Topic: ZoomAir 4105 wireless network card

[Rob Bracken]

I'm trying to install a ZoomAir 4105 wireless network card in my e-smith server (it's a ZoomAir 4100 in a PCI/PCMCIA adapter). I've compiled the wlan-ng drivers, and the card is detected by pcmcia, but when the hfa384x driver loads, it fails with a message "Allocate(tx) command failed" and ifconfig shows a MAC address of 00:00:00:00:00:00. I've tried the card in a Win95 laptop - it seems to work OK. I've also tried a pcmcia modem card in the adapter - it also seems to work OK, so I don't think I've got a hardware failure problem. "cardctl status" and "cardctl ident" recognise the card. "prism2_cs" shows up in "lsmod" and in "/proc/interrupts".

Anyone got any ideas?

Here's the output from the "messages" file:

Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel: Linux PCMCIA Card Services 3.2.0
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel:   kernel build: 2.2.19-7.0.8 #1 Thu Jun 21 06:28:56 EDT 2001
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel:   options:  [pci] [cardbus] [apm] [pnp]
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel: PCI routing table version 1.0 at 0xfdbe0
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel: PnP: PNP BIOS installation structure at 0xc00fbd00
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel: PnP: PNP BIOS version 1.0, entry at f0000:bd30, dseg at f0000
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel: Intel ISA/PCI/CardBus PCIC probe:
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel:   TI 1410 rev 01 PCI-to-CardBus at slot 00:0a, mem 0xdf106000
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel:     host opts

• : [pci only] [pci irq 9] [lat 32/176] [bus 32/34]

Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel:     PCI card interrupts, PCI status changes
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver cardmgr[26188]: watching 1 sockets
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver cardmgr[26189]: starting, version is 3.2.0
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel: cs: memory probe 0xa0000000-0xa0ffffff: clean.
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver cardmgr[26189]: socket 0: ZoomAir 4100 11Mb/s 802.11b WLAN Card
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver cardmgr[26189]: executing: 'modprobe prism2_cs'
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel: init_module: prism2_cs.o: 0.1.14 Loaded
Aug 13 17:11:38 myserver kernel: init_module: dev_info is: prism2_cs
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: cs: IO port probe 0x0100-0x04ff: excluding 0x1f0-0x1f7 0x200-0x207 0x330-0x337
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: cs: IO port probe 0x01f8-0x01ff: clean.
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: cs: IO port probe 0x0208-0x032f: clean.
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: cs: IO port probe 0x0338-0x04ff: clean.
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: cs: IO port probe 0x0800-0x08ff: clean.
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: cs: IO port probe 0x0a00-0x0aff: clean.
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: cs: IO port probe 0x0c00-0x0cff: clean.
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: prism2_cs: index 0x01: Vcc 5.0, irq 9, io 0x0100-0x013f
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver cardmgr[26189]: executing: './wlan-ng start wlan0'
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: hfa384x_drvr_start: Allocate(tx) command failed.
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: hfa384x_drvr_start: Failed, result=127
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver kernel: prism2sta_ifstate: hfa384x_drvr_start() failed,result=127
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver cardmgr[26189]: + Failed to enable the device, resultcode= implementation_failure .
Aug 13 17:11:39 myserver cardmgr[26189]: start cmd exited with status 1

[Duncan]

Cant really help with this one except to say that i have had this card working without any problems.

The only thing i can say is that i used the latest pcmcia drivers as opposed to using what comes standard (not sure from your post which one you used).

Regards Duncan

[Rob Bracken]

Duncan,

Thanks for your response (apologies for not responding sooner - I've been out of the office). At least I know it's possible. Also, many thanks for the instructions in your & Allen's previous posts - I wouldn't have got this far without them.

pcmcia appears to be working OK. I've installed pcmcia-cs-3.2.0 (with linux-wlan-ng-0.1.14), but I got the same result with 3.1.24. carcdctl identifies the card and makes the right sort of noises. The problem arises when cardmgr runs wlan-ng to start the driver (hfa384x_drvr), and I think this is failing because ifconfig reports a HWaddr of 00:00:00:00:00:00 (why should it report this?).

I've tried the card in a Win95 laptop, and I've tried a pcmcia modem card in the Zoom adapter - both appeared to work OK.

The only option I've put in /etc/sysconfig/pcmcia is "PCIC_OPTS="irq_mode=0"". I've put no options for prism_cs into modules.conf. I think wlan-ng.conf is OK, as the card is identified correctly. Have I missed some config somewhere?

I'm tearing my hair out here - any help would be much appreciated.

