Wireless - RTL 8187b + wicd + wpa_supplicant - naughty behaviour
So I got as a present a Laptop, the giver was aware that I don´t use M$ anymore for some time now (about 5years) and she (my wife) did this as a surprise in the coming of our new baby girl (she took pity at my old Laptop - witch Toshiba should buy me up for historical purposes). This means she baught me a Linux running box (!!). But it also means that I did not choose the hardware, and have no heart to tell her it is CRAP!
It all started when I booted the thing and it started a Mandriva 2008.0 (2008? - you got to be kidding me) It took me about 10 minutes to download the latest Debian Testing no.1 CD and start what would be my first 64bit OS :)))
After installing the screen resolution sucked (800x600 in 16bit) this is when I started to look at the box with that "don´t you go naughty on me boy" look I learned from my mother ;-)
I quickly switched to xorg.conf edited some Modeline and was up and running a 1280x768 24bit X (about 2 hours work - I tried first to install my SiS driver from source, but it wouldn´t compile on Testing -- seems the missing file is Sid only)
Ok now I installed all my necessary packages and took out the net cable - I wanted to go upstairs and see my daughter, but was downloading a movie. Suddenly the wireless stops.
Tried to reconnect and it gave me a "wrong password" error in ' wicd '.
Weird, must be a coincidence and started checking my router ... everything fine there all other wireless gadgets running smoothly (including old dinosaur laptop - Debian Testing updated in a i386 kernel).
Then I discovered that wireless WAS working, but in a very peculiar way: when I am 2-3 meters form router it connects at normal speed and very easily, but farther form this distance it just doesn´t seem able to CONNECT, but it still correcly scans and finds the wireless networks. Sometimes I can "take the connection with me" upstairs, but it´s not reproductable enough to make it a pseudo-fix.
I thought it maybe the card, but then would it connect when I am standing besides the router? Thought it to be wpa-supplicant but the same holds true as with the card ... my guess it has something to do with POWER SAVING.
I tried
# iwconfig wlan0 power off
but it gives me:
>
Here are some outputs
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