Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

rettie · 2008-08-17 12:55:43

Hello everyone! I've just moved from Ubuntu to the newest verson of 32-bit Arch, and the difference in speed is impressive however, I am having a nightmare with my wireless set-up and after trolling through guides and the wiki I have to ask for help. I actually installed Arch using my wireless connection first (using the FTP/HTTP install) with very few problems once I realised I needed to use wlan0. However after the install wlan0 didn't exist anymore and only the two non-wireless interfaces eth0 and lo came up using "ifconfig -a". So I re-installed using my wired connection, where the same problem now exists.

After much looking I found a thread which recommended:

rmmod iwl3945
modprobe iwl3945

And hey! wlan0 was back! But when I tried to scan using it:

wlan0     Interface doesn't support scanning : Network is down

When trying to bring this interface "up" I get the error:

SIOCSIFFLAGS: No such file or directory

I don't know what this means, and couldn't find a thread to fix it. I'm using a Lenovo 3000 n200 laptop with an Intel PRO/wireless 3945ABG card and a Broadcom BCM5906M PCM Express card. It would also seem I have to repeat the first step to get wlan0 back after every boot? Let me know what information would be useful for the forum to help fix this (I'm a bit of a noob haha)

Cheers!

vicayres · 2008-08-17 20:36:05

I had a problem with my Intel 3945 when I upgraded the kernel to 2.6.26. I had to downgrade to kernel26 2.6.25 to get it working again.

I use netcfg to connect but trying to connect manually (with 2.6.26) I couldn't set the channel to 12. I can't remember if my error message was the same as yours but yours is certainly one I've seen before.

rettie · 2008-08-17 21:10:35

I see, how would I go about down-grading the kernel? Is a case of just forcing it through pacman (like I said, I'm a bit of noob)? Did you use the iwl3945 module or the ipw3945 (I think this one is older) btw? Any help would be appreciated, this is starting to hack me off!! Wireless works fine on ubuntu and windows. On an unrelated note: you're from Scotland? I'm from Scotland too! w00t I guess haha

thayer · 2008-08-17 21:54:47

Before you start downgrading kernels and potentially opening a bigger can of worms, show us your rc.conf and explain how you're bringing up the network and what you are using to manage your wifi connections (e.g. networkmanager, wicd, etc.). Also, I assume you have read the wiki entry on Wireless Setup?

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wireless_Setup

I just revised the article myself (I use the iwl3945 driver) to make things a bit clearer.

Cosay · 2008-08-18 14:05:38

rettie wrote:

I actually installed Arch using my wireless connection first (using the FTP/HTTP install) with very few problems once I realised I needed to use wlan0. However after the install wlan0 didn't exist anymore and only the two non-wireless interfaces eth0 and lo came up using "ifconfig -a". So I re-installed using my wired connection, where the same problem now exists.

That happened to me too. I got wireless networking working for a ftp install and everything went well. After installation, I quickly realized that the wireless tools were not installed as part of base, so I reinstalled again but I was still down because I forgot to install the RT61 wireless firmware (I only figured this out after looking using the dmesg command to look for errors). The next install I got everything right and I was up and running.

rettie · 2008-08-18 21:52:48

@ thayer Sorry for the delay, the main parts of my rc.conf are here (apologies if there's a nicer way of presenting this):

# HARDWARE
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
#
# MOD_AUTOLOAD: Allow autoloading of modules at boot and when needed
# MOD_BLACKLIST: Prevent udev from loading these modules
# MODULES: Modules to load at boot-up. Prefix with a ! to blacklist.
#
# NOTE: Use of 'MOD_BLACKLIST' is deprecated. Please use ! in the MODULES array.
#
MOD_AUTOLOAD="yes"
#MOD_BLACKLIST=() #deprecated
MODULES=(tg3 !ipw3945 iwl3945 snd-mixer-oss snd-pcm-oss snd-hwdep
snd-page-alloc snd-pcm snd-timer snd snd-hda-intel soundcore)

# NETWORKING
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
#
# HOSTNAME: Hostname of machine. Should also be put in /etc/hosts
#
HOSTNAME="arch"

