Trying it again: Prism2 PCMCIA 802.11b card refuses to work in laptop

Electrode · 01-13-2003, 03:37 PM

Well, I've decided to try once again to get my 802.11b PCMCIA card to work in Linux on my laptop. I've never been able to get it working, always getting error messages that make no sense. The fact that the card is completely functional both in one of my desktop boxes under Linux, and in the laptop running Windows, keeps bringing me to this point.

To start, here's the hardware info:

System: Compaq Armada 7750MT laptop (Pentium MMX 166, 144 MB RAM)
OS: Slackware Linux 8.1, kernel 2.4.20 w/ xfs and preempt-kernel patches
PCMCIA cards: D-Link DWL-650 (doesn't work), NEC-based USB 2.0 card (works)

Right now, I'm using the latest orinoco_cs driver, although I've also tried the hostap_cs, samsung binary, and wvlan_cs drivers to no avail. dmesg contains no useful info, but in the boot messages I see this:

Code:

cardmgr[50]: socket 0: D-Link DWL-650
cardmgr[50]: executing: 'modprobe hermes'
cardmgr[50]: executing: 'modprobe orinoco'
cardmgr[50]: executing: 'modprobe orinoco_cs'
hermes @ IO 0x100: Card removed while waiting for command completion.
eth0: Error -19 reading firmware info. Wildly guessing capabilities...
eth0: Intersil firmware earlier than v0.8.x - several features not supported
hermes @ IO 0x100: Error -16 issuing command.
eth0: failed ot read MAC address!
orinoco_cs: register_netdev() failed
cardmgr[50]: get dev info on socket 0 failed: Resource temporarily unavailable

I have asked for help on quite a few forums and in a few different IRC channels, and I've searched google so many times that I could recite the first page of results from memory. None of it has gotten me anywhere. Right now, the only info I am going on is that, at one point, someone suggested that I should change something's memory ranges, and some screenshots I took of the resource settings for the PCMCIA-related stuff in Windows 98 SE.

Can anyone suggest anything? There must be some way to get this working!

Electrode · 01-14-2003, 10:17 PM

Electrode · 01-17-2003, 01:04 AM

another bump

finegan · 01-17-2003, 02:30 AM

Have you tried these instead of the orinocos?

http://hostap.epitest.fi/

Cheers,

Finegan

Electrode · 01-17-2003, 12:08 PM

Yes, I have.

Quote:

Right now, I'm using the latest orinoco_cs driver, although I've also tried the hostap_cs, samsung binary, and wvlan_cs drivers to no avail.

finegan · 01-17-2003, 01:54 PM

I remember the first go around of this thread now. The only thing I can suggest is exactly what I suggested last time: upgrade the firmware. The host_ap module doesn't really get fully effective until 1.0x firmware and came out long after these cards had flooded the market. Similarly the orinoco module was adapted for prism2 cards long after the fact, and the wvlan_cs module was built with lucent cards and prism1 cards in mind, so it doesn't even vaguely cover the prism2 chipset, but an older cardmgr is dumb enough to mis-identify the card as a prism1. None of these drivers were built with pre 0.8.x firmware in mind, nor probably ever tested on that old a firmware. If anything covers it as is, its the wlan-ng project, but I don't even know about that.

Cheers,

Finegan

moses · 01-17-2003, 02:08 PM

I haven't seen the previous thread, but. . .
Does this EXACT card work on the Linux desktop machine, or is
it a similar card with with the same name?
Why haven't you updated the firmware? It should be as simple as
downloading a small bit of sw from the manufacturer. . .
You say you have another PCMCIA card that works, and one
that doesn't. Is there a PCMCIA version (type I or type II)
problem? Is there a slot problem -- have you tried the card in all
slots on the laptop (may be a dumb question, but lesser mistakes
have been made)?

Electrode · 01-17-2003, 04:58 PM

finegan: I have already upgraded the firmware, it didn't help.
moses: It's the exact same card. I have updated the firmware. The other card is a 32-bit cardbus card. I have tried the wireless card in both slots.

moses · 01-18-2003, 12:12 AM

What do the commands (run as root, after the pcmcia services
have been turned on):

Code:

lspci
cat /proc/interrupts
cat /proc/ioports

return?
The modules still seem to think that your card has firmware a
firmware version of <0.8.x. . . Does windows or your other
computer think the same thing?

Electrode · 01-18-2003, 01:05 PM

Quote:

Does windows or your other
computer think the same thing?

No, they correctly identify the card and it works exactly as it is supposed to.

I'll give you the outputs of those commands when I get around to reinstalling Linux on the laptop, as I have once again installed windows on it.

moses · 01-20-2003, 02:55 AM

I did a bit of googling, and found this (have you tried it?):
http://www.focusresearch.com/dwl-650.html

Quote:

The instructions are really pretty simple, although I wouldn't have been able to do it without help (that's why I'm making this information available). Here's what it says at the MobiliX site:

1.

