Hi,

I'm using Ubuntu 5.10 and have some strange problems occuring when using the wirless card. I've been unable to find any information pertaining to my problem pretty much anywhere...I've check Ubuntu's site, here, and googled for the problem with no luck. The card in question is an iblitzz model bwp612b ... but I cannot verify the exact model since the card doesn't have that information and the manufacturer's site is gone. I know the card is based upon the AdmTek 8211 chipset. The card works perfectly fine in Windows and Slackware 10.0. The driver being used for Slackware is different. It is the source code from AdmTek's site and for a 2.4 kernel. Ubuntu seems to have a driver in the 2.6 kernel named adm8211 that the card recognizes and likes. So, below is the problem(s) I'm having:

When the laptop boots up and the interface is activated it doesn't link with my router...the activity light blinks but the link light stays off. This causes Ubuntu to momentairily hang when trying to sync the time with ntp. When finally booted, firing up a terminal and bring the interface down via ifconfig eth0 down and back up via ifconfig eth0 up causes the card the link up. Other times, even that doesn't work and after I bring the card back up I need to issue an iwconfig eth0 essid xxx (where xxx is my router) and the card links. Sometimes, just sometimes, it "just works".

Now, most of the time even if I get the card to link it just means you are on borrowed time. Eventually you'll drop off and loose connectivity but the link light remains lit. The longest it has ever "just worked" has been 8 hours. Most of the time 30 minutes is considered great but the average is more like 10. Looking at the output of dmesg you can see that it is consistently timing out when trying to authenticate with the router. Pages upon pages of the same stuff. If the interface is left active long enough but can't link the laptop will freeze to the point you have to pull the plug. Also, looking at the output of iwconfig I see that the Link quality is low. Sometimes it is 15 or 17 or 23. A lot of the time it is 0. Putting the card in my other laptop running Slackware and the link quality is 100. It must be something different between the two drivers or some setting that I'm missing.

At any rate, I have no idea how to fix it. I'm starting to think that it is the module being used. Even though the module is the correct one, it just isn't working correctly. Then again, it could be a setting I'm missing. It is about enough to make me want to reload XP back onto the laptop. I'm enjoying Ubuntu though and if I could get past this one issue I'd be thrilled with it.

So, does anybody know how to go about making this work? Any help would be much appreciated. For the record, ndiswrapper will not work. Been there and done that with the Slackware laptop.

Thanks,
kmyst