# Use 'ifconfig -a' or 'ls /sys/class/net/' to see all available interfaces.
#
# Interfaces to start at boot-up (in this order)
# Declare each interface then list in INTERFACES
#   - prefix an entry in INTERFACES with a ! to disable it
#   - no hyphens in your interface names - Bash doesn't like it
#
# DHCP:     Set your interface to "dhcp" (eth0="dhcp")
# Wireless: See network profiles below
#
eth0="dhcp"
wlan0="dhcp"
INTERFACES=(eth0 wlan0)

# Routes to start at boot-up (in this order)
# Declare each route then list in ROUTES
#   - prefix an entry in ROUTES with a ! to disable it
#
gateway="default gw 192.168.0.1"
ROUTES=(gateway)

# Enable these network profiles at boot-up.  These are only useful
# if you happen to need multiple network configurations (ie, laptop users)
#   - set to 'menu' to present a menu during boot-up (dialog package required)
#   - prefix an entry with a ! to disable it
#
# Network profiles are found in /etc/network.d
#
# This now requires the netcfg package
#
#
NETWORKS=(main)

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
# DAEMONS
# -----------------------------------------------------------------------
#
# Daemons to start at boot-up (in this order)
#   - prefix a daemon with a ! to disable it
#   - prefix a daemon with a @ to start it up in the background
#
DAEMONS=(syslog-ng network netfs crond @hal @fam @laptop-mode)

I'm using wireless_tools (which I installed using my wired connection) and just following the wireless guide to bring it up i.e.

ifconfig wlan0 up

Now my wireless light is on (on my laptop) which is a good sign. However when I "iwconfig" to my wireless (which is picked up using iwlist wlan0 scan) and then "dhcpcd wlan0" to bring up the network interface (just following the steps from the Wireless Setup) I get no output and cannot ping. Also I have to repeat removing and probing the iwl3945 module upon start-up in order to get wlan0 to appear. I re-installed the iwlwifi-3945-ucode firmware but still no wlan0 on start up (as in the Wireless Setup guide). I think I've added it to my modules correctly above, still no wlan0 on start up.

@Corsay my dmesg output is here: http://pastebin.com/m4c6daf7b you'll notice on line 371 iwl3945 has failed. I don't know why, maybe the source of all my problems? Am considering a re-install of Arch tomorrow just to see if everything can be fixed by setting up wireless in the correct order as you mentioned...

Thanks for your speedy replies, keep em coming! Let me know what other info is needed!

*EDIT* the command I'm using to connect to wireless network is "iwconfig" NOT "ifconfig" as I had before, that's what I meant.

Last edited by rettie (2008-08-19 08:18:59)

cjpembo · 2008-08-19 01:19:53

I have a Lenovo 3000 N100 with the most up to date kernel and wireless works great.

Just do this:

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wicd

Rember to blacklist the old 3945 driver: (!ipw3945) BEFORE you enable the new 3945 driver (iwl3945). In addition, if using wicd, disable the network daemon (!network) and load the wicd daemon (@wicd). There is a little more: just carefully read and folllow the directions in the wicd wiki.

Chris

thayer · 2008-08-19 03:26:34

rettie wrote:

@ thayer Sorry for the delay, the main parts of my rc.conf are here (apologies if there's a nicer way of presenting this):

No worries. I don't have much time to look over the details tonight, but I'll see what I can come up with (hopefully someone might have some advice too). This might be a stupid question, but...are you running all of these commands as root (or with sudo)? I just noticed the wiki doesn't specify this properly (I have since fixed this), but you won't get any results if you're running any of these commands as a normal user.

rettie · 2008-08-19 07:58:46

Cheers cjpembo, will look into using Wicd, is it good for roaming? I was looking at Network Manager for this capability, plus I'm pretty sure I used it on Ubuntu. This is probably getting ahead of myself a bit but in the wiki

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/NetworkManager

There's a note about if you can't get an IP address using dhcp (near the bottom under Configuration) and you add a line to /etc/dhclient.conf where aa:bb:cc:dd:ee:ff is the MAC-address of this nic. What's a nic? At the mo I'd settle to just be able to get wlan0 on start up or ping google though!

Yep, pretty sure I'm doing all networking tasks as root, will double check when I get home. Should I have "wireless_tools" somewhere in my rc.conf?

Thanks guys good advice!

Last edited by rettie (2008-08-19 08:26:04)

peart · 2008-08-19 08:25:41

Hello rettie,

I saw you are getting error -12 in your dmesg, and I remember seeing someone else getting this recently. So I googled and found a bug report on iwlwifi's bug tracker: http://www.intellinuxwireless.org/bugzi … gi?id=1212 (error -12 would give bug #1212, of course).

