hello. Just trying to get a dwl-650+ to start on my libranet2.8 laptop. I am using the Acx100 driver and have it inserted but the card won't connect to my access point for some reason. Have tried using iwconfig to set ap, essid, channel, key and others but still can't get it. any help would be greatly appreciated.

Speaking of open source, which driver (kernel module) are you using, and from where?

like i said i am using the acx100 driver from http://acx100.sourceforge.net/
i just can't get the card configured right

oh and i am using the 2.4.20 kernel... sorry

Actually there are 2 drivers out there for this chipset, one is the project on sourceforge the other is the "leaked" binaries which came out earlier, this is why I asked.

Other than complete misconfiguration of the card, which doesn't sound like your problem, the problem may that your card has a different radio in it and thus needs different firmware in the acx100/firmware directory prior to compilation, check out this post: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...452#post446452
I've also found that v0.1h is far superior to v0.1g, in that you no longer get the degradation of the connection over time.

hey... i still can't get anything going. I followed what was in the other post and downloaded the latest acx100 driver (version "h") and can't get it to configure or compile. When I run make or make config in the source directory i get errors.

here is what I get when i run make:

here is what i get when i run make config

I read the readme and this is what it said to do but still I have trouble. I just really have no clue what to do. I think that by using libranet a few things are hairy and I don't know how to workaround.

you need to install the kernel source, then the module should compile without incident, if you're using kernel 2.4.20, you can try downloading the pre-compiled module for slackware 9, which is also 2.4.20, from this little howto page I put together for that chipset: http://www.houseofcraig.net/acx100_howto.php

I should add that this module may not work for you depending on how different the libranet's config for their kernel is from slackware's, if your pcmcia_core and friends were compiled as modules, then it should work, if they were compiled-in, It may work, it may not.

Hey. I followed your howto. Got all the way to loading the module and checking it. I did lsmod | grep acx100_pci like you state, but it returned nothing... so i did tail -n 20 /var/log/messages and it returned among other GOOD things and
I proceeded to setting up card variables like ip,key, etc... thinking those errors might be able to be ignored. I set it all up and tried to ping the router and nothing... tried iwconfig eth1 essid my_essid many times to no avail.

I did tail -n 20 /var/log/messages after all this and it gave me things like:
GSTWLAN0: The wirless driver starts ok!
Set Mode: 2
Transmit authentication request!
Transmit association request!
Associated!

I am so close. What the hell...

It looks like you've got the binary driver somehow, it's the "leaked" binary, look for a module somewhere under /lib/modules with acx100 and "sta" in it. Those log messages are definitely from the leaked binary, not from the open source driver. Do an lsmod and see which module is loaded, it's going to have acx100 and "sta" in it. Do a cardctl eject and then rmmod that module, remember it's name as listed by lsmod and add it's name to the /etc/hotplug/blacklist file, this will stop it from loading for your dwl-650+, then if all else has gone well, when you plug your card back in the open source module should get loaded.

Let me add this: the leaked binary works for my cards, the firmware that was embedded in it happens to work with the radio in my cards. According to the post I linked to above, it does *not* work for the dwl-650+, which apparently has a different radio chip in it, it will appear to be associated and show all good in iwconfig but will never transmit, so you've got to go with the open-source driver, where both radios are represented, that's why the firmware you downloaded has both the RADIO0d.BIN and RADIO11.BIN files in it.

hey... you were right... the binary driver was my first attempt at this fiasco and it was obviously causing problems... so i did what you said... ejected the card... rmmod'ed the binary driver, put it on the blacklist and tried pluggin in the card again... BUT... for some reason the hotplug system doesn't load the open-source driver when i plug it in. I tried to do it myself w/ a modprobe but it returns: can't locate module acx100_pci.o. It is definately there, in /lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/net. I have tried updating module dependencies w/ depmod -A like you said before, but still nothing. I even tried gziping the module to no avail. WHAT IS MY DEAL, I am at the point where i think i am retarded.

Does a "grep acx100 /lib/modules/`uname -r`/modules.pcimap turn up a couple of lines with the driver? If not, do depmod -a, (not -A), this will take a good bit longer then -A, which is not working for you for some reason.

ya. when i do grep acx100 /lib/modules/`uname -r`/modules.pcimap it returns two lines w/ acx100_pci in them. and when i try depmod -a it returns:
what does this mean?

I have few modules that generate that error and yet still work, so it may still work for you, on the other hand this may mean that the module needs to be compiled locally, ie: on your machine. Does modprobe still not find the module? How about a "modinfo acx100_pci?

Oh, almost forgot this, those unresolved symbols may be references to things in the firmware files (the .BIN files) do you have the proper options line listing their location in your /etc/modules.conf?

hey i am gonna try compiling the driver on my machine. In your howto it says to have kernel source installed. How might i go about this on my machine (libranet). I have a file named "kernel-source-2.4.20.tar.bz2 in my /usr/src directory... is this what I should use?