Getting Intel 3945 to work

Fri Nov 14 00:41:33 GMT 2008

On Thu, 2008-11-13 at 19:13 -0500, Mac wrote:
> email message attachment, "Forwarded message - Re: Jack/Ardour
> impressions"
> > -------- Forwarded Message --------
> > From: Gustin Johnson <gustin at echostar.ca>
> > To: suemac at empire.net
> > Cc: ubuntu-studio-users at lists.ubuntu.com
> > Subject: Re: Jack/Ardour impressions
> > Date: Mon, 03 Nov 2008 14:21:26 -0700
> > 
> > >> Do you have the kernel module loaded?
> > >> 
> > >> lsmod |grep iwl

Results:
iwl3945                96244  0 
lbm_iwl_mac80211      242292  1 iwl3945
rfkill                  8596  2 iwl3945
led_class               6020  1 iwl3945
lbm_iwl_cfg80211       33248  2 iwl3945,lbm_iwl_mac80211

> > >> 
> > >> If not what happens when you try to load it?
> > >> 
> > >> sudo modprobe iwl3945

There is no output from this command

> > >> 
> > >> Check the output from dmesg (only the last couple of lines are
> > >> likely to be relevant).

.....
[   29.360309] iwl3945: Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG/BG Network
Connection driver for Linux, 1.2.26k
[   29.360313] iwl3945: Copyright(c) 2003-2008 Intel Corporation
.....
[   29.468763] iwl3945: Detected Intel Wireless WiFi Link 3945ABG
.....
[   29.557540] iwl3945: Tunable channels: 11 802.11bg, 13 802.11a
channels
[   29.580964] phy0: Selected rate control algorithm 'iwl-3945-rs'
[   29.670078] ACPI: PCI interrupt for device 0000:0b:00.0 disabled
[   29.670149] input: 3945ABG
as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1c.1/0000:0b:00.0/input/input13
[   30.203941] sky2 eth0: enabling interface
[   30.518012] lp: driver loaded but no devices found
[   30.686343] Adding 3542292k swap on /dev/sda5.  Priority:-1 extents:1
across:3542292k
[   30.729175] NET: Registered protocol family 10
[   30.729406] lo: Disabled Privacy Extensions
[   30.729744] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready
[   31.320238] EXT3 FS on sda3, internal journal
[   32.382492] sky2 eth0: Link is up at 10 Mbps, half duplex, flow
control none
[   32.384487] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_CHANGE): eth0: link becomