Netgear WG111 v2 sees router, doesn't connect

pickarooney · 11-10-2007, 12:23 PM

!i'm running Kubuntu Feisty and trying to connect my laptop to my wireless router, a Sagem Livebox from France Telecom/Orange. The Wireless adapter is recognised by the OS and appears correctly in the lsusb list. When I run KDE's wireless assistant it displays a list of available networks, including that of my router. When I click, however, it fails to connect, with the DHCP option on. There is no security enabled on the wireless router. I tried manually entering an IP address and broadcast and submask info, but to no avail. What can I try next to get connected to the router?

The router is set to Channel 10. I'm not sure if I have to tell the adapter to look at this channel, and if so, how.

2Gnu · 11-10-2007, 02:25 PM

You need not tell the adapter what channel.

Try setting the mode and SSID manually:

sudo iwconfig wlan0 essid <your_ssid> mode managed

(your interface may be different, so insert yours if it's not wlan0)

Then run iwconfig to see if the configuration changed. Assuming it did, pull an IP address (for Ubuntu, I think it would be sudo: dhclient wlan0).

Post any errors.

pickarooney · 11-10-2007, 03:52 PM

I got this:

Error for wireless request "Set Mode" (8B06) :
SET failed on device wlan0 ; Device or resource busy.

Seems I have to disable it first somehow?
Running iwconfig, the card already seems to be in managed mode
and has the right ESSID.

Code:

lo        no wireless extensions.

eth0      no wireless extensions.

wmaster0  IEEE 802.11g  Frequency:2.412 GHz
          RTS thr:off   Fragment thr=2346 B

wlan0     IEEE 802.11g  ESSID:"Livebox-8ed8"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.412 GHz  Access Point: 00:1A:6B:E9:77:E4
          RTS thr:off   Fragment thr=2346 B
          Encryption key:off
          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

No luck getting an IP address though:

Code:

There is already a pid file /var/run/dhclient.pid with pid 134993416
Internet Systems Consortium DHCP Client V3.0.4
Copyright 2004-2006 Internet Systems Consortium.
All rights reserved.
For info, please visit http://www.isc.org/sw/dhcp/

wmaster0: unknown hardware address type 801
wmaster0: unknown hardware address type 801
Listening on LPF/wlan0/00:18:4d:b5:2a:c3
Sending on   LPF/wlan0/00:18:4d:b5:2a:c3
Sending on   Socket/fallback
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 4
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 6
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 14
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 7
No DHCPOFFERS received.
No working leases in persistent database - sleeping.

The ethernet connection was active while I was dong this; I don't know if it makes a difference, but I'll try without the network cable in a minute.

pickarooney · 11-10-2007, 04:17 PM

N o change without the ethernet cable, so I looked at the router and found an option to add the MAC address of my Wifi dongle to the list of permitted addresses. Still no luck getting an IP from it though...

2Gnu · 11-10-2007, 05:17 PM

"Link Quality:0 Signal level:0 Noise level:0" You won't get an IP address until you have real signal numbers there.

That tells me you're still not connected to the wireless. Double-check that no MAC address filtering, WEP or WPA is set on the router.

Try killing the running dhclient and rm the PID. Bring up the interface with:
sudo ifconfig wlan0 up

Then, check iwconfig. If you can see something like "Link Quality:59/100 Signal level:-58 dBm Noise level:-96 dBm," try dhclient again.

pickarooney · 11-10-2007, 06:09 PM

nothing doing. I've tried everything I could find in the router interface but can't get wlan0 to acquire a signal. I once managed to get a Windows laptop connected to this router with the pcmcia version of the netgear so I know it should be possible without too much configuring...

pickarooney · 11-10-2007, 07:43 PM

I don't know what I've done now but the ESSID and access point have disappeared from iwconfig and the wireless assistant cannot find a single network any more - previously there were 6 including mine

2Gnu · 11-10-2007, 10:26 PM

Go back to the basics - lsmod to see if the driver is loaded, check the radio if it's BIOS-controlled (with a key combo like Fn-F2, for example) or a physical switch.

Check dmesg for clues.

Don't know what to tell you about the earlier issues, assuming you get back to that point. Odd that it sees the AP, but won't connect. That can be due to an incorrect (or incorrectly installed) driver.

Good luck.

rhys42 · 11-11-2007, 09:47 AM

I had a similar problem here
running Sabayon miniEd 64-bit. Never figured it out... is this a hardware issue?

pickarooney · 11-11-2007, 09:57 AM

I don't know how, but I briefly got the Access point back and managed to acquire an IP for the wireless dongle. I couldn't get on the internet or even the router interface and then I tied to change the default network interface in KNetworkmanager and the machine just hung. After rebooting the access point was gone again and with it any chance of getting an IP.

pickarooney · 11-11-2007, 04:34 PM

I think it's a hardware problem at this stage, the dongle is only recognised one in every three tiles I connect it and then fails to scan most of the time. I'll try again after upgrading to Kubuntu Gutsy in case there's an improvement.

pickarooney · 11-12-2007, 04:39 PM

Would I be likely to have more luck with NDISWrapper?

edit: tried it, dongle recognised, scans with wireless assistant, finds lots of nodes but not my own router ??
it ignores commabds to set the essid and access points now too.. totally bizarre

and... suddenly the router interface is inaccessible from the laptop (still fine from the other PC) - unauthorized request...

pickarooney · 11-28-2007, 02:04 AM

So... I got around to installing Kubuntu Gutsy last night (clean install) and within 10 minutes I was connected via WiFi and am posting this with no ethernet cable! (no hands, Mum!).
Literally just plugged in the dongle and selected my router from the list of available WiFi spots and away it went.