Intel Wireless 3945ABG, problems with Knoppix 5.3.1

**alepelo** · 05-01-2008, 05:28 PM

Hi everybody!

This is my first message here and I am quite new with Knoppix. Anyway I downloaded Knoppix DVD v 5.3.1 and it's really awesome.
But I couldn't so far make my wireless card work.

This card is an Intel Wireless 3945ABG and the computer I am using is a DELL Latitude D630.

Knoppix detects wlan0 when booting and I can see the interface by typing ifconfig, but I cannot see any network with Kwifimanager, or receive any packets with WireShark, basically it is as if the interface was not working at all.

I will cut and paste the results of a couple of commands I have issued:

after typing

ifconfig wlan0 up

ifconfig
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:22:3a:12:32:43
inet addr:201.18.22.21 Bcast:201.18.22.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:14720 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:12674 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:15613374 (14.8 MiB) TX bytes:2365469 (2.2 MiB)
Interrupt:17

lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
RX packets:7 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:7 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX bytes:560 (560.0 B) TX bytes:560 (560.0 B)

wlan0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:2d:33:41:11:21
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 01-2C-79-93-33-E4-6A-24-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00
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)

and when I type:

root@Knoppix:~# ifup wlan0
Operation failed.
Failed to bring up wlan0.
root@Knoppix:~#

Please help! Coud anybody use this card with Knoppix???
Any tips will be highly appreciated

**chip.ling** · 05-05-2008, 03:17 AM

Don't have Knoppix 5.3.0 nor a Dell D630. So the following is my wild guess.
(still waiting for the cd version, download a DVD is too much to me)

Do your wireless network has ESSID setup?

The only step seems missing is the ESSID, channel and the network key.

For a network with ESSID="TEST" channel=11 network key="abcde", enter the following as root

Code:

iwconfig wlan0 essid TEST channel 11 key 6162636465

where 61 is the hex value of "a"

Then perform a

Code:

iwconfig

You should see the ESSID is set.

Then bring up the wireless device

Code:

ifconfig wlan0 up   (same as ifup wlan0)
pump -i wlan0

If this is not working, chances are Knoppix loaded a bad wireless driver on boot time. Then you may need to try the ndiswrapper.

Check out FAQ 2 & 3 at http://www.knoppix.net/wiki/Network_FAQ
and see if it help or not.

Good luck.

Rgds,
Chip