ndis on 6.1-PRERELEASE

[Dan Langille]

On 7 Feb 2006 at 21:28, Bill Paul wrote:

> > I'm trying, and failing so far, to get ndis running on 6.1-PRERELEASE 
> > (Sat Feb 4).  I was using ipw but it frooze the system.
> 
> Even though there's nothing I can do about it personally and you don't
> happen to perceive it as being your primary problem, it would have been
> nice if you'd bothered to elaborate further on this.

That's in another thread.  I''ve had the same problem for about 6 or 
8 months with ipw.  It works, for a while, but then freezes the 
system up totally.

> > I have an IBM ThinkPad T41.  I grabbed the drivers from http://www-
> > 307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=MIGR-59438
> > 
> > After downloading and extracting the files from 1rwc88ww.exe, 
> > I used w70n501.inf and w70n51.sys as inputs to ndisgen.
> > 
> > When asked for firmware, I supplied w70n51.sys the input.
> 
> No, wrong. You didn't read what ndisgen said about the nature of firmware
> files. There are _extra_ files, in addition to the .inf and .sys files.
> The Intel driver doesn't have any: they compiled the firmware for the
> chip directly into the driver (which is why w70n51.sys is several megabytes
> in size -- not only did the compile it in, they did it in S-record format).
>  
> > The result was w70n51_sys.ko and w70n51.sys.ko
> 
> Go back and do it again, this time skipping the firmware by just
> hitting enter at the prompt. You should only have w70n51_sys.ko.

Will do.  That's a job for tomorrow morning.  I think we tried that, 
but I'll try it again.

> > I loaded ndis.ko, if_ndis.ko, w70n51.sys.ko, and w70n51_sys.ko (in 
> > that order).  dmesg showed:
> > 
> > ndis0: <Intel(R) PRO/Wireless LAN 2100 3B Mini PCI Adapter> mem 
> > 0xc0214000-0xc0214fff irq 11 at device 2.0 on pci2
> > ndis0: [GIANT-LOCKED]
> > ndis0: NDIS API version: 5.1
> > ndis0: Ethernet address: 00:0c:f1:27:67:f5
> 
> Looks fine so far.
> 
> > ndis0 is unable to set/retain an SSID while it is UP.  When DOWN, 
> > yes, it takes an SSID, but moving the card to UP loses the SSID:
> 
> It doesn't "lose" the SSID. It's not able to associate in the first
> place. Setting the SSID when the interface is down doesn't have any
> effect on the chip. When it's up, ifconfig will report exactly what
> the NDIS driver's current state is. (If it's not associated, it'll
> report as much.)

Ahh, thanks. That explains something I didn't know.  Cheers.

> Unfortunately, you provided very little additional information. In
> particular, you failed to report the output of "ifconfig ndis0 scan"
> to us. If the card doesn't see an AP named "foo" when you do a scan,
> it won't be able to associate.

I tried that. It finds the same APs that Windows XP finds.  And if 
finds the AP I'm interested in: DoNotUseThis

> You also failed to tell us what kind of AP you're trying to associate
> with and what security options, if any, may be set on it. You also
> didn't mention if your laptop has an RF kill switch and whether or not
> you turned it on.

It's a Linksys WAP54G.  No WEP.  I can't recall if there's any MAC 
filtering, but if there any MAC filteringt, it permits this NIC (it 
works with Windows XP and with the ipw driver).

> You should be able to just do "ifconfig ndis0 ssid <myssid> up" and have
> it associate when it starts up.

That looks familiar.  I think I tried that yesterday.  Tomorrow, I'll 
try all the above and reply again.

Thank you.

-- 
Dan Langille : Software Developer looking for work
my resume: http://www.freebsddiary.org/dan_langille.php