[Duncan]

Perhaps

PCMCIA=yes
PCIC=i82365

Some info here

http://www.pccard.co.uk/support/pfaq/plinux.php

Regards Duncan

[Rob Bracken]

>Perhaps
>
>PCMCIA=yes
>PCIC=i82365

Yes, I've got these set. I also had "irq_mode=0" set.

>Some info here
>
>http://www.pccard.co.uk/support/pfaq/plinux.php

Thanks - theres some interesting info there. I've run all the diagnostics I can think of. I'm coming to the conclusion that there's a hardware/BIOS problem. The PCI/PCMCIA bridge doesn't work correctly. I've tried it with an Ethernet adapter from my laptop, and the driver for that won't load either. I'll put in a message on an IBM forum & see if I get any response.

I'm doing this because we don't have ADSL or cable here, and someone is setting up a subscription wireless broadband service. They've supplied the card (it must be able to accept an external, high-gain antenna) and would install it in a Windows box, but know nothing about Linux. They also have a USB card - would this work with e-smith?

I want to use the wireless connection as my external connection on the e-smith gateway - if I get the connection working, would I be able to do this (I think I'd need to set up the wireless card as eth1, rather than wlan0)?

What about wireless/wired bridges such as the Linksys WET11 (which, I think, can take an external antenna)? Could I put a 2nd ethernet card in my server & connect through a bridge?

[Duncan]

Setting the wireless card to eth1 is a problem (i am not sure if it can be done). This makes things hard with respect to the template system. I have only ever used wireless to connect lans .

Going the access point method is the better option. My lan connects to the internet via a Marconi CDMA wireless connection thru a second nic. Works a treat.
They tend to be higher powered as well.

Regards Duncan

[Rob Bracken]

>My lan connects to the internet via a Marconi CDMA wireless connection thru a second nic.

What's one of those? Sounds expensive.

The service provider says they're using modified kit, and only a few wireless cards will work with it. I described the problems I'm having and they said "Oh yeah. We had the same sort of thing with a faulty PCI/PCMCIA adapter on a Windows box". They're going to replace my card with one that they know works. (Doh!!!). I'll let you know how I get on.

If you're interested, you can find the details at www.iap.uk.net.

[Duncan]

The Marconi units are quite expensive. But they are carrier grade and go a lot further (unaided) than typical spread units.

I am lucky, my company does the installations for the provider, so i get it free and a good rate on bandwidth otherwise i would still be on 56K. cant get ADSL where i am.

Good luck with the replacement card

Regards Duncan

[Rob Bracken]

Right. I now have a replacement PCMCIA adapter and things are moving forward. The wireless card starts & goes looking for a DHCP address.

The next problem is that I want to use the wireless card as my external interface, with the wired card as the internal (the opposite way round from the usual). The card needs to get a DHCP address from the access point, so that their network will route it through to the internet. I'm currently using the orinoco_cs driver, on "eth1". (I've also got wlan-ng working - it binds to "wlan0".) If I go to the e-smith configuration screen, eth1 doesn't show up, and orinoco_cs isn't listed in the list of drivers for the external interface. Can someone give me an overview of how e-smith sets up NAT, please, so I can configure it?

[Duncan]

Glad to hear you had success with the card. My suggestion would be to start a new thread so that people will see it.

I had a similar problem when i was playing with this. I would create some new templates pointing your gateway at the wlan0 interface so internet traffic will route out that interface.

If you look at /etc/rc.d/init.d/masq you will find the firewall and NAT configuration. Have a look towards the top and you will see OUTERIF and OUTERNET you can probably set these to the wlan0. I am thinking off the top of my head here, i am sure that more will be needed.

Bare in mind that if the system doesnt see the second nic it will make things  difficult with respect to the whole server gateway setup.

I will be interested to see your end result.

Regards Duncan

[Rob Bracken]

> Glad to hear you had success with the card. My suggestion would be to start a new thread so that people will see it.

I'll do that. See "Wireless network card as external interface". Many thanks for your support on this - it really helps to be able to bounce ideas off someone else.

    > I had a similar problem when i was playing with this. I would create some new templates pointing your gateway at the wlan0 interface so internet traffic will route out that interface.

    > If you look at /etc/rc.d/init.d/masq you will find the firewall and NAT configuration. Have a look towards the top and you will see OUTERIF and OUTERNET you can probably set these to the wlan0. I am thinking off the top of my head here, i am sure that more will be needed.

Thanks, that looks interesting.

    > Bare in mind that if the system doesnt see the second nic it will make things difficult with respect to the whole server gateway setup.

I notice that the masq script is getting the External IP from the db. How does the External IP get into the db? I suspect also that I'll have to change the order of things so that PCMCIA starts earlier in the sequence.

    > I will be interested to see your end result.

It'll be a couple of days until I can look at it, as I'm up to my eyes in paid work at the moment. I'll post the details when it's working.