Hello I have a Toshiba laptop with a Microsoft (I know I Know) WiFi card. It has the prism 2 chipset. I am using Mandrake 9.0.
How do I get it to work?
I have read several post in this forum and have got some good information, but nothing that is complete.
Could someone take me through it step but step?
I am a novice Linux user.

Thanks in advance Erik

wow, I looked at an MS card the other day and tried for about 10 minutes to get it working... if you are certain its vanilla prism, we can hack together an entry for it that you can add to /etc/pcmcia/config and hopefully get it to force load the orinoco modules... I hope.

/sbin/cardctl ident

That'll give us the reading off of the card's identification so that we can trick cardmgr into loading the right modules.

Cheers,

Finegan

I did what you said
and it just said it was a Microsoft card.

I found this post in another web forum

"Just now I succeeded in using Microsoft's Wireless N/W hardware with RedHat Linux 8. The hardware I used: 1. Microsoft Wireless Notebook Adapter MN-520 2. Microsoft Wireless Base Station MN-500 I added the following to /etc/pcmcia/config : card "Microsoft Wireless Notebook Adapter MN-520 1.0.3" version "Microsoft", "Wireless Notebook Adapter MN-520", "", "1.0.3" bind "orinoco_cs" I configured this device as eth1 and entered the following for Wireless configuration: 1. Mode: Ad-Hoc 2. SSID Specified : my_wireless_network_name Channel : 11 (I am using 11) Transmit : 11Mbps Key : my_encryption_key (for 128bit) This is working great for me. This is very useful for anyone using dual boot (I am using XP and RHL 8). My Windows XP uses the same hardware. Now RHL also uses the same hardware"

But I don't know enough to hack through this to make it work. Any ideas?
maybe break it down step by step for a newbie?
I have Mandrake 9.0 not redhat.

thanks Erik

I can build a config file for you, can you either re-post that with the cut'n'paste in a {code} {/code} around it so the justification is kept in there. Just sub in the square brackets for the curly ones.

Cheers,

Finegan

OK the forum I go that post from looked just like that. But I will try to clean it up a bit

{code} (card "Microsoft Wireless Notebook Adapter MN-520 1.0.3" version "Microsoft", "Wireless Notebook Adapter MN-520", "", "1.0.3")
(bind "orinoco_cs")
I configured this device as eth1 and entered the following for Wireless configuration: 1.
(Mode: Ad-Hoc 2. SSID Specified : my_wireless_network_name) (Channel : 11 (I am using 11) Transmit : 11Mbps Key : my_encryption_key (for 128bit) {/code}



I hope this is helpful.

Okay, download this:

http://www.clockwatching.net/~fin/random/microsoft.conf

And add it to /etc/pcmcia/

Hard restart pcmcia with:

/etc/rc.d/init.d/pcmcia restart

If you hear two pretty much matched beeps, it loaded the module, look at the last ten or so lines of:

dmesg

and also check to see that hermes, orinoco, and orinoco_cs are listed under:

/sbin/lsmod

If everything looks good so far:

ifconfig eth0 up
iwconfig eth0 essid nameofyournetwork
iwconfig eth0 enc 123123213 (if you are using WEP)
dhcpcd eth0

Of course if you've got another ethernet device in here, then this thing probably got eth1, also you've got to do more or less all of this as root... more or less.

Cheers,

Finegan

thanks for all your help. It was easy once I was directed down the right path.

Here is a link that was helpful as well.

http://homepage.mac.com/cuddapah/wireless.html

Just for furture reference (so it appears in searches), I got bored and added on the manfid entires for two other prismX based cards that are the usual suspects: the WPC11v3 WPC11 version3 (same card, I'm seeding keywords), and the Netgear MA401RA Here's the conf:

www.clockwatching.net/~fin/random/lqhacks.conf

Stick that in /etc/pcmcia/ and you should be rock and roll.

Cheers,

Finegan

Good Idea, What ever helps us newbies