3Com Office Connect (3CRWE154G72)

kimothy · 11-27-2005, 02:30 PM

Hi. I own a 3Com office connect (3CRWE154G72), version 2, wifi card. I'm running Mepis 3.4, kernel 2.6.12, on my Compaq Evo N610c.

Im trying to get this prism 54 card to run undrer linux so I took a look at ndiswrapper in my konsole. When i told ndiswrapper to list all drives, the driver I need was there, but it also sead that it was invalid. Then I uninstalled that driver and installed the ones from the 3com CD. Now ndiswrapper says this when I ask it to list the installed drivers:

Code:

ndekim@1[~]$ ndiswrapper -l
Installed ndis drivers:
3c154g72        driver present, hardware present
airplus driver present
bcmwl5  driver present
lsbcmnds        driver present
lstinds driver present
mrv8k51 driver present
netr33x driver present
prismnic        driver present
wlanuig driver present
wlipnds driver present
kim@1[~]$

As you se, the driver installed properly and it finds my card, but it aint working.
The 'link' light blinkes about every 60 seconds (a sign that hotplug finds it???). So thats a step in the right direction, but mepis still can't connect and use it...

So I need help to figure this out.

An other thing. The kernel I use is the standard mepis 2.6.12-1-586tsc kernel.
Do I need to use 2.6.14.x kernel or newer to make this card work?

Thanks for any reply. :-)

Hangdog42 · 12-04-2005, 08:33 AM

Can you see this card in iwconfig? That is usually the real test for a working ndiswrapper install.

Quote:

An other thing. The kernel I use is the standard mepis 2.6.12-1-586tsc kernel.
Do I need to use 2.6.14.x kernel or newer to make this card work?

No, you shouldn't need the absolute latest kernel. Any 2.6.x kernel should work. In fact, I believe you can also use 2.4 kernels with ndiswrapper.

By the way, if that is a Prism54 chipset, there are native linux drivers. Check out prism54.org for drivers and details.

kimothy · 12-04-2005, 11:13 AM

this is the iwconfig output:

Code:

kim@1[~]$ iwconfig
lo        no wireless extensions.

eth0      no wireless extensions.

sit0      no wireless extensions.

wlan0     IEEE 802.11g  ESSID:off/any
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 00:00:00:00:00:00
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Tx-Power:32 dBm
          RTS thr:2347 B   Fragment thr:2346 B
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality:100  Signal level:0  Noise level:0
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:44   Missed beacon:0

kim@1[~]$

What does this mean? I'll check out the linux native prism54 drivers.

Thanks

Hangdog42 · 12-04-2005, 03:32 PM

The good news is that the drivers you have work and Linux recognizes it as a usable card. The bad news is that the card absolutely isn't configured. Yet.

You can use the iwconfig command to set the ssid and WEP key if you need to. the iwconfig man page (man iwconfig) is actually a pretty clear explanation of what parameters iwconfig can set. At a minimum you need the SSID of your access point. Once you have that set (you'll need to be root to do it) you'll need to request an IP address from your DHCP server or set a static IP with ifconfig.

kimothy · 12-20-2005, 12:51 PM

I took a look at the prism54.org site. Dosen't theese drivers only supporg usb devices? I have a pcmica device. Any way I can make this card work in linux?

Hangdog42 · 12-20-2005, 03:13 PM

Can I ask why you think it doesn't work? The card is visible to iwconfig, which usually means it has a functioning driver. Can you fill in some details on what you have tried?

kevkiwi · 12-23-2005, 09:40 AM

Hi, I'm also having probems with my 3Com office connect (3CRWE154G72), version 2, wifi card on a Compaq Evo N610c, running Ubuntu (Breezy Badger).

ndiswrapper -l shows:

Code:

kevin@london:~/ISL$ sudo ndiswrapper -l
Installed ndis drivers:
3c154g72        driver present, hardware present

iwconfig shows:

Code:

kevin@london:~/ISL$ sudo iwconfig
...
eth1      NOT READY!  ESSID:"xxxxxx"
          Mode:Managed  Channel:0  Access Point: 00:00:00:00:00:00
          Tx-Power=31 dBm   Sensitivity=0/200
          Retry min limit:0   RTS thr=0 B   Fragment thr=0 B
          Encryption key:XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XX   Security mode:restricted
          Link Quality:0  Signal level:0  Noise level:0
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0
...

When I try

Code:

sudo iwconfig eth1 channel 11

it doesn't stick.

When I try

Code:

sudo ifup eth 1

I get:

Code:

kevin@london:~/ISL$ sudo ifup eth1
There is already a pid file /var/run/dhclient.eth1.pid with pid 0
Internet Systems Consortium DHCP Client V3.0.2
Copyright 2004 Internet Systems Consortium.
All rights reserved.
For info, please visit XXX

sit0: unknown hardware address type 776
SIOCSIFFLAGS: Timer expired
SIOCSIFFLAGS: Timer expired
sit0: unknown hardware address type 776
Listening on LPF/eth1/00:30:b4:00:00:00
Sending on   LPF/eth1/00:30:b4:00:00:00
Sending on   Socket/fallback
receive_packet failed on eth1: Network is down
DHCPDISCOVER on eth1 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 6
send_packet: Network is down
DHCPDISCOVER on eth1 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 12
send_packet: Network is down
DHCPDISCOVER on eth1 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 15
send_packet: Network is down
DHCPDISCOVER on eth1 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 17
send_packet: Network is down
DHCPDISCOVER on eth1 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 11
send_packet: Network is down
No DHCPOFFERS received.
No working leases in persistent database - sleeping.

