Thanks for all the responses. It seems to be working now, though I'm not
sure why. 'network-config' kept failing at DHCP negotiations. I turned
off the firewall ('ferm'), then it worked, and now it doesn't seem to
care whether the firewall is up or not. My own rather amateurish reading
of the iptables settings don't shed any light on this, but as long as
long as I can surf the Internet from my La-Z-boy without worrying about
the Schnauzers tripping over the network cable to the router (nearly two
meters away), I'll be content.


-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Errington [mailto:[email protected]] 
Sent: Wednesday, 8 April 2009 2:51 p.m.
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Getting started with 802.11

On Wed, April 8, 2009 10:35, Nick Rout wrote:
<snip>
> I have had no real problems with ubuntu/mythbuntu 8.04 or 8.10 using
> atheros chipsets, using the standard network manager and no extra
packages.
>

Indeed, I am using Mepis 8.0, which is based on Debian Lenny, and the
stock utilities 'just work'.

The key points are:

* Ensure the correct module is loaded to drive your wifi chipset
(sometimes there may be 2 or 3 that will work, so you migh tneed to
blacklist one).
* Find a wifi utility that you like.  I used to use Kwifimanager, but
knetworkmanager seems ok to me, and I have heard wicd recommended many
times.
* Be aware that the driver might not 'come back' after a suspend, or the
wifi kill switch status may not be indicated to you by any means.  For
the
Aspire One I added a little script that stops and starts wifi0 upon
resume
(I haven't found a utility to show the status of the kill switch).

The fact that you have demonstrated the wifi working on another OS is
reassuring.  You shouldn't really have to fiddle with it in Linux these
days to get it going.  In fact, Mepis worked remarkably well for me on
my
old ThinkPad with PCMCIA wifi, and my new Aspire One.

HTH,

A





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