Add some information to /etc/pcmcia/conf:

card "D-Link DWL-650"
manfid 0x0156, 0x0002
bind "wvlan_cs"

(In my file, this is around line 280, between the entries for "D-Link DE-650" and "DynaLink L10C Ethernet".)
2.

Run 'netconf' (the network configuration part of linuxconf) and under Basic Host information add an adaptor left otherwise blank but with 'wvlan0' filled in as the interface name.

This looks to be RH specific, but I believe if you add the above
information to /etc/pcmcia/config, and reboot the machine, it
will work -- I don't do very much pcmcia stuff, so I don't
completely understand which files are configuration files for
which programs, hence the reboot recommendation. . .
Anyone know what RH's netconf does?

Also found this:
http://support.dlink.com/faq/view.as...20/%20DWL-A650

Quote:

Step 1 BIOS upgrades for Dell and Toshiba laptops may resolve wireless installation issues. Even if your laptop was purchased recently it may not have the latest BIOS.

Go to Dell Support for upgrade information and instructions.
Go to Toshiba Support for upgrade information and instructions.

Step 2 Verify that your laptop has a Cardbus controller (32-bit). If your laptop has a 16-bit PCMCIA slot, then the wireless card will not work.

Step 3 Disable or uninstall any other network adapter you may have in your laptop.
.
.
.

Perhaps you need to grab the latest BIOS update for your
machine (it looks like that could be difficult. . .)?

Electrode · 01-20-2003, 04:05 AM

1. The first suggestion looks like it binds the card to the wvlan_cs driver. I've never had any luck with that driver, but I'll give it a try.

2. I applied the most recent BIOS about a month ago to fix an unrelated problem. I also upgraded the setup program at that time (like on many old laptops, the BIOS setup program is actually a hidden partition at the front of the HD).

Electrode · 01-22-2003, 11:30 PM

I reinstalled Slackware on the laptop a few hours ago, this time using the DWL-650 wireless card from a desktop system. The card I was trying to use in the laptop is currently working perfectly in that system, and the card from that system does not work in the laptop.

moses: here's the result of those commands.

lspci:

Code:

00:0c.0 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1131 (rev 01)
00:0c.1 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1131 (rev 01)
00:0d.0 VGA compatible controller: S3 Inc. 86cM65 [Aurora64V+] (rev 43)
00:0e.0 ISA bridge: Compaq Computer Corporation MIS-L (rev 04)
00:0e.1 IDE interface: Compaq Computer Corporation Triflex Dual EIDE Controller (rev 03)
02:00.0 USB Controller: NEC Corporation USB (rev 41)
02:00.1 USB Controller: NEC Corporation USB (rev 41)
02:00.2 USB Controller: NEC Corporation USB 2.0 (rev 01)

cat /proc/interrupts:

Code:

CP0
0: 76037 XT-PIC timer
1: 95 XT-PIC keyboard
2: 0 XT-PIC cascade
8: 1 XT-PIC rtc
11: 0 XT-PIC Texas Instruments PCI1131, Texas Instruments PCI1131 (#2)
12: 0 XT-PIC PS/2 Mouse
14: 1470 XT-PIC ide0
NMI: 0
LOC: 0
ERR: 0
MIS: 0

cat /proc/ioports:

Code:

0000-001f : dma1
0020-003f : pic1
0040-005f : timer
0060-006f : keyboard
0060-007f : rtc
0080-008f : dma page reg
00a0-00bf : pic2
00c0-00df : dma2
00f0-00ff : fpu
01f0-01f7 : ide0
0378-037a : parport0
037b-037f : parport0
03c0-03df : vga+
03f6-03f6 : ide0
03f8-03ff : serial(auto)
0cf8-0cff : PCI conf1
b140-b14f : Compaq Computer Corporation Triflex Dual EIDE Controller
b140-b147 : ide0
fb00-fbff : PCI CardBus #02
fc00-fcff : PCI CardBus #02
fd00-fdff : PCI CardBus #01
ff00-ffff : PCI CardBus #01

moses · 01-28-2003, 11:07 PM

Ok. What does the lsmod command show (before doing anything
with the wireless card)?
Look in:
/lib/modules/2.X.YY/modules.dep
(where 2.X.YY is your kernel version)
for the line(s) concerning the module you are trying to load. What
are its dependencies?

What does the lsmod command show after you've loaded a
different card up?

Electrode · 01-29-2003, 12:14 AM

moses: the only modules that are loaded are hermes, orinoco, and orinoco_cs. These are, of course, only present when the wireless card is inserted. The other card requires me to manually modprobe its modules (ehci-hcd, usb-ohci) as pcmcia_cs isn't configured to handle it.

Everything else is compiled into the kernel.