SimplyMepis 3.4.3-rc3 and wireless pcmcia netgear WG511T (802.11g)

BTW,
in mepis 343rc3 the oscenter does not report any wireless device when the card is plugged in.

ubuntu 5.10 doesn't work with that card either.

but older mepises worked fine!

can anyone help ?

I had the same problem. Exact same card. I upgraded my Mepis laptop to one of the recent RCs and the wireless stopped working. Luckily I have a wired NIC also. A friend looked at it with me and discovered that the atheros module was not compiled with the kernel. He said I'd have to redo the kernel with this compiled as a module. then we ran out of time to actually do it.

I also have a non-working USB optical mouse. It is a logitech/Microsoft mouse that came from Gateway. It also worked in prior stable versions of Mepis. All USB devices seem to have to be plugged in before boot in order to work. This is not how I expect USB to work. What's up with that?

Somewhere there is a village missing an idiot.

You might want to try ndiswrapper

That's how I get a Netgear WG311 Version 3 card to work.

Copy the Windows 2000 driver files (not the XP folder) you find on the CD that came with your card to your DEsktop.

You'll probably find the drivers under drive/Windows 2000

Then, open a terminal as root by typing SU (you'll be prompted for the root pasword). You'll need to use ndiswrapper to point to the .inf file.

You'll probably only need to do this after copying the files from your driver\windows 2000 folder to your desktop (you'll need to install with the inf file included).

Note that i need to include the actual ESSID of cockfield for mine to work. If you don't know the ESSID, login to your router and look.

cd Desktop
ndiswrapper -i WG311v3.INF
ndiswrapper -m
modprobe -r ndiswrapper
modprobe ndiswrapper
iwconfig wlan0 ESSID cockfield
dhclient

Here's an example of what I need to do for my WG311 Version 3 crd: Make sure you're root (type SU and enter a password first). I needed to remove a driver because of a conflice (ndiswrapper -r mrv8k51), but you probably won't need to do that. See if you've got any hardware recognized first using ndiswrapper -l

oot@1[Desktop]# dir
Documents konsole.desktop trash.desktop WG311v3.INF WG311v3XP.sys
Hard\ Disc\ Device MEPIS\ websites WG311v3.cat WG311v3.sys
root@1[Desktop]# ndiswrapper -l
Installed ndis drivers:
airplus driver present
bcmwl5 driver present
lsbcmnds driver present
lstinds driver present
mrv8k51 driver present, hardware present
netr33x driver present
prismnic driver present
wlanuig driver present
wlipnds driver present
root@1[Desktop]# ndiswrapper -e mrv8k51
root@1[Desktop]# ndiswrapper -i WG311v3.INF
Installing wg311v3
Forcing parameter AdhocGMode|1 to AdhocGMode|0
Forcing parameter AdhocGMode|1 to AdhocGMode|0
root@1[Desktop]# ndiswrapper -m
Adding "alias wlan0 ndiswrapper" to /etc/modprobe.d/ndiswrapper
root@1[Desktop]# modprobe -r ndiswrapper
root@1[Desktop]# modprobe ndiswrapper
root@1[Desktop]# iwconfig wlan0 ESSID cockfield
root@1[Desktop]# dhclient wlan0
Internet Systems Consortium DHCP Client V3.0.3
Copyright 2004-2005 Internet Systems Consortium.
All rights reserved.
For info, please visit http://www.isc.org/products/DHCP

Listening on LPF/wlan0/00:0f:b5:f4:79:b6
Sending on LPF/wlan0/00:0f:b5:f4:79:b6
Sending on Socket/fallback
DHCPDISCOVER on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 5
DHCPOFFER from 192.168.1.1
DHCPREQUEST on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67
DHCPACK from 192.168.1.1
bound to 192.168.1.101 -- renewal in 42744 seconds.

After getting them to work, make sure to update the "Network Configuration" information under MEPIS OS Config Center. You'll need to set your ESSID under the WiFI Tab, as in this screen print:

Then, make sure "Start at System Boot" is checked under the wlan0 Tab, as in this screen print. DHCP is already checked by Default.

[url-http://www.pbase.com/jcockfield/image/55296328/large.jpg][/url]

Jim C.

Well, those instructions look nice and thanks, but my beef remains. There is, after all, an ath0 tab in the Mepis OS Center. I think someone just forgot to compile this as a module.

Brian
Somewhere there is a village missing an idiot.

It's only a handful of commands to get the Netgear Windows 2000 drivers to work (at least it was easy with the Netgear WG311 Version 3).

Just copy the files from the Netgear CD under driver\windows 2000 (probably 4 or 5) to your desktop, open a terminal and go. I copied 'em to the desktop since the Windows 2000 folder name seemed to be causing a problem.

Substitute the .inf file for your card for WG311v3.INF. Make sure you know the ESSID if you use the Windows 2000 drivers (it needed it for my WG311 to work). Substitute the correct ESSID for cockfield

su
cd Desktop

ndiwrapper -l [optional, use ndiswrapper -l to see if a driver for your card is already installed]

ndiswrapper -i WG311v3.INF
ndiswrapper -m
modprobe -r ndiswrapper
modprobe ndiswrapper
iwconfig wlan0 ESSID cockfield
dhclient

Thanks for all your help. You prodded me to try a windows install, from which I gather the card must be damaged.

Funny how in these cases, when using linux I suspect the software, only when using windows I suspect the hardware.

http://www.mepis.org/node/8921#comment-31171

Well it doesn't get detected on windows either, and doesn't work on windows using its original CD. It must be a broken card.

Jim, I'll try the NDIS wrapper if I can find the box for the card around here. But I would like for the final release of this version to have the module compiled since there is one. This was the original reason i chose Mepis for my old laptop. Everything worked and the wireless was detected, etc. on boot. I'll send a message on the Atheros to the and put it in the vote for final posting.

Thanks,
Brian

Looky here http://kbserver.netgear.com/products/wg311.asp

Also here http://linux-wless.passys.nl/

Mike