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caelestis

Member

Registered: 2009-04-04

Posts: 88

WIFI kill switch won't turn back on

By default, when I boot, the wireless is off. I can turn it on with ifconfig wlan0 up, but when I use the wireless kill switch, and try to use ifconfig wlan0 up I get error 132. I also want the button to turn the wirelss back on, but I don't know how. I found this package called rfkill though.

Here are some commands to explain the story:

sudo ifconfig wlan0 up
[user@myhost ~]$ rfkill list
0: acer-wireless: Wireless LAN
        Soft blocked: no      
        Hard blocked: no      
1: phy0: Wireless LAN         
        Soft blocked: no      
        Hard blocked: no      
[user@myhost ~]$ sudo ifconfig wlan0 down
[user@myhost ~]$ rfkill list
0: acer-wireless: Wireless LAN
        Soft blocked: no      
        Hard blocked: no      
1: phy0: Wireless LAN         
        Soft blocked: no      
        Hard blocked: no      
[user@myhost ~]$ sudo ifconfig wlan0 up

At this point I pressed the kill switch.

[user@myhost ~]$ sudo ifconfig wlan0 up
SIOCSIFFLAGS: Unknown error 132
[user@myhost ~]$ rfkill list
0: acer-wireless: Wireless LAN
        Soft blocked: yes
        Hard blocked: no
1: phy0: Wireless LAN
        Soft blocked: no
        Hard blocked: yes
[user@myhost ~]$ sudo rfkill unblock all
[user@myhost ~]$ rfkill list
0: acer-wireless: Wireless LAN
        Soft blocked: no
        Hard blocked: no
1: phy0: Wireless LAN
        Soft blocked: no
        Hard blocked: no
[user@myhost ~]$ sudo ifconfig wlan0 up

The only way to turn it back on is with rfkill unblock all or wifi

My wireless card is:
01:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation WiFi Link 100 Series

I really just want the kill switch to be toggable, but it doesnt turn back on. Somehow I need it to respond to rfkill events but I'm a newbie.

Oh, and one more problem:
sudo iwconfig wlan0 power on
yields
Error for wireless request "Set Power Management" (8B2C) :
    SET failed on device wlan0 ; Operation not supported.

Currently this is a big battery waste and I want to enable wireless power savings but I get that error.

I installed the 1000 series microcode from http://intellinuxwireless.org/?n=Downloads and copied it to /lib/firmware

Last edited by caelestis (2009-12-24 22:37:02)

Coacher

Guest

Re: WIFI kill switch won't turn back on

By default, when I boot, the wireless is off. I can turn it on with ifconfig wlan0 up, but when I use the wireless kill switch, and try to use ifconfig wlan0 up I get error 132. I also want the button to turn the wirelss back on, but I don't know how. I found this package called rfkill though.

Are you sure that your wireless is off? What says rfkill list just after booting without any ifconfig's?

I really just want the kill switch to be toggable, but it doesnt turn back on. Somehow I need it to respond to rfkill events but I'm a newbie.

That behavior is normal for rfkill afaik. You can't and shouldn't try to set up blocked device.

Also you don't have to install firmware manually, there is a package in core that should suit your card: http://www.archlinux.org/packages/core/ … 000-ucode/

Error for wireless request "Set Power Management" (8B2C) :
    SET failed on device wlan0 ; Operation not supported.

I've got the same output with Intel WIFI Link 5100. But

iwconfig wlan0 txpower off

disables the transmitter power for me. Try it. Power managment seems to be unsupported.

caelestis

Member

Registered: 2009-04-04

Posts: 88

Re: WIFI kill switch won't turn back on

Are you sure that your wireless is off? What says rfkill list just after booting without any ifconfig's?

It says it's not blocked, so it's on. Sorry about that.

Also you don't have to install firmware manually, there is a package in core that should suit your card: http://www.archlinux.org/packages/core/ … 000-ucode/

I had that, but I wasn't sure if that was an old driver that didnt have power management on.

I've got the same output with Intel WIFI Link 5100. But

iwconfig wlan0 txpower off

disables the transmitter power for me. Try it. Power managment seems to be unsupported.

That works, but I want power saving features to be on while the wifi is working?

I had a suspicion that it was an old driver problem because for the wiki page for my laptop on ubuntu:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AspireTimeline/Using

Any suggestions about turning the wifi on/off with the hardware switch? I can post rfkill events for when I press the button off if that helps.

Last edited by caelestis (2009-12-24 23:55:14)

Coacher

Guest

Re: WIFI kill switch won't turn back on

That works, but I want power saving features to be on while the wifi is working?
I had a suspicion that it was an old driver problem because for the wiki page for my laptop on ubuntu:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AspireTimeline/Using

Hm, I dont know the decision of this problem. Maybe it is really kernel or firmware issue.

Any suggestions about turning the wifi on/off with the hardware switch? I can post rfkill events for when I press the button off if that helps.

On my laptop I catch ACPI events with acpid from wifi switch, here is part of handler.sh:

hotkey)
        case "$3" in
           0000005d) if [ -f /var/run/wpa_supplicant_*.pid ]
                     then { echo "0" > /sys/devices/platform/asus_laptop/wlan
                            netcfg -i wlan0
                          }
                     else { echo "1" > /sys/devices/platform/asus_laptop/wlan
                            netcfg wireless_home 
                          }
                     fi;;
           esac
        ;;

and in my netcfg "wireless_home" profile I added:

# Commands to run at various stages of configuration
PRE_UP="ifconfig wlan0 down; iwconfig wlan0 txpower auto; ifconfig wlan0 up"
POST_UP=
PRE_DOWN=
POST_DOWN="iwconfig wlan0 txpower off; ifconfig wlan0 down"

and everything works fine for me.