problem in my wireless ipw2200

tredegar · 04-09-2007, 09:20 AM

Quote:

I use WEP.

Sorry, I did not notice this. (You know WEP is very insecure, don't you?)
You could try this:

Code:

# my wifi configuration
auto eth1
iface eth1 inet dhcp
wireless_essid HomeWLAN
wireless_key xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Are you able to use WAP?

Otherwise please try JimBass' suggestion.
I hope you get this fixed soon!

SuSE_Lamer · 04-10-2007, 04:53 AM

Hello everybody.

@JimBass: I use 26 HEX chars in my key.
@Tredegar: I know that WEP is insecure. But my decision to use WEP was "Linux"-driven - I used my first card with ndiswrapper and it was not WEP-capable. :-) So, thochoice was not very rich - nothing or WEP. What would you take? :-)

I have another idea: I searched the Web a bit, and found an interesting information. The ipw2200 had (some time ago) problems/bugs in its DHCP part - it could not get the IP address (I think, IPW2200-Project even posted a patch fo it). Can this be the explanation of my problem? The IPW2200-project claimed they had fixed it in the versions 1.0.7+, but I don't know exactly which verison is compiled in my actual kernel.

So, to find it out I would like to try to connect my WLAN card with fixed IP address. Can you give me a hint how I do it with iwconfig?

If this doesn't work, I will try to switch from WEP to WPA. I hope, I will not have to go that far! :-)

Regards,
Andrey

P.S. Another solution would be to compile my own module ipw220 from the freshest sources, but in this case I don't know how to enforce Linux/kernel to use MY (freshly compiled) modules instead of built-in ones? Any hint would be usefull...

Cheers and greetings from Europe,
A.

tredegar · 04-10-2007, 06:44 AM

Here's my interfaces file for static IP.

Code:

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
address 127.0.0.1
netmask 255.0.0.0

auto eth1
iface eth1 inet static
# Andrey, you'll need 192.168.0.255 on the next line
broadcast 10.255.255.255
# Andrey, you'll need something like 192.168.0.4 for your static IP
address 10.0.0.8
# Andrey, you'll need 255.255.255.0 on the next line
netmask 255.0.0.0
# Andrey, you'll need the IP address of your router (maybe 192.168.0.1? - please check)
# on the next line
gateway 10.0.0.2
# I am using WPA
# You'll probably need to have "wireless-key yourHEXkey" 
# on the next line as you are using WEP
wpa-passphrase mywpapassphrase
# You'll probably need to have "wireless-essid yourESSID" 
# on the next line as you are using WEP
wpa-ssid myssid
# And I am using channal 11, (my neighbours are on Ch 6)
wireless-channel 11

Hope this is of some help.

JimBass · 04-10-2007, 07:34 AM

I get DHCP on my ipw2200, so if there is a dhcp issue, it was fixed long ago, or just certain configurations have that problem. The ipw2200 has been in the main kernel since 2.6.15 or 2.6.16, and something like dhcp not working would have been fixed long ago.

If you're running Etch with it's default kernel, it would have detected your card during install, and you've have no need of the ipw2200-project, as it would be supported by the mainline kernel.

Encryption wise, the wpa-supplicant project (which exists in Debian repositories) supports doing WPA encryption. You don't have to change to it, but don't feel that you "need" to use WEP, because you don't.

If your 26 digit key matches the one shown on your router, then I can't image what the problem is. It still sounds to me like the keys are not identical, but I obviously can't see what the key is. If you try tredegar's static IP solution and that doesn't work, then it does appear that you have some other problem, like a bad key, or bad /etc/network/interfaces file.

Peace,
JimBass

nx5000 · 04-10-2007, 10:30 AM

I sometimes get some problems with dhcp and this card.

After making a lot of tries, I realized it's a conflict with ifup scripts and ifplugd (which I installed).
Using the gnome applet works (It does not use ifup, directly ifconfig)
Using ifup from command line does not work.

I didn't have the time to dig more. On a lot of networks it works but on one, it fails.
...
When I get bored, I put a fixed IP.

SuSE_Lamer · 04-10-2007, 02:55 PM

Hi, it's me again.

Thanks for all your hints, but meanwhile I'm ready to ask a an evil for the help. Today I read a couple of other sources and updated the kernel's modules. I installed module ipw2200 for the kernel 2.6.18 (which I use at the present instead of default Etch kernel). This changed the version of the driver from 1.1.2 to 1.2.0.

