New Lappy No Wifi Please Help

[quinne]

OK, Joble.  To add to the mix:

08:00.0 0280: 168c:002b (rev 01)
        Subsystem: 103c:303f
        Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 5
        Memory at f1100000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
        Capabilities: [40] Power Management version 3
        Capabilities: [50] MSI: Enable- Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit-
        Capabilities: [60] Express Legacy Endpoint, MSI 00
        Capabilities: [100] Advanced Error Reporting
        Capabilities: [140] Virtual Channel
        Capabilities: [160] Device Serial Number 00-15-17-ff-ff-24-14-12
        Capabilities: [170] Power Budgeting <?>
        Kernel driver in use: ath9k
        Kernel modules: ath9k

[Joble]

 coffeetime:  Did she get that new or refurbished?  It is possible the wireless is actually OFF in the bios.  Has she checked?

[quinne]

Hey Joble, if the 'she' you're referring to is me, this laptop is new -- I made a point  of not getting a refurbished unit.  Also, I've gone into bios, which is pretty paltry, really.  Not much in way of settings to play with.  Only reference I could find in there to anything network related were the WLAN FCC ID, and then in the boot menu, the option to enable network adapter boot, neither which have any bearing here.

[Joble]

Uh, yeah, sorry bout that, it was actually a reply to Coffeetime in IRC, but my IRC timed out.  It was just faster to repost it here.  Didn't mean to sound like you were not in the room.  Sorry bout that.

[quinne]

Heh, that's OK Joble, it seemed to be the reply to something I wasn't reading, however, I also thought perhaps you were being clever in a convoluted sort of way...You know, back in the day when women were 'taken care of'. 

Anyway, to change the approach a bit, how about we go through the network setup.  Maybe I'm missing something really simple.  Here's what I'm doing:

I'm logged in as root.
I open 'configure your computer' -> 'setup new network interface' -> wireless -> select the first option, WLAN0 Atheros Communications Inc, etc

At the next screen under 'Please select your network', I've only got one option: Unlisted - edit manually

On the next screen I've got to deal with the following list of settings (I've listed all the options after the colon):

Operating mode: Ad-hoc, Managed, Master, Repeater, Secondary, Auto (it defaults to Managed)

Network name (ESSID): Here I insert the SSID given to me by my ISP, from whom I bought the router.

Encryption mode: none, Open WEP, Restricted WEP, WPA/WPA2 Enterprise, WPA/WPA2 pre-shared key

This last defaults to Open WEP, however, my ISP gave me a password, so I first tried Restricted WEP, then WPA/WPA2 pre-shared key.  Although I have since then tried all of the options.

Next screen:  Automatic IP or Manual, I choose auto.

Next screen:  IP settings, I check 'Get DNS servers from DHCP'

Next screen, I don't change anything, leaving 'start the connection at boot' and 'enable traffic accounting' checked

Last screen?  That's the one that asks if you want to start the connection, to which I always respond, YES! And...it never does.

So, am I doing something wrong here?  Like I said, it worked right off the bat when I booted into Windows...(and please don't misconstrue that as some kind of plug for Windows -- there's a reason why I wiped them off my system....Overall, their OS is truly insulting to those who like knowing at least a little of what goes on on 'under the hood'...)

[johnmart]

Hi quinne-
Sorry to butt in here, especially with some really knowledgeable folks already signed on. (I am not)
But I read in another post to delete your existing, broken network connection, log out/restart.
Then add a network connection configuring according to your specs.
It is a very simplistic approach compared with the route you are now, but it worked for me.
Worth a try?
Hope you get connected!
John

[Duvid]

Hi- I ran into a very similar problem where my wireless hardware was being recognized by PCLOS but a connection wasn't being made from the router side. My wireless was not able to scan for my ESSID until I changed my encryption type. You may want to try to change WPA to WEP or remove it altogether so it will see your ESSID from the router without having to put it in manually. Then I put back the encryption that allowed it to work.

[quinne]

johnmart, thanks for the well-wishes.  I'm still hoping to hear back from hootiegibbon and/or coffeetime, in response to the various output from lspci before I do anything too radical  However, if all else fails, I may try as you suggest.

Duvid, what you say makes a kind of sense, considering the fact that after I attempt the wlan install, I never see the ssid or encryption code in the 'select your network' box (as accessed via the network icon on the panel.)  However, following your suggestion has yielded no (positive) results.  Thanks for trying to help.

ETA:  Any of you folks that were helping me earlier (Joble, Hootiegibbon, coffeetime), I'm afraid it's time for me to hit the hay -- have to get up at the crack of dawn tomorrow.  I hope you may have some new ideas for me tomorrow.  I really do need this machine for work soon.  Thanks again!

[Joble]

I would have to say, your network is not up yet, because your driver is not properly configured yet.  You know who to watch.

Good Luck.

[quinne]

hootiegibbon, moving ahead under the assumption that the modprobe.conf I posted earlier was OK, here's the additional konsole info you asked for:

lsmod |grep ath:

ath9k                 244435  0
mac80211              137463  1 ath9k
ath                     7007  1 ath9k
cfg80211               98416  3 ath9k,mac80211,ath
led_class               2696  1 ath9k

lspci |grep Atheros:

08:00.0 Network controller: Atheros Communications Inc. AR9285 Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01)


What do you think?

[denoobifyme]

Couple things. I've read in other posts something about wcid. Have you installed that through Synaptic?

Also, the switch earlier posts referred to: my layout may be different than yours, but my internet switch (which pclos took care of out of the box) is in the lower right corner of the keyboard's wrist platform. Rather, the light and the emblem of the switch is there. The actual switch is a thumb-slider UNDER THE LIP of the part of the platform where the emblem is. Touching the emblem itself on top does nothing.

quinne, I encourage you to reinstall your wifi through PCC>Network and Internet>Remove a connection. Once you root into PCC, it's about a twenty-second process. It gives you a much better starting point.

