Netgear MA311 Wireless Card - RH9
 

I can't quite figure out the problem, here's the situation.

The motherboard has a built-in Ethernet card. I installed the MA311 after installing Linux.

I loaded the orinoco_pci drivers, they list as being used by 1 device in /sbin/lsmod.

Doing a "dmesg | more" (I haven't read through every line) lists eth0, it doesn't look like the wireless card.

The Network Configuration GUI doesn't display any card options when I try a "New" command.

Those are the facts.

Ok, I'll need a bit more information. When you say you "loaded" the driver what, exactly did your do?

I use the MA311 myself, and I have used the orinoco_pci driver. It gives acceptable performance, but there is a better alternative.

While this isn't your card this may help:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...003/04/1/38274

Here is your card directly:

http://uug.byu.edu/pipermail/uug-lis...ay/003108.html

Cheers--
Charles

Here are the full details.

I loaded orinoco_pci using /sbin/modprobe orinoco_pci. /sbin/lsmod listed orinoco_pci, orinoco, and hermes as running, orinoco_pci was being used by 1 device.

Doing a /sbin/lspci, lists one network controller, "Harris Semiconductor Prism 2.5 Wavelan chipset" that looks right, and no ethernet controller.

dmesg | more shows the following at the very end:

Detected Orinoco/Prism2 PCI device at (gibberish)
Reset done......... (a bunch of dots)
Clear rest...... (even more dots)
pci_cor : reg = 0x0 - 6E34 - 6E02
divert: allocating divert_blk for eth0
eth0: Station identity 001f:0006:0001:0003
eth0: Looks like an Intersil firmware version 1.03
eth0: Ad-hoc demo mode supported
eth0: IEEE standard IBSS ad-hoc mode supported
eth0: WEP supported, 104-bit key
eth0: MAC address 00:09:5B:41:4F:72
eth0: Station name "Prism I"
eth0: ready
eth0: Channel out of range (0)!

Using the network configuration GUI still doesn't show anything.

But going to the Hardware Browser -does- show a Prism 2 Wavelan chipset using the orinoco_pci drivers.

And this computer cannot currently go online, I'm posting this from a Mac.

Adam :newbie:

I am sure you have tried this, but make sure that WEP on your access point is off and then do this in exactly this order (assuming that eth0 will be the interface, else change it acordingly):

/sbin/modprobe hermes
/sbin/modprobe orinoco
/sbin/modprobe orinoco_pci
ifconfig eth0 up
iwconfig eth0 essid nameofnetworkyour APbroadcasts

Cheers--
Charles

(PS. When you are ready to use the wlan-ng drivers instead, let me know! :))

Ok, I know why Linux wasn't detecting the Ethernet card, it's 'cause I disabled it, :) . It never registered in my head that the ROM BIOS affected both OS's, :rolleyes: .

However.

It's still not working, :). What is WEP exactly? Would I change that on the router? Currently our router is working with a bunch of Macs, so I'm not sure what's needed there.

Other then that, I've done everything you said cnjohnson, and I plan on looking at the wlan-ng drivers once I get it working.

Adam

Ok, well I don't even have these problems yet. Thats because I cannot find a linux driver for the Netgear MA311 anywhere. It is not on the CD and I haven't seen anyone posting any links for it anywhere on the internet. If you could help me out I'd really appreciate it.

The drivers I used are the orinoco_pci ones, they were back-hacked for the Netgear card. Doing a:

/sbin/modprobe/orinoco_pci

Should activate them, check with:

/sbin/lsmod

I don't know the link, but there should be a link in these forums to the wlan-ng project.

Ah. Well, if you use RPM's then you can go here for the RPM set. Use the set that matches both your version of Redhat, and the kernel version that you are running. If you use DHCP, you may not have to even edit any files after installation. If you manually assign an IP address to your machine, then you will have to edit at least one file. Read the docs carefully.

If you don't use Redhat, then you can go directly to the developer page for wlan-ng (you will find it here) and download the source code. You will need the kernel sources for your kernel properly installed and configured. If you haven't done that before, just ask.

In any event, the wlan-ng driver set is more functional than the orinoco set (IMHO, of course) even though many people use (and like) the orinoco set.

If you need any other help, just post.

Cheers--
Charles

Yeah, I've used those RPMs. I downloaded all the correct sets and still can't get the damn thing to work. It still fails at initialization during startup.

OK, I use a bunch of the these MA311's under Redhat 9, and they all work just fine; so, I'll need a bit more information to help you diagnose the problems. Sorry if this seems like a lot of questions, but I am shooting in the dark here.

Are you using DHCP?
Are you using WEP?
What is your Kernel version?
What is your architecture (386, 585, 686, Athlon).
What were the exact names of the RPM's you installed.
Did you edit the /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-wlan0 file?
Did you edit the /etc/wlan/wlan.conf file?
Did you edit any of the other files in /etc/wlan?
What, if anything, does dmesg show?
What does /var/log/messages show?

Cheers--
Charles

Is STA firmware present on MA311?
 

Hi,

Am I using this card on my MIPS board with PCI 2.1, which runs entirely a different OS (!linux ). I took linux-wlan-ng-0.2.1-pre9 code as reference & did parts of my Prism2 driver.

After PCI probe or init, I read the Card info (some of the RIDs), below is the result of the same:

hw: 1.0.0
Primary fw: 1.0.7
STA fw: RID not implemented

So, I assumed that the card did not have STA firmware & I ported the prism2_srec util of hostap driver to my platform. Then loaded the STA firmware (SF010306.HEX) using this ported util. After the STA fw was successfully downloaded into the card, I again read the Card info, this time the STA firmware version got updated to 1.3.6 & the Link LED started blinking at approximately 1Hz or less.

Then I reset the board & tried reading the Card info. The STA fw RID returned not implemented again <the downloaded STA fw is gone after hw reset>.

Questions:
1. Does MA311 from factory contain STA firmware in it?
2. When a NVWrite is done, does downloaded fw go into RAM? Is it because MA311 provide RAM (only) & not Flash (non-volatile memory)?
3. If all of the above said is true; then, each time the STA firmware needs to be downloaded into the Card (MA311). If so, How & when is such a thing done in the wlan-ng driver? The exact line of code.

Thanks,
-Mike.