Afterwards I deleted the content of the /etc/network/interfaces file and tried to set up my connection using a tool of Gnome. With both static and dynamic IP - no way. :-(

Next I tried to configure the entries in /etc/network/interfaces file and use command line. No results either.

But I noticed two interesting things:
1) when I try to reach my access point/router via browser (192.168.0.1), it asks me for a admin's login/password (which is very normal) and then shows me a page saying that he could not connect to 192.168.0.1. I had to press F5/CTRL-R several times to come to the page;

2) when I ran iwconfig after failed attempts to connect, I saw the following:

Code:

tashkent:/home/andrey/bin# iwconfig
lo        no wireless extensions.

eth0      no wireless extensions.

irda0     no wireless extensions.

eth1      IEEE 802.11g  ESSID:"HomeWLAN"  
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 00:0C:F6:1C:07:0B   
          Bit Rate:54 Mb/s   Tx-Power=20 dBm   Sensitivity=8/0  
          Retry limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:7721-AC50-9211-C7D2-AA00-1112-13   Security mode:open
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=96/100  Signal level=-29 dBm  Noise level=-89 dBm
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:14  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

sit0      no wireless extensions.

Have you noticed those 14 packets with invalid crypt? Now I'm nearly 100% sure, that I simply cannot connect to the access point - even via browser (at least, immediately. After several attempts it works...). But why? Conflicts/bugs in the 80211-module? Default encoding of Etch - UTF-8 - doesn't match the encoding of router's software? But then why can I connect by simply pressing F5?

So, intermediate conclusions:
1) Etch see my card;
2) I use the freshest drivers/modules available (at least, for ipw2200. Should I update 80211 too?)
3) I can control the antenna - RF_KILL works;
4) I cannot reach my access point with DCHPDISCOVER and need several attempts to do it via Firefox.

Any ideas? :-) Is my firewall too restrictive? But eth0 (wired Ethernet) gets its IP address within seconds....

Regards,
Andrey.

P.S. I hope, you don't get bored by my stories... This card costed me already a lot of time. So, I think, I will get it working...

SuSE_Lamer · 04-10-2007, 02:57 PM

Yes, I know, I published my key openly. For me it doesn't play any role - I will change it later if necessary.

By the way: can a WEP-key contain letters?

A.

JimBass · 04-10-2007, 07:48 PM

Do you have the newest firmware for the card? Without the firmware, you can't do encryption - http://ipw2200.sourceforge.net/

Quote:

1) when I try to reach my access point/router via browser (192.168.0.1), it asks me for a admin's login/password

If you were prompted for a username/pass on that address, that means you had to be connected. That is a private address, and to reach it, you have to have either a static address on that subnet or one given to you by DHCP.

Quote:

Now I'm nearly 100% sure, that I simply cannot connect to the access point - even via browser

That seems like you're confusing some things. If you can reach the router's IP on a web browser, that means that all the underlying things that are important (wireless networking) are working. The browser tells you nothing, and doesn't do any connecting. What happens if you continuously ping the router? It should have 100% success.

Quote:

4) I cannot reach my access point with DCHPDISCOVER and need several attempts to do it via Firefox.

Once again, to reach your router in any way, all of the networking needs to be working. Firefox is the very last of many steps that makes communication possible. Firefox (or any browser) does not directly connect to anything, you need to have an address delivered or initiated by your machine on the same network segment to reach the router, or have your router forward your request for a connecting to a remote address. In any case, no local address for your computer means an inability to reach anything, including the local router. Since you have some connectivity (limited as it is), you're at least getting an address.

Quote:

By the way: can a WEP-key contain letters?

Absolutely. Letters and numbers are fine, capitalized and not. I don't think you can have symbols in a WEP passphrase, but everything else works.

Peace,
JimBass

SuSE_Lamer · 04-11-2007, 02:26 AM

Hello.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimBass

Do you have the newest firmware for the card? Without the firmware, you can't do encryption - http://ipw2200.sourceforge.net/

Sure. I downloaded it in the very beginning and placed in the /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware. There are 4 files (as you mentioned it earlier in this thread) and they have version 3.0

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimBass

If you were prompted for a username/pass on that address, that means you had to be connected. That is a private address, and to reach it, you have to have either a static address on that subnet or one given to you by DHCP.

That seems like you're confusing some things. If you can reach the router's IP on a web browser, that means that all the underlying things that are important (wireless networking) are working. The browser tells you nothing, and doesn't do any connecting. What happens if you continuously ping the router? It should have 100% success.