My router is on 192.168.1.254

I have Googled all over the place and tried all sorts of suggestions but I can't even get the Link light on my card to come on.

Any suggestions?

Cheers,
Kevin

kevkiwi · 12-23-2005, 09:47 AM

Some additional info - when I unplug my card and re-insert it, dmesg shows:

Code:

[4300950.642000] eth1: hot unplug detected
[4300950.642000] eth1: removing device
[4300950.650000] ACPI: PCI interrupt for device 0000:03:00.0 disabled
[4300973.430000] PCI: Enabling device 0000:03:00.0 (0000 -> 0002)
[4300973.430000] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:03:00.0[A] -> Link [C0B8] -> GSI 11 (level, low) -> IRQ 11

Hangdog42 · 12-23-2005, 12:01 PM

Quote:

Access Point: 00:00:00:00:00:00

Is that real or did you alter it for posting? If it is real, then you need to take a good look at how your configuring the card, becuase I don't think it is associating with the access point. That would explain why ifup isn't working.

kevkiwi · 12-23-2005, 03:15 PM

That's the actual value returned by iwconfig. I'm not sure how to configure the card for my access point, other than setting the SSID, encryption technique and key.

Hangdog42 · 12-23-2005, 03:31 PM

That is seriously strange. I don't think I've ever seen a card take the ssid and key, but not the channel and leave the MAC blank......

OK, a couple of ideas. First if you've turned off your SSID broadcast on your router, turn it back on. Sometimes that makes the difference. Second, if that still doesn't work, try setting a static IP address with ifconfig and the gateway with route:

ifconfig eth1 192.168.1.x
route add default gw 192.168.1.254

Then add your ISP's DNS servers to your /etc/resolv.conf file

nameserver xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx and replace the x's with the real IP address.

kevkiwi · 12-23-2005, 04:34 PM

I tried re-enabling SSID broadcast, but still no link. I tried ifconfig eth1 192.168.1.7, and got:

Code:

kevin@london:~$ ifconfig eth1 192.168.1.7
SIOCSIFADDR: Permission denied
SIOCSIFFLAGS: Permission denied

Then I noticed something else in dmesg:

Code:

[4295070.115000] eth1: resetting device...
[4295070.115000] eth1: uploading firmware...
[4295070.253000] eth1: firmware version: 1.0.4.3
[4295070.253000] eth1: firmware upload complete
[4295071.253000] eth1: no 'reset complete' IRQ seen - retrying
[4295072.253000] eth1: no 'reset complete' IRQ seen - retrying
[4295072.253000] eth1: interface reset failure
[4295072.253000] prism54: Your card/socket may be faulty, or IRQ line too busy :(

Could this be affecting things? Does this mean I've got an interrupt conflict? I think I saw somewhere that my wireless card is on IRQ 11.

Hangdog42 · 12-23-2005, 05:59 PM

Quote:

kevin@london:~$ ifconfig eth1 192.168.1.7

Close, but no cigar....You gotta be root (or use sudo in your case) to get that command to run.

Certainly an IRQ conflict would cause some trouble. If you run cat /proc/interrupts it will list what things are assigned to what IRQ numbers.

kevkiwi · 12-24-2005, 03:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hangdog42

Close, but no cigar....You gotta be root (or use sudo in your case) to get that command to run.

Ah, should have thought of that - my lack of Linux-time showing through there. Anyway, I've done it correctly now and I get:

Code:

kevin@london:~$ sudo ifconfig eth1 192.168.1.7
Password:
SIOCSIFFLAGS: Timer expired

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hangdog42

Certainly an IRQ conflict would cause some trouble. If you run cat /proc/interrupts it will list what things are assigned to what IRQ numbers.

Code:

kevin@london:~$ cat /proc/interrupts
           CPU0
  0:     403397          XT-PIC  timer
  1:        191          XT-PIC  i8042
  2:          0          XT-PIC  cascade
  7:          0          XT-PIC  parport0
  8:          1          XT-PIC  rtc
  9:          1          XT-PIC  acpi
 10:       1475          XT-PIC  ohci_hcd:usb1, ohci_hcd:usb2, ehci_hcd:usb3, eth0
 11:      19313          XT-PIC  Intel 82801CA-ICH3, yenta, yenta, eth1, radeon@pci:0000:01:00.0
 12:       1748          XT-PIC  i8042
 14:       9786          XT-PIC  ide0
 15:       2684          XT-PIC  ide1
NMI:          0
LOC:          0
ERR:          0
MIS:          0

IRQ 11 does seem to be pretty busy although I can't tell if this is a problem or not. What do you think? Can I force the wireless card to use a different interrupt?

Cheers,
Kevin

Hangdog42 · 12-27-2005, 08:12 AM

Sorry, I should have noticed this earlier.......

In your first post you say you are using ndiswrapper, yet the card is named eth1 (ndiswrapper tries to create wlan0) and in your dump of /proc/interrupts ndiswrapper isn't in the list. It should be if you were using it. What this is leading me to believe is that Ubuntu is trying to use some other driver for this card (and probably a native linux one at that) and either the driver is completely wrong or the firmware its using isn't up to the task. Your earlier dmesg output suggests that the firmware loads OK, but then the card has trouble with it.

I would spend some quality time in your system logs and see what module Ubuntu is trying to use with this card. That might give us some clues as to what Ubuntu is trying to do.