Ubuntu Hardy: Wireless occasionally fails to connect (NDISwrapper)
 

I'm running the Hardy Heron 64-bit version and NDISwrapper is installed correctly allowing me to browse the web through a wireless router. The router is detected instantly at startup as it should. Well, almost every time...

Now, why is it that sometimes when I boot up, my wireless doesn't connect? The network is detected and the signal is strong but it refuses to connect. After a timeout it prompts for the passphrase and having typed this NDISwrapper starts over and ends with a new timeout.

This is kind of frustrating! I bet tonight, when I make a new boot, the connection process runs like warm butter. No essential updates installed and settings untouched.

Any solution to this?

Well, difficult to say based on that..one possibility could be this problem about which I made a thread recently (see here), but if you are using only one computer, it's probably not. Shortly put, my access point refused to connect one client if one other was already connected, with all the other clients working without trouble; problems seemed to vanish with a firmware upgrade, soon came back, vanished when I switched from auto channel setting to a manually set channel and now I'm waiting to see if this works.

Another possibility is that the driver malfunctions sometimes, but it would sound more probable if it did that all the time. Have you looked at any logfiles, or perhaps tried to print verbose output from whatever program you use to connect (wpa_supplicant maybe?), if there was anything interesting during the failure?

And have you any knowledge about how the card worked with Windows, for example, where you didn't have to use ndiswrapper - was it the same, or did it work perfectly then (with the same hardware, access point etc.)?

We do actually own two laptops. Both were running with Windows with no problems as to simultaneous wireless connection. Today one of the laptops is installed with Linux and at times both laptops have been in wireless operation at the same time without problems.

However, what I did tonight was to change the security settings on the wireless router from WEP to WPA TKIP (should have done this decades ago). Then I changed the wireless settings correspondently on both laptops and waggediwam! The wireless connection acts like being on a formula one court.

So I don't know the answer to the original connection problem, but it does seem that I have a reliable wireless connection now.

Nice to hear, and good you changed the encryption to WPA :) After all, it's quite a long ago already when they invented how to break a WEP key in a moment..

Nevertheless, if more problems should rise, post again and describe the situation.

Thanks, bOuncer. Cheers.

Ok, now I kinda lost a tyre on that formula one court!

My original problem with the occasional wireless connection has returned though having switched to WPA. Anyway, I did had a very good idea this had no influence.

Could it have something to do with the boot sequence? Something which has to be loaded before something else?

Have a nice weekend!

Router Needs Resetting
 

Hi -
From the symptoms you describe, I think the your router buffers are full now and need to be cleared. Your router may do a different way, but with ours, we poke the reset hole in the back of our router with a pen. Then log in as administrator to the router, and treat just as if it's brand new, reset password, firewall and services again. Then it goes like the wind. Good luck!
Sonya