Once again, to reach your router in any way, all of the networking needs to be working. Firefox is the very last of many steps that makes communication possible. Firefox (or any browser) does not directly connect to anything, you need to have an address delivered or initiated by your machine on the same network segment to reach the router, or have your router forward your request for a connecting to a remote address. In any case, no local address for your computer means an inability to reach anything, including the local router. Since you have some connectivity (limited as it is), you're at least getting an address.

JimBass

I know that the browser is a very last step. I know, how DHCP works, and I know, what TCP is.

To be short: I have a router (with fixed IP 192.168.0.1), connected to my DSL modem. The router has 4 ports + WLAN capability. When I connect my notebook via cable (it doesn't matter where - under WinXP or under Linux), it gets an IP address within seconds (assigned by DHCP server running on the router). But WLAN does work under WinXP only.

The main point of my previous post was to tell you, that I have problems with accessing the router's control center with browser under Linux. Under WinXP I enter my login/password and that's all, I'm there. In Linux (GNOME) I have to enter login/password (you are right, this mean I'm already connected to it), but authentification fails. And I need to press F5 several times to reach the control center. And I would like to know why. I think, what I enter from the keyboard (password in browser or WEP key in the command line) IS NOT what router gets.

I know, this is already far from ipw2200, and I'm ready to move the discussion to another forum/thread (if moderators will insist on it). But I'll be very happy to get the asssitance of the community, because I have doubts if I can resolve the issue by myself.

I will try to find something on the Web, but any hint/help is welcome.

Regards,
Andrey.

P.S. A couple of words to my background: I'm an IT engineer, I worked 2 years in the area of TCP/IP networking and another 2 years as web-developer. So, I really know how network's components play together. :-) And I work with Linux for more than 5 years already.

nx5000 · 04-11-2007, 10:12 AM

Quote:

but authentification fails. And I need to press F5 several times to reach the control center.

Authentication fails means it tells you that authentication fails or nothing? Are you sure that authentication fails or is it a network problem?
Seems funny that authentication fails and then pressing F5 allows the authentication??
I also hope you are not getting pages from the cache!

Can you try with epiphany browser?
And make all your test without WEP, damned complication!
You probably have a wired connection, try to login with this connection (look if the F5 trick also does something) and remove that WEP. Then make a lot of tests and then add functionnality..

This thread is too long for other people to help you (I'm not saying that JimBass and tredegar won't manage but just to get the attention from all members that you deserve)
You are also "hijacking" a thread from someone else. Would be better to open a new thread.
_In_my_opinion_

SuSE_Lamer · 04-12-2007, 02:35 PM

Hello everybody!

Quote:

Originally Posted by nx5000

Authentication fails means it tells you that authentication fails or nothing? Are you sure that authentication fails or is it a network problem?
Seems funny that authentication fails and then pressing F5 allows the authentication??
I also hope you are not getting pages from the cache!

Can you try with epiphany browser?
And make all your test without WEP, damned complication!
You probably have a wired connection, try to login with this connection (look if the F5 trick also does something) and remove that WEP. Then make a lot of tests and then add functionnality..

1) I HAVE wired connection and I USE this connection from the very first day. Actually, I installed Etch using that connection;
2) when I enter my login and password for the router, the browser - Firefox or Epiphany - shows me in the window header (that blue line, which every window has) the right name - SITECOM WLAN router - but the content is not rendered (showing several reasons like server is too busy, network problems or rejected connection). When I press F5, I see it. The network problems are impossible - at the same time I can work in the Internet. "Server too busy" in the case of WLAN router sounds quite weak, doesn't it? :-) So, we have authentification left...

So, yesterday I switched off WEP and could connect to my router. Very easily and smoothly. And I really think, that there are certain issues - I don't know exactly which ones - with encoding of the data which is sent from my host. I don't know if it has anything to do with locales, but at the present I know that my network card is working properly.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nx5000

This thread is too long for other people to help you (I'm not saying that JimBass and tredegar won't manage but just to get the attention from all members that you deserve)
You are also "hijacking" a thread from someone else. Would be better to open a new thread.
_In_my_opinion_

Since this issue is not networking-related, I'm going to start a new thread in another forum - about general configuration of the system or in the Debian-related forum. I hope, we will find solution soon. I think, that the issue is resolved as soon as I can connect to my router in the browser with a very first attempt.

Thanks a lot for your help and I hope to see you on my new thread! ;-)

Cheers,
Andrey