Is this a bug? Fixing Wireless for my BCM43xx

Post Reply
Message
Author
geneven
Posts: 87
Joined: Thu 04 Oct 2007, 19:36
Location: Agoura Hills, California

Is this a bug? Fixing Wireless for my BCM43xx

#1 Post by geneven »

Ok, so I was confused looking at a log file for errors that one said "Provide' was wrong.

Then I found that the file eth1wireless (which I hadn't seen mentioned in any documentation) had the words "Provide a key" in it!

So, I replaced the words Provide a key with the key for my Wep wireless.

That solved the internet connection problem! I had made a script that solved the problem, but it appears I don't need the script any more.

But! Now I Puppy initialization crashes when I enter Puppy! However, all I have to do is enter "startx" or your equivalent, which I forget, and it starts, no problem!

How do I keep Puppy initialization from crashing? All I changed that I remember was the Provide a key line.

I am running puppy 301 beta. I'll be happy to answer other questions. This is fun!

geneven
Posts: 87
Joined: Thu 04 Oct 2007, 19:36
Location: Agoura Hills, California

More info

#2 Post by geneven »

On looking back at the log file, it now says something like

Error for wireless request "Set Encode" (8B2A)

So that obviously has something to do with encryption.

I see that this question pops up often by Googling, but I havent' found an answer yet that I know offhand how to implement.

Bruce B

#3 Post by Bruce B »

How do I keep Puppy initialization from crashing? All I changed that I remember was the Provide a key line.
If it boots when you type 'startx' with no problems, you might boot to the prompt, then startx

If booting from cd disc: puppy pfix=nox

If boot from grub, add: pfix=nox

Or you can edit /etc/profile and comment out the line that says: exec xwin

Now this is obviously a workaround, but it started with your workaround and maybe you need another.

Who knows? You are also a beta tester as you well know.

geneven
Posts: 87
Joined: Thu 04 Oct 2007, 19:36
Location: Agoura Hills, California

Further info

#4 Post by geneven »

Yes! Commenting out exec xwin got me in without hitting Ctrl-C and waiting a long time. All I have to do is type startx and hit Enter.

And,to my continued surprise, my Internet connection works great with no further delay. So, though I get that weird error message, on some level the system is accepting my WEP key.
That is what really confuses me.

Thanks for the rapidfire response!

geneven
Posts: 87
Joined: Thu 04 Oct 2007, 19:36
Location: Agoura Hills, California

Whoa, what does this mean?

#5 Post by geneven »

I have reinstalled Puppy cleanly and ran into a very puzzling phenomenon related to the above-mentioned problem.

If I type iwconfig on first entering Puppy, it tells me that my essid is geneven

But I can't connect to the Internet.

If I then issue the following

iwconfig essid geneven

I can get on the Internet! In other words, if I tell the system what it just told me, it lets me connect!

What does this mean?

Here is the session, one of many I experimented with, rebooting between tests:


eth1 IEEE 802.11b/g ESSID:"geneven" Nickname:"Broadcom 4306"
Mode:Managed Frequency=2.437 GHz Access Point: 00:0F:66:2A:FF:5E
Bit Rate=1 Mb/s Tx-Power=15 dBm
RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Encryption key:<it put my key here> Security mode:open
Link Quality=78/100 Signal level=-48 dBm Noise level=-43 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:1 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0

# ping www.google.com
<here I gave it plenty of time to respond, but nothing. I hit Ctrl-C to get back to being able to issue commands>


# iwconfig eth1 essid "geneven"
<then I associate the essid with eth1>

# ping www.google.com
PING www.google.com (74.125.19.103): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 74.125.19.103: seq=0 ttl=238 time=93.7 ms
64 bytes from 74.125.19.103: seq=1 ttl=238 time=35.9 ms
64 bytes from 74.125.19.103: seq=2 ttl=238 time=37.3 ms
64 bytes from 74.125.19.103: seq=3 ttl=238 time=37.3 ms

--- www.google.com ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 4 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 35.9/51.0/93.7 ms

Post Reply