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I've just installed Slackware 12.2, and I'm trying to get my wireless connection going using wicd. It gets stuck at "obtaining IP address...", but it never gets the connection.
The network controller is "Broadcom Corporation BCM4328 802.11a/b/g/n"
It's using WEP encryption, and the passphrase is definitely correct. In advanced settings, I've checked "Use Encryption," and it is set to use WEP (Passphrase).
Any help with this would be very much appreciated.
It is possible that support for you is shakey at best; I had similar issues and decided it would be better to stick a new card in, ten quid and a two day wait
I do also have an ALFA Networks USB 500mw (USB wireless adapter card), but I'm not really sure how to begin installing the software to make it work. It came with a driver disc (with Linux support), but I'm very new to Linux, so I don't know how to use the files on the disc.
Any help?
Last edited by Innervision; 06-03-2009 at 11:13 PM.
these directions download the drivers needed for you nic card.
Quote:
It's using WEP encryption, and the passphrase is definitely correct. In advanced settings, I've checked "Use Encryption," and it is set to use WEP (Passphrase).
Can you look into your router to get the key? The WEP (passphrase) didn't work for me but the WEP (hex) did for wicd
lo no wireless extensions.
eth0 no wireless extensions.
lsusb
Code:
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 008 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 007 Device 003: ID 0a81:0101 Chesen Electronics Corp. Keyboard
Bus 007 Device 002: ID 0461:4d15 Primax Electronics, Ltd Dell Optical Mouse
Bus 007 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 0bda:8187 Realtek Semiconductor Corp. RTL8187 Wireless Adapter
Bus 001 Device 002: ID beef:0006
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 006 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Distribution: slackware64 13.37 and -current, Dragonfly BSD
Posts: 1,810
Rep:
I'm not entirely sure your version of the wifi card is supported by the b43 driver. It may be but in any case I believe Broadcomm have released a Linux driver that does support this card which is available here. There is also a README file there which will detail building the driver from the supplied source code. This may seem a little daunting at first but it's not really that hard. There's always the "old" way of doing things with ndiswrapper but I don't think this is necessary any more with Linux driver advances.
Wifi in general can be a real pain. Alien Bob's excellent wiki article is a standard source of information for setting up Slackware networks and is here.
From that link, it says it gives support for "Broadcom's IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n hybrid Linux® device driver for use with Broadcom's BCM4311-, BCM4312-, BCM4321-, and BCM4322-based hardware."
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 0bda:8187 Realtek Semiconductor Corp. RTL8187 Wireless Adapter
This adapter has been supported since the 2.6.27 kernel. Before that, ndiswrapper was necessary. I would type lsmod
to see if the rtl8187 driver is loaded because it may be conflicting with your broadcom card. You might want to try the rtl8187b and see if it works. You may not need the broadcom card. The rtl8187B works out of the box with the 2.6.27 or higher kernel.
Bob
Last edited by BobNutfield; 06-04-2009 at 01:50 PM.
What exactly am I looking for in lsmod? How would I remove that confliction?
,
Well, as it turns out, the rtl8187B is the wireless chipset I have in my Toshiba laptop. It works very well and supports both WEP and WPA. But, if you want to use the broadcom, remove the rtl8187 module. It will look like this when you run lsmod:
Code:
cfg80211 36436 2 rtl8187,mac80211
If you want to remove it, as root, run:
Code:
rmmod rtl8187
Then try to set up your broadcom card. If it works to your satisfaction, then you can blacklist the rtl8187 so that it does not reload at boot time. But, if you have the 2.6.27 (which you would with 12.2) or higher kernel, I would recommend trying the rtl8187B over the broadcom.
Bob
Last edited by BobNutfield; 06-04-2009 at 03:19 PM.
I haven't had luck with my wireless, so for me, the rtl8187 didn't work out of the box, as others have experienced. What would cause the difference? I'd like to get the rtl8187 working, since it seems to have the highest compatibility, and not use the Broadcom at all. So what can I do?
Code:
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 0bda:8187 Realtek Semiconductor Corp. RTL8187 Wireless Adapter
That's the display from lsusb, when my ALFA usb wireless card is plugged in, so I know that it's definitely detected.
Last edited by Innervision; 06-04-2009 at 04:41 PM.
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