Others have had problems similar to yours and have fixed them by compiling the crypto modules and mac80211 statically into the kernel. With their new kernel, there is no need to modprobe the module a 2nd time. You may want to give this a try.

Ciao.

vicayres · 2008-08-19 21:11:53

Hello rettie,

You will get the MAC address from

ifconfig wlan0

It's shown as "HWaddr"

You don't need wireless-tools in /etc/rc.conf

FWIW, I had another try with kernel26-2.6.26-2 (I'm using iwl3945). It doesn't work! I use netcfg and, running it manually gives

Wireless association failed

If I try to manually configure it, it seems that I can set the essid but not the Access Point or Channel.

Rebooting with kernel26-2.6.25-11, netcfg works and I get connected.

If you installed from the Arch 2008.6 Core CD, there is a 2.6.25 kernel on it. If you did an ftp install, I'm not qualified to advise on how to get a 2.6.25 kernel.

cjpembo · 2008-08-20 02:15:45

I know some of you are having trouble with recent kernels; my kernel is (uname -r) 2.6.26-ARCH (the most recent kernel obtained via pacman -Syu) and it works fine with the 3945 intel chip using the newer in-kernel driver.

The only items in my rc.conf regarding networking are the following:

MODULES=( .... !8139cp 8139too !ipw3945 iwl3945 .... ) // I blacklist the incorrect wired (8139cp) and wireless (ipw3945) modules before loading the correct wired (8139too) and wireless (iwl3945) modules
...
eth0="dhcp" // I don't let wicd configure my wired connection, so I just do it here
INTERFACES=(eth0)
...
DAEMONS=(.... !network @dbus @wicd...) // looks like I disabled the wired ethernet I configured above

You asked about roaming and using wicd:

I live in a rural area and can only get one wireless signal at a time. I configured wicd for my home network and a wireless network at a neighbor's house. Roaming from my network to the neighbor's does not work. The wicd web site claims to "automatically connect at resume from suspend". I have not tried suspending the machine in one network and waking in another; nor have I tried suspending and waking in the same wireless network.

Chris

rettie · 2008-08-20 22:13:24

I have fixed the problem!! will post my solution tomorrow but in short, I used the ipw3945 module (depreciated) which brought up eth1 as my wireless interface and I then configured netcfg and viola!! Going to try and set up knetworkmanager, will include if it works! btw KDEmod is the balls!

vicayres · 2008-08-22 21:21:08

Well, just for the record, I tried ipw3945. Nada.

I tried compiling my own kernel with MAC and crypto modules builtin. Nada.

I tried wicd. Nada.

I tried networkmanager. Nada.

Sacrificed a couple of chickens and danced naked round the garden (a b..... stupid thing to do in northeast Scotland at any season!) Nada.

Kernel26-2.6.26 will not drive my laptop's Intel 3945 card, although it's fine on my (wired connection) desktop box. Kernel26-2.6.25 works fine on my laptop with netcfg, wicd, networkmanager and manual configuration.

rettie · 2008-08-25 22:06:38

Right so like I said before, in order to get wlan0 up I had to manually remove the iwl3945 module and then modprobe it. Now it's probably simple to write a start-up script to do this but I re-installed arch and upon seeing that it made no difference I decided to try the depreciated iwp3945 modules. Following the instructions in Wireless Setup on the wiki I got a new interface, a wireless interface; eth1. After setting up netcfg using this interface and rebooting, wireless was working!

Apologies if this isn't a very in depth solution, but I'd just be repeating the wiki if I put in the commands haha. Also got knetworkmanager working with it, just following the wiki, god I love that thing! Thanks for all your help everyone, I now have a whole raft of other problems to fix so will be needing your help again no doubt!

@vicayres hmmmm ah well, at least it's working! It is strange though, I didn't try downgrading the kernel, would you like to post instructions or a link to some as I certainly wouldn't know how to do it...

rettie · 2008-09-02 20:24:13

(sigh) I recently upgraded my kernel (pressed "y" just a second too soon, that'll teach me) and wireless was not working.

