Hoping for some help here...

The situation: I started a new job about a month ago, and was delighted to learn I would be receiving a relatively new Dell 8*00 laptop (I'm not sure on the exact model, but it's their big 'desktop replacement' notebook). Since the job requires a lot of php & mysql web programming, I was pretty stoked on using linux.

The problem: I can't get a wireless card to work. So far, I've tried a crappy linksys card and an SMC 2635w pcmcia card, which is the one I will be sticking with.

Details: I don't believe the problem I'm having getting the card working is related to driver installation (yet!). In fact, Redhat doesn't even see the card in the network configuration wizard, and the card's 'power' light isn't on at all. Upon bootup into WinXP, the power button is solid the whole time, but has never once turned on in linux. Perhaps a problem with my pcmcia hardware being recognized? Also, whenever I start pcmcia services manually (via '/etc/rc.d/init.d/pcmcia start'), I get a *massive* keyboard lag of about 7 or 8 seconds... ie; when I type into a console, it takes a long time for the actual text to appear. I have to reboot to stop this lag... just stopping the service doesn't work.

Anyhoo... I'm just hoping someone can help shed some light on this for me. Let me know what other info I can provide, etc.

Thanks a bunch,

JP

Well well, i will try my best, seeing as how i am still a newbie myself,
I believe you are having a irq issue with your pcmcia, do you have any other pcmcia devices that are working?? do you get any messages when starting up that say something about irq's for the pcmcia?
try typing 'dmesg' and see what you get, you are probably going to have to go to /etc/modules.conf and check/change the IRQ that the pcmcia is using. try 9 or above, that worked for me, that is probably why you get the lag from the keyboard too, it's maybe trying to use a irq port already in use.

Rock on,
Hope you dont have to go through the same problems i went though, i just got my wireless working today in RH9.
Let me know if this helped, maybe i can offer more...

Hmmm... I thought I posted a reply last night, but apparently it didn't exactly work

Here's some relevant output from /var/log/message:

"localhost kernel: cs: socket f786d000 timed out during reset. Try increasing setup_delay." flashes by a few times during bootup as well. Note that this is what happens when the pcmcia service is started at boot... If the service is not turned on at boot time I don't have any keyboard lag issues.

Here's what I have in /etc/modules.conf:

From the output in /var/log/messages, it appears to me that you could be correct in that an irq conflict is causing my problem. If you can help shed some light on how to fix this, I would be grateful.

JP

Ok... I have no idea what I did, but pcmcia isn't throwing errors all over the place anymore. Interesting.

Now, to get my smc2635w wireless card working...

Thanks anyways,

JP

Hi, I'm running debian on a couple of Dell Laptops (Inspiron I200 & Latitude C800). I managed to get a Netgear (WLAN) card working on the 2500 some time ago, using Kernel 2.2.20, the card services package and some specific drivers for my card I downloaded from somewhere??.... anyway, the point I want to make: I later upgraded to kernel 2.4.20 and now the wirless will NOT work!.... same config as before. I have tried everything I can think of and found others with the same prob... so perhaps look in that direction. I did have to some work on the files: network.opts, wireless.opts, etc. in /etc/pcmcia before I could get anything to work at all.

Hope this helps to point you in the right direction