[SOLVED] EEE 900 wifi <almost> works!

[ckotting]

I've searched the Forums most of the day, and haven't quite found an answer that works.  If I missed it, feel free to whack me with a cluebat.

The Machine is an ASUS EEE 900 (ath5k wireless).  I have:

• downloaded the latest PCLOS LXDE
• moved it to a thumbdrive with PCLinuxOS USB
• booted from the USB
• install to the "hard drive" (really a SSD)
• Run Synaptic (Reload | Mark all Upgrades | Apply)
• configured the Network using PCC

My wifi picks up and recognizes my router, and I have the right WPA2 key in place.  However, it won't connect.  It tries mightily, but "Connection failed."

Before I compile all the code blocks and post them, is there something flamingly obvious that I'm missing here?

I know from reading the posts that coffeecup has one of these cooperating, but I haven't found the right voodoo.

[scoundrel]

no need to go to PCC.. and the ath5k works out the box.. just left click the net applet and set it up ..

 

[ckotting]

I should have specified that I tried the Network applet first.  No go.

Next post will include relevant code blocks...stay tuned (switching from desktop to wired connection on laptop)

[Hootiegibbon]

ckotting,

can you open a terminal and post the results of

lspci |grep -i net

also check any switches for the wireless are in the "on" position

Jase

[ckotting]

Will do (I did ask if I was missing anything obvious...)

Right now I'm doing a complete reinstall because I've monkeyed around enough that I may have really gorped things up.  I'm writing down every step in a post to follow, with the code snippets (starting with the one you asked for) coming after that.

[ckotting]

Okay, the post after this one.  I'm going back to square one, and detailing every step.  This post is from my desktop, while I go through the laptop step-by-step.

Latest PCLOS LXDE ISO (not Mini)
Burned CD
Booted Desktop Machine from CD
Made bootable USB using PCLOS Live USB Creator
USB stick into ASUS 900
Booted (with persistence so I might not have to repeat next steps)
Wired connection working
Wifi on (little blue light shining cheerfully at me)  
Synaptic (Reload, Mark all Upgrades, Apply)
Synaptic (Install lvm2, since I'm using an SD card to extend the internal SSD, and the install process won't play nice without it)

aaaand, now I switch over to the laptop for my next post.

[ckotting]

lspci | grep -i  net

Code:

01:00.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications Inc. AR242x / AR542x Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01)
03:00.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications L2 Fast Ethernet (rev a0)

uname -a

Code:

Linux localhost 2.6.38.8-pclos3.bfs #1 SMP PREEMPT Fri Jul 8 18:01:30 CDT 2011 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux

ifconfig

Code:

eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:22:15:A0:11:D4 
          inet addr:192.168.5.5  Bcast:192.168.5.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          inet6 addr: fe80::222:15ff:fea0:11d4/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:66732 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:1
          TX packets:36827 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:1
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:98452571 (93.8 MiB)  TX bytes:2622835 (2.5 MiB)
          Memory:fbfc0000-fc000000

lo        Link encap:Local Loopback 
          inet addr:127.0.0.1  Mask:255.0.0.0
          inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
          UP LOOPBACK RUNNING  MTU:16436  Metric:1
          RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
          RX bytes:0 (0.0 b)  TX bytes:0 (0.0 b)

wlan0     Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:22:43:04:CE:F3 
          inet6 addr: fe80::222:43ff:fe04:cef3/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:1430 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:1457 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:193050 (188.5 KiB)  TX bytes:228665 (223.3 KiB)

wlan0:9   Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:22:43:04:CE:F3 
          inet addr:169.254.181.235  Bcast:169.254.255.255  Mask:255.255.0.0
          UP BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1

iwconfig

Code:

lo        no wireless extensions.

wlan0     IEEE 802.11bg  ESSID:"thekottinghousehold" 
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 00:24:B2:B8:6B:92   
          Bit Rate=1 Mb/s   Tx-Power=20 dBm   
          Retry  long limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=23/70  Signal level=-87 dBm 
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:1  Invalid misc:2   Missed beacon:0

eth0      no wireless extensions.

What next?

