Arch Linux

lasersquid

Member

Registered: 2011-01-15

Posts: 7

Networkmanager hangs when connecting to public wireless network

Whenever I try to connect to my university's public wireless network on my laptop, I can usually connect after a few tries, but the connection drops frequently (about every 2 minutes or so). Usually within 10 minutes, -something- hangs, and thereafter, calls to ifconfig wait forever, I can't shut down, and I can't kill processes. After a minute or two in this state, the system hangs completely.

I've never had any problems connecting to my home wireless network or any wired network. My windows laptop can connect to the university wireless fine, also.

Based on my limited knowledge, I'd guess that some system call within networkmanager isn't returning. Any thoughts on diagnosing the problem? I'm using the rtl8192se driver.

Strike0

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2011-09-05

Posts: 1,429

Re: Networkmanager hangs when connecting to public wireless network

A guess would be that your university uses a different encryption than your home wireless and that your driver has problems with that. If you search this bbs with your driver's name (and that encryption), you will also encounter a number of freeze problems when using newer kernels. However, those drivers and kernels move quick, so if you see an error in a post from 2 months ago, the error might have vanished already.
Second, you should find out the card you are using with

lspci -nn | grep Realtek

lasersquid

Member

Registered: 2011-01-15

Posts: 7

Re: Networkmanager hangs when connecting to public wireless network

That particular network is unencrypted, so I'm not sure that's the problem. My home network uses WPA2. I think it might have something to do with the IPv6 settings--I always end up with 6 or 7 inet6 lines when I ifconfig, and they change rapidly. I'm afraid I don't know the significance of this.

My wireless card is the RTL8191SEvB.

Strike0

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2011-09-05

Posts: 1,429

Re: Networkmanager hangs when connecting to public wireless network

Ok, that guess about encryption was a fair miss then. I won't guess again on that. And your description

I always end up with 6 or 7 inet6 lines when I ifconfig, and they change rapidly. I'm afraid I don't know the significance of this.

does not help me to picture what you mean. You should consider posting relevant system output next time as well as information on how you connect to it.