I spent four days trying every flavor of PCLOS10 and other distros, and NONE of them worked with my wifi. Then I found out my IP was down and I needed to reset my routers (unplug for ten seconds). Do your or does a friend have a second laptop that is able to get online? We want to make sure the problem is with your specific unit. A new laptop should not have this problem.

Also, have you tried getting online at a neighborhood hotspot?  This would confirm the problem is with your WAP, not your computer. Troubleshooting starts with finding the location of the problem, eliminating all the variables that DO work. (smile) Good luck. Tell yourself it's fun to learn this stuff.

[quinne]

Hi denoobifyme, thanks for the sound thinking.  I've installed wicd from synaptic.  Looks like a nice interface, but not really doing me any good at this point.  You got me to do some further digging on this particular HP laptop -- if I'm understanding their manual correctly, the glowing network icon at the top of my keyboard should glow blue when enabled, and orange when disabled.  It's orange, and I can't seem to get it to do otherwise.  I also went ahead and went through the 'remove a connection' process.  I tell ya, I'm wondering at this point whether or not HP has some kind of internal software switch which I'm going to have to figure out how to access...I wonder if I install my old copy of Windows 2000 in VBox, and then install HP's wireless assistant software, that it could identify (and fix!) the problem.  Does that sound like a path worth trying?

Heh, I'm waaay out in the boonies, so no neighborhood hotspots around here.  However, I do have some friends in town that also have wireless routers, so I could take a trip to their house. 

I'm not 100% certain about my network indicator light -- the manual I downloaded from HP shows two kinds of icons: one where the symbol changes (on, wireless tower/off, wireless tower with an X by it) and other online documentation says on this model the icon changes from amber to blue when network is activated.  Assuming it is truly the latter, then I've got to figure out how to activate it...

Thanks again for your input, it's greatly appreciated!

[The Chief]

if I'm understanding their manual correctly, the glowing network icon at the top of my keyboard should glow blue when enabled, and orange when disabled. 

That's under the pre-installed Windows and the led may well be software controlled (indicator lights often are) so it may mean nothing under PCLOS, as it may not be switching it.

Doesn't help much I know, but just letting you know you shouldn't place too much emphasis on the color of the light.

[denoobifyme]

I have an Acer netbook which also has an Atheros adapter, 5k. My wifi signal light is supposed to show green when activated. With pclos2007, it wouldn't come on at all, and I still got online. There were posts about pclos disabling this switch and having the internal wifi adapter on all the time. I never had to thumb the switch.

With 2009, the light glowed green, and I never had to thumb the switch.

Now, with 2010 (gnome), it flickers orange, varying with activity. I still don't have to thumb  the switch on, my wifi worked out of the box and is on and active by the time my desktop comes up. So with PCLOS, the light may not be sending you the right color when you do get it working.

Out in the boonies can present a problem. Besides journeying to your friends' house, invite them (or at least their laptop) back with you on your return trip, and see if their laptop can catch a viable signal. A twenty-dollar investment in a wifi finder may help you find the strongest signal spot in your house, too. Sometimes the connection will time out if the signals too weak, or won't connect below a factory-set signal strength. You may or may not be able to change this threshold.

Again, the more combinations you can find that do work, the narrower will be your list of suspects of what isn't working.

Even though installing Linux has voided your warranty, if you care to lie by omission, you might still be able to get some tech support.

Also, google your model and Help, or just HP Help, and see if it does have that internal or software switch which may be obstructing you.

Also, in your systray, does the netmonitor light show you as connecting (arrows) or connected (green checkmark)? If checkmark, your wifi is fine, connecting to your wireless router (or IP signal), but not to the internet itself. This could be a DNS misconfiguration.

If it shows connecting, the problem is probably within the confines of your laptop.

There are quite a few posts on wifi problems. Search "wifi" in the forum and settle down for quite a bit of reading.

[coffeetime]

Well, I would:

- reset wifi router
- go to PCC and delete wifi connection
- go to wifi router preferences and set it up as DHCP [unless you have static IP?] w/o encryption
- back to PCC/new connection->DHCP/no encryption

and try to establish connection.

This looks ok:

08:00.0 0280: 168c:002b (rev 01)
        Subsystem: 103c:303f
        Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 5
        Memory at f1100000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
        Capabilities: [40] Power Management version 3
        Capabilities: [50] MSI: Enable- Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit-
        Capabilities: [60] Express Legacy Endpoint, MSI 00
        Capabilities: [100] Advanced Error Reporting
        Capabilities: [140] Virtual Channel
        Capabilities: [160] Device Serial Number 00-15-17-ff-ff-24-14-12
        Capabilities: [170] Power Budgeting <?>
        Kernel driver in use: ath9k
         Kernel modules: ath9k

install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe pata_atiixp; /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install ide-controller /sbin/modprobe ide_generic; /bin/true
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe ohci_hcd; /bin/true
alias wlan0 ath9k
alias sound-slot-1 snd_hda_intel
alias eth0 r8169
alias sound-slot-0 snd_hda_intel
options snd-ac97-codec power_save=1
alias pci:v0000168Cd0000002Bsv0000103Csd0000303Fbc02sc80i00 ath9k    <---wireless
alias pci:v000010ECd00008136sv0000103Csd00003638bc02sc00i00 r8169    <---ethernet

the glowing network icon at the top of my keyboard should glow blue when enabled, and orange when disabled.  It's orange, and I can't seem to get it to do otherwise.

Network icon is actually a button, right? What happens, if you press on it? And hold it for a sec or two? Does it turn blue? At least for a sec?