[ckotting]

cat /etc/modprobe.conf

Code:

install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe uhci_hcd; /bin/true
alias wlan0 ath5k
alias eth0 atl2
alias sound-slot-0 snd_hda_intel
options snd-ac97-codec power_save=1
alias pci:v0000168Cd0000001Csv00001A3Bsd00001026bc02sc00i00 ath5k

cat /etc/modprobe.preload

Code:

# /etc/modprobe.preload: kernel modules to load at boot time.
#
# This file should contain the names of kernel modules that are
# to be loaded at boot time, one per line.  Comments begin with
# a `#', and everything on the line after them are ignored.
# this file is for module-init-tools (kernel 2.5 and above) ONLY
# for old kernel use /etc/modules
fuse
raw1394
sbp2
ohci1394
pciehp
nvram
evdev

cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-wlan0

Code:

DEVICE=wlan0
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
ONBOOT=yes
METRIC=35
MII_NOT_SUPPORTED=no
USERCTL=no
RESOLV_MODS=no
WIRELESS_MODE=Managed
WIRELESS_ESSID=YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
WIRELESS_ENC_KEY=s:XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
WIRELESS_WPA_DRIVER=wext
WIRELESS_WPA_REASSOCIATE=no
IPV6INIT=no
IPV6TO4INIT=no
ACCOUNTING=yes
DHCP_CLIENT=dhclient
NEEDHOSTNAME=no
PEERDNS=yes
PEERYP=yes
PEERNTPD=no

cat /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist

Code:

blacklist ssb

blacklist ssb

[Hootiegibbon]

01:00.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications Inc. AR242x / AR542x Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01)

This looks like one of the atheros cards that works better with madwifi ( I have one that does not agree with ath5k and it is very similar to this)

The work around is to first of all delete teh wlan connection in ppc>network&internet>remove select wlan0 in the dropdown then add both ath5k and ath9k to /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist do this by adding two lines

blacklist ath5k
blacklist ath9k

to that file. then use your ethernet connection to install madwifi afetr it has completed installing reboot

then try pcc again and set up a new connection - you will notivce that instead of wlan0 that it is now ath0

should work

Jase

[ckotting]

I can see how that should work, but ath5k is still getting loaded (it still shows up in lsmod.)

[Hootiegibbon]

I can see how that should work, but ath5k is still getting loaded (it still shows up in lsmod.)

change

install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe uhci_hcd; /bin/true
alias wlan0 ath5k
alias eth0 atl2
alias sound-slot-0 snd_hda_intel
options snd-ac97-codec power_save=1
alias pci:v0000168Cd0000001Csv00001A3Bsd00001026bc02sc00i00 ath5k


to


install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe uhci_hcd; /bin/true
alias ath0 ath_pci
alias eth0 atl2
alias sound-slot-0 snd_hda_intel
options snd-ac97-codec power_save=1
alias pci:v0000168Cd0000001Csv00001A3Bsd00001026bc02sc00i00 ath_pci



should work

Jase

[Ferdes Fides]

Open WEP works on mine.
Restricted WEP only works sometimes.

FF

[Ɗα√ϵς§]

My ex-girlfriend has the eeePC900 and on occasion it would not log into a wireless signal. From net-applet, when using "Configure" make sure that the pull down menu for the type of encryption is correct. Occasionally it defaults to the wrong one then it doesn't connect.

[ckotting]

I can see how that should work, but ath5k is still getting loaded (it still shows up in lsmod.)

change

install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe uhci_hcd; /bin/true
alias wlan0 ath5k
alias eth0 atl2
alias sound-slot-0 snd_hda_intel
options snd-ac97-codec power_save=1
alias pci:v0000168Cd0000001Csv00001A3Bsd00001026bc02sc00i00 ath5k


to


install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe uhci_hcd; /bin/true
alias ath0 ath_pci
alias eth0 atl2
alias sound-slot-0 snd_hda_intel
options snd-ac97-codec power_save=1
alias pci:v0000168Cd0000001Csv00001A3Bsd00001026bc02sc00i00 ath_pci



should work

Jase

<ckotting hangs head in shame>  I can only claim too many hours wrestling with this as my defence.

[ckotting]

Open WEP works on mine.
Restricted WEP only works sometimes.

FF

I work a lot with cybersecurity types.  I'd get laughed out of the conference room if I showed up with WEP.  Actually I'd get hacked, and THEN I'd get laughed out of the conference room.