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lonleyppl
Gerbil XP
Topic Author
Posts: 380
Joined: Wed Jan 26, 2011 2:59 pm

wi-fi weirdness

Mon May 16, 2011 10:22 pm

So I recently got my lovely ThinkPad. W520 Trying to cut costs a bit, I skimped on the Wi-Fi adapter and only got the ThinkPad option as opposed to an Intel option. Unfortunately, the Realtek 8188CE chipset used has terrible Linux support. After a few tries I finally found the driver in the openSUSE repositories. I have it installed now, but am not viewing any wireless networks, no matter my distance from the router. When I say not viewing, I mean I have opened knetworkmanager, and hit scan and not found any networks. The hardware switch is in the correct position, but just to be sure I've tested it in both spots it can be in. Sitll doesn't work. Any insight on this? (And yeah, I've tried compiling the driver from Realtek straight into the kernel. Didn't work out too well...)

ifconfig and iwconfig
linux-5mj6:********* # ifconfig
eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr **:**:**:**:**:** 
          inet addr:***.***.*.**  Bcast:***.***.*.***  Mask:255.255.255.0
          inet6 addr:****::****:****:***:***/** Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:3718 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:3415 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:3406467 (3.2 Mb)  TX bytes:513473 (501.4 Kb)
          Interrupt:20 Memory:f3b00000-f3b20000

lo        Link encap:Local Loopback 
          inet addr:127.0.0.1  Mask:255.0.0.0
          inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
          UP LOOPBACK RUNNING  MTU:16436  Metric:1
          RX packets:149 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:149 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
          RX bytes:12295 (12.0 Kb)  TX bytes:12295 (12.0 Kb)

linux-5mj6:********* # iwconfig
lo        no wireless extensions.

eth0      no wireless extensions.

wlan0     IEEE 802.11bgn  ESSID:off/any 
          Mode:Managed  Access Point: Not-Associated   Tx-Power=0 dBm   
          Retry  long limit:7   RTS thr=2347 B   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off


Lots of asterisks, I know. Just ask if you need any further information. Any help would be appreciated as I really prefer Linux to Windows for daily use.
Lenovo W520
IBM dx340
Nokia Lumia 928
Sony a7 with far too many lenses to list or even count
 
lonleyppl
Gerbil XP
Topic Author
Posts: 380
Joined: Wed Jan 26, 2011 2:59 pm

Re: wi-fi weirdness

Tue May 17, 2011 2:07 pm

So just now as I restarted my laptop to switch from openSUSE to Windows I noticed a line saying something along the lines of "modem-something or other: driver not whitelisted."
Is the firewall a plausible reason for my problem?
Lenovo W520
IBM dx340
Nokia Lumia 928
Sony a7 with far too many lenses to list or even count
 
bthylafh
Maximum Gerbil
Posts: 4320
Joined: Mon Dec 29, 2003 11:55 pm
Location: Southwest Missouri, USA

Re: wi-fi weirdness

Tue May 17, 2011 2:16 pm

That's not a firewall - probably the driver's not whitelisted because it's known to be buggy, so the kernel doesn't load it unless you force it to. Since it says modem, I'd guess that's for an actual dial-up modem (does yours have one?) and not your wireless.

What I'd do in your case is buy an Intel wireless card and replace the Realtek. Newegg's got a new-in-box 6200 for $21 plus $6 shipping:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6833106061
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kc77
Gerbil Team Leader
Posts: 242
Joined: Sat Jul 02, 2005 2:25 am

Re: wi-fi weirdness

Tue May 17, 2011 4:52 pm

This is going to sound odd, but me and OpenSuse and wifi have a long history of hatred with one another. Before buying anything try installing Ubuntu first and give that a whirl.
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Flatland_Spider
Graphmaster Gerbil
Posts: 1324
Joined: Mon Sep 13, 2004 8:33 pm

Re: wi-fi weirdness

Fri Jun 24, 2011 3:11 pm

Have you checked dmesg to to see if the driver is loading. There should be two eth connections.

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