Re: desktop pci wireless card

Greg Madden wrote:
> http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/wiki/index.php/Hardware
>
> The above link suggests that the Ralink stuff works with Linux. In the
> world of compusa there is only: Linksys, D-Link, and Belkin with no
> mention of chipsets. Can someone suggest a wireless pci card available in
> Anchorage ?
>
> TIA

Hey Greg and everybody!

At All Saints I have two PCI wireless cards that I have been trying to
get to work in linux. Ones is a Hawking HWP54G which has the rt2500
chip, and the other is a Linksys WMP54G with the rt61 chip.

I had the Hawking working for about a year or so, but either updates to
kernel and drivers or perhaps the increase in interference from other
local wireless (downtown, F Street and 8th Avenue) installations killed
the connectivity. Back in the 2.6.15 kernel days, I used ndiswrapper and
the Windows XP driver I found somewhere (I can't remember - I probably
Googled for it in any case). Then, when the 2.6.16 or maybe the 2.6.17
kernel came out I found it had an rt2500 driver. It seemed to work but
there were problems. So I tried the Linksys card.

I installed the Linsys card with the rt61 chip. There also came out at
that time an rt25xx driver with source that one could compile with the
target kernel version to work with several of the chips, apparently
including the rt61. I never could get the Linksys to connect using the
various combinations of drivers and kernels. I did note the 2.6.18 (I
think) kernel on the AMD64 box had a broken nVidia ethernet driver, but
that is a different story.

So, this afternoon (Thursday, 13SEP2007) I will again be wrestling with
these two cards. An additional problem is moving to the WPA Personal
security mode. Because of the interference problem (other WiFi and the
secretary's walk-around handset which is in the 2.4GHz band) I replaced
the Buffalo AirStation with a Linksys WRT300N (draft 802.11n with MIMO -
multi-in, multi-out). I set up WPA Personal and the Rector's desktop and
laptop connect just fine. In fact, one member of the congregation showed
me his iPhone, and it was able to connect (after I gave him the
passphrase). The problem seems to be with the Linux drivers. The
wpa_supplicant software does not yet work with the free drivers, it does
work with the ndiswrapper and Windows XP combination. So, it is back to
(barf) ndiswrapper.

More later.

-- 
Mit freundlichen Grüßen / Best regards       Debian/GNU Linux
Fielder George Dowding, Chief Iceworm        "etch" Testing
dba Iceworm Enterprises, Anchorage, Alaska   User Number 269482
Since 1976 - Over 30 Years of Service.       "Seth" 186667
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