Problems using Netgear WN111v2 with the driver built into the kernel

[Forester]

Hi Charlie,

Oh dear.

I don't think this is a Network Manager problem. Once you've supplied the keyring password the NM takes over and if the WLAN connection is dropped, the NM will reconnect automatically without bothering you for a password. Under Knoppix I never gave a keyring password so every now and then I get asked to enter my WPA pass phrase again, That's the NM reconnecting. The fact that you got asked for the pass phrase I think means the automatic reconnection failed.

The automatic reconnection failed, I believe because of ...

kernel: [29816.893738] ieee80211 phy0: wlan0: No probe response from AP 94:44:52:43:16:f4 after 500ms, disconnecting.

What this means it the kernel thinks your wireless interface has gone away (been unplugged). More likely it has powered down (gone into suspend or hibernation mode).

You've tried unplugging and reinsertion to get out of this disconnect problem. I seem to remember you have a laptop. Does closing the lid make it suspend/hibernate ? Does the wireless reconnect when you resume ? Have you tried closing the lid as a way either of avoiding or of getting out of this disconnect problem ?

I did a google on:

ieee80211 phy0: wlan0: No probe response

and got a lot of recent (this year) hits. There were a couple for Broadcom (b43 / bcm4318, which I think utu has), one for a Linksys WUSB600N v1 (which I think has the same chip as you do Charlie) and loads for the athk5 (which Krishna has). That does not mean they are related. Many are on mailing lists and ramble on and on without conclusion.

There is one long conversion between some well meaning chap with a problem and an expert. Basically the expert was saying if the chap had a problem he should find out exactly which change in the kernel has introduced it and then maybe the expert would look into it. Ever build the kernel yourself ? Ever done a git bisection ? The chap's problem was a disconnect at start up that was intermittent (like Krishna's). Get one bisect wrong and you're wasting your time.

Have I seen this kind of problem ? May be and I might be able to suggest a work around. I've two old laptop I sometimes use for testing. One has a cheap USB wireless and the other an old PCMCIA card wireless. Last backend I tried testing Debian squeeze installation by using the netinstall from the smallest business card iso. Not recommended. It worked fine but was slow so I left it running overnight. In the morning the wireless connections were dead (both laptops). No way to revive them short of unplugging and reinserting the device and then rescanning to remake the network connection allowing the installation to be completed.

My hypothesis os that if the wireless adapter is idle for a long time it will shut down. It will appear to disconnect from Linux and you need, at least, to unplug and reinsert. No one sees this much because wireless connections are usually idle for long enough.

Open a console and ping your router. Leave the ping running for 48 hours and see if your wireless does not disconnect. If it does not, then install ntp and all ntp to the list of SERVICES in /etc/rc.local. That should keep your wireless up and your time correct.

[Charlie Foxtrot]

Hi Charlie,

You've tried unplugging and reinsertion to get out of this disconnect problem. I seem to remember you have a laptop. Does closing the lid make it suspend/hibernate ? Does the wireless reconnect when you resume ? Have you tried closing the lid as a way either of avoiding or of getting out of this disconnect problem ?


There is one long conversion between some well meaning chap with a problem and an expert. Basically the expert was saying if the chap had a problem he should find out exactly which change in the kernel has introduced it and then maybe the expert would look into it. Ever build the kernel yourself ? Ever done a git bisection ? The chap's problem was a disconnect at start up that was intermittent (like Krishna's). Get one bisect wrong and you're wasting your time.

Have I seen this kind of problem ? May be and I might be able to suggest a work around. I've two old laptop I sometimes use for testing. One has a cheap USB wireless and the other an old PCMCIA card wireless. Last backend I tried testing Debian squeeze installation by using the netinstall from the smallest business card iso. Not recommended. It worked fine but was slow so I left it running overnight. In the morning the wireless connections were dead (both laptops). No way to revive them short of unplugging and reinserting the device and then rescanning to remake the network connection allowing the installation to be completed.

My hypothesis os that if the wireless adapter is idle for a long time it will shut down. It will appear to disconnect from Linux and you need, at least, to unplug and reinsert. No one sees this much because wireless connections are usually idle for long enough.

Open a console and ping your router. Leave the ping running for 48 hours and see if your wireless does not disconnect. If it does not, then install ntp and all ntp to the list of SERVICES in /etc/rc.local. That should keep your wireless up and your time correct.

Forester,

I tried out running knoppix briefly as a live cd on my wife's laptop, but I'm mainly running it installed on the HDD of my old Dell desktop, that's where I'm seeing this problem.

Generally, it does seem like my wireless connection dies when the machine is idle. The first time it ran successfully overnight was when I was running iwevent in a terminal window, which would probably act similar to doing a ping.

However, it has died several times when I was in the middle of surfing the web. Generally it will stay up for 3 or 4 hours at at time. For some reason it's been working for about 28 hours straight now, I'm not sure what's up.

It seems the best way to recover is hit cancel when it prompts for my credentials, which it shouldn't really have to do, since I've saved them in the keyring. This puts the adapter in disconnected mode. I generally have

tail -F /var/log/syslog

running in a terminal window. After all the activity has stopped, I remove and reinsert my adapter and then pick my wireless router from the list. If I remove adapter while linux is trying to use it, it seems to put things in a weird state and I sometimes have to do a reboot to get it to work again.

Thanks,
-Charlie

[Forester]

However, it has died several times when I was in the middle of surfing the web.

Oh dear. I'm sorry to read that. Must be a bit of nuisance. However, you seem to have a work around.

The thread I read said there is bug somewhere in the encryption. Perhaps that is what you are seeing. It wasn't clear but what was clear was that they don't know where the problem lies so little chance of a fix any time soon.

I looked at the ar9170 driver page you referenced and it says the driver is deprecated and you should be using the carl9170 driver instead. The driver is present in Knoppix but you'd need to download appropriate firmware. Both drivers a loadable modules (they aren't actually built into the kernel). If you want to try this driver, we'd need to find and change a udev rule somewhere. Let me know if you want to give it a go and I'll dig a little deeper.

[Charlie Foxtrot]

I might try playing around with the firmware later. For now, I've noticed that I'm seeing the following in dmesg:

[ 3.812719] usb 5-2: not running at top speed; connect to a high speed hub

So I've ordered an el-cheapo USB 2.0 adapter card, and will try that out. I'm wondering if it might make my connection more stable, in addition to making it faster.

-Charlie

[Forester]

So I've ordered an el-cheapo USB 2.0 adapter card, and will try that out. I'm wondering if it might make my connection more stable, in addition to making it faster.

I hope so. I did wonder when you said you had an old laptop whether you were stuck with USB 1.1.

USB 1.1 through put is about the same as 802.11 b (12 Mbps). If this forces your adapter into that mode, it will slow your WLAN down for anyone else using it. With a USB 2.0 hub you should get 802.11 g (54 Mbps) so yes it will be faster. Fast enough to watch streamed video (if your laptop can keep up).

I would hope it is more stable. Although your adapter claims to be USB 1.1 compatible, that won't have been tested as much. I've had wireless disconnects while transferring large files to another machine. I guess something couldn't take the load. Overload might be why you loose the connection while you're busy. That should get better with a USB 2 hub. You don't want the wireless going down and taking your VPN connection with it.

Interference is another possibility. Does the Network Manager report other wireless networks in your neighbourhood ? Are they on the same channel ? If so, try using a different one. It is said that things like cordless mice and cheap electrical equipment can cause interference too.

Anyway, best of luck. Let us know how you get on.