Re: wireless network problems

[Tim Folger <tfolger@myrealbox.com>]

Hi Andy,

Thanks for your advice. My Orinoco gold card uses128-bit encryption, but 
a wireless gateway I use (called the RG-1000, manufactured by Lucent)
specifies a five-character-long alphanumeric key for both computers on 
my home network.  So I'm not sure how I would go about converting that 
to a 26-character key. If you have any advice I'd appreciate it.

I also tried entering my wireless settings in /etc/pcmcia/wireless.opts, 
but I must have messed something up: my card seemed to work--it lit 
up--but KDE refused to load. So now I'm about to reinstall woody. I'm 
wondering if it would be worthwhile to do a very minimal installation, 
and then upgrade to sarge or sid (using my painfully slow dial-up 
connection)? Would a dist-upgrade also upgrade the kernel?

I can't do lsmod right now because I'm (arrgh) using Windows, but I 
think during installation I  installed the hermes and orinoco modules.

I notice that in your /etc/network/interfaces file you have "auto eth1." 
I thought I had read somewhere that including that line would interfere 
with the pcmcia module, so I didn't' include it in my file.

Tim

Andy Firman wrote:

> Damn...just realized I sent this to debian-user
> by mistake on Sunday.
>
> See below for my response to your question.
>
> Sorry for the lateness....
>
> On Sun, Dec 21, 2003 at 12:56:55PM -0500,  wrote:
>  
>
> > On Sat, Dec 20, 2003 at 07:54:54PM -0700, Tim Folger wrote:
> >    
> >
> > > I'm relatively new to Linux, and have installed debian woody with the 
> > > bf2.4 kernel. I'm having trouble getting my orinoco wireless card to 
> > > work. The card beeps during startup, and its green light flickers, but 
> > > doesn't stay on. When I run iwconfig eth1 the output gives the correct 
> > > essid and nickname, but says that the encryption key is turned off, even 
> > > though I've specified a key in /etc/network/interfaces.  Here's what 
> > > I've entered in /etc/network/interfaces:
> > >
> > > iface eth1 inet dhcp
> > > wireless_essid (my network name)
> > > wireless_mode managed
> > > wireless_key (a combination of five numbers and letters)
> > > wireless_nick (computer's nickname)
> > > wireless_channel 10
> > >
> > > Is there another parameter I need to enter to turn on wireless 
> > > encryption? Or am I missing something else?
> > >      
> > I have the same card.
> > Are you using 40 or 128 bit encryption?
> >
> > Have you tried setting encryption manually?
> >
> > Such as:
> > ~$ iwconfig eth1 enc 01234567890123456789123456
> >
> > (for 128 bit encryption there are 26 characters needed and for
> > the 40 bit encryption there are 10 characters needed...I think...
> > so if you are using only 5 characters...that may be the problem)
> >
> > Also, have you played around with /etc/pcmcia/wireless.opts ?
> > I don't use the interfaces file for the wireless settings 
> > like you do.  All my configuration in in wireless.opts
> > and the only thing in my interfaces file is this:
> >
> > auto eth1
> > iface eth1 inet dhcp
> >
> > One other thing, I remember vaguely having trouble with the 
> > bf24 kernel and wireless.  Maybe you can try to do a custom kernel?
> >
> > Also what do you have for modules?
> >
> > This is what I have when I do lsmod:
> >
> > orinoco_cs              4724   1
> > orinoco                37140   0 [orinoco_cs]
> > hermes                  6020   0 [orinoco_cs orinoco]
> >
> > Hope this gets you started in the right direction.
> >
> > Andy
> >    
>
>
>