"Intel Corporation Wireless 3945 AGB not found"

or something like that when the ipw3945d daemon was started on boot. Anyways I've since gone back to the iwl3945 module, which as I said in the first post, I had to remove and then probe the module everytime I booted up to get wlan0 working. I can't find a solution to this bar using a quick start-up script (just make executable (sudo chown +x <file>, and put in /.kde/Autostart). This works excellently, think arch starts about 5 seconds faster too now that it doesn't bother telling me that it can't find wlan0!

#! /bin/bash
rmmod iwl3945
modprobe iwl3945
ifconfig wlan0 up
iwconfig wlan0 essid <network> key <WEP key>
dhcpcd wlan0

Hardly difficult or ground-breaking I know, might help one other fellow noob out there though lol

Hessiess · 2008-09-02 23:13:18

I also have a 3945ABG wireless card, everything seems to work fine, I can scan for networks fine, it seems to connect except that I cannot ping anything. im using iwl3945. Also I would like to avoid compiling a new kernel if passable.

rettie · 2008-09-03 12:00:11

Have you tried rmmod'ing and then modprobing the iwl3945 module, then starting up wireless and connecting again? I had your exact problem at one point, I could scan and connect to the network but couldn't ping... remember to

dhcpcd wlan0

if using wireless-tools after connecting to the network and, if that fails, try the rrmod method. Let us know your results!

Hessiess · 2008-09-03 16:10:55

just tried rmmod and modprobeing iwl3945, then ran dchpcd, still no ping.

ifconfig

[a@a-laptop ~]$ ifconfig
eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:16:D3:08:DF:BE  
          inet addr:192.168.1.87  Bcast:192.168.1.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          inet6 addr: fe80::216:d3ff:fe08:dfbe/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:174 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:215 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 
          RX bytes:75612 (73.8 Kb)  TX bytes:33458 (32.6 Kb)

lo        Link encap:Local Loopback  
          inet addr:127.0.0.1  Mask:255.0.0.0
          inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
          UP LOOPBACK RUNNING  MTU:16436  Metric:1
          RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:0 
          RX bytes:0 (0.0 b)  TX bytes:0 (0.0 b)

wlan0     Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:13:02:8E:AA:45  
          UP BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 
          RX bytes:0 (0.0 b)  TX bytes:0 (0.0 b)

wmaster0  Link encap:UNSPEC  HWaddr 00-13-02-8E-AA-45-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00  
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 
          RX bytes:0 (0.0 b)  TX bytes:0 (0.0 b)

[a@a-laptop ~]$ ping 92.68.1.1
PING 92.68.1.1 (92.68.1.1) 56(84) bytes of data.
From 192.168.1.87 icmp_seq=2 Destination Host Unreachable

[a@a-laptop ~]$ sudo iwlist wlan0 scanPassword: 
wlan0     Scan completed :
          Cell 01 - Address: 00:19:7D:CA:DC:0D
                    ESSID:"Livebox-8780"
                    Mode:Master
                    Channel:1
                    Frequency:2.412 GHz (Channel 1)
                    Quality=52/100  Signal level=-77 dBm  Noise level=-89 dBm
                    Encryption key:off
                    Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s
                              24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s; 9 Mb/s
                              12 Mb/s; 48 Mb/s
                    Extra:tsf=0000000ec8044386

[a@a-laptop ~]$

edit:

OK, so it now works if I boot without the LAN cable connected

edit2:

I think ive fixed it, wicd combined with unloading/reloading the module works perfectly, with the exception that it wont resume after suspend/hibernate.

Last edited by Hessiess (2008-09-03 17:35:47)

Arch Linux

#1 2008-08-17 12:55:43

Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#2 2008-08-17 20:36:05

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#3 2008-08-17 21:10:35

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#4 2008-08-17 21:54:47

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#5 2008-08-18 14:05:38

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#6 2008-08-18 21:52:48

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#7 2008-08-19 01:19:53

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#8 2008-08-19 03:26:34

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#9 2008-08-19 07:58:46

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#10 2008-08-19 08:25:41

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#11 2008-08-19 21:11:53

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#12 2008-08-20 02:15:45

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#13 2008-08-20 22:13:24

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#14 2008-08-22 21:21:08

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#15 2008-08-25 22:06:38

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#16 2008-09-02 20:24:13

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#17 2008-09-02 23:13:18

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

#18 2008-09-03 12:00:11

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#19 2008-09-03 16:10:55

Re: Hello! Another wireless help post (please help)

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