 ndiswrapper -l

returns that "prismnic driver installed, hardware present"

However iwconfig yields no different results and dhcpcd on either setup still leads to nothing. The 2.6 kernel doesn't really have an option for my outdated piece of a wireless card. It has similar drivers it appears, an Intersil Prism GT/Duette/Indigo PCI/Cardbus option is available. The list says that the only D-Link is the D-Link Air Plus Xtreme G A1 Cardbus Card aka DWL-g650. Which I do not have. The rest of that section does mention that

Quote:

If you enable this you will need a firmware file as well.
You will need to copy this to /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware/isl3890.
You can get this non-GPL'd firmware file from the Prism54 project page:
<http://prism54.org>
You will also need the /etc/hotplug/firmware.agent script from
a current hotplug package."

I also looked at prism54's page, my card isn't listed and it doesn't appear I can use that type of software anyway.

I'm a slight bit confused on why a newer kernel wouldn't support the same card.

Thanks you guys for any suggestions or anything, this is probably just something stupid I'm overlooking.

kaz2100 · 05-25-2006, 11:46 AM

Did you compile madwifi also?

drache777 · 05-25-2006, 12:26 PM

I just tried to compile madwifi-ng, it errors out pretty immediately. Gives me some output to this effect:

Code:

/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:24: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:25: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:26: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:27: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:28: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:29: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8[]'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:37: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:38: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:39: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:40: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:41: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:42: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:43: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8[]'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:137: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:138: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8[255u]'
/usr/src/linux-2.4.31/include/linux/ncp.h:174: warning: 'packed' attribute ignored for field of type '__u8'
make[3]: *** [ah_osdep.o] Error 1
make[3]: Leaving directory `/root/madwifi-ng/ath_hal'
make[2]: *** [_mod_/root/madwifi-ng/ath_hal] Error 2
make[2]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-2.4.31'
make[1]: *** [all] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory `/root/madwifi-ng/ath_hal'
make: *** [modules] Error 1

I suspected as much, I seriously don't think I have an atheros chipset anyway, unless that is implying that my D-Link uses their technology or something.

drache777 · 05-25-2006, 05:51 PM

Madwifi-ng didn't compile on 2.4 but it did compile and make install'ed fine on 2.6 but that doesn't seem to have done anything. Of course, I have no idea how to use madwifi though.

drache777 · 05-26-2006, 10:07 AM

*************SOLVED************************

cd 'd to ndiswrapper directory and ran

Code:

modprobe ndiswrapper

Code:

dhcpcd wlan0

Works fine and proper now. I knew it was something stupid I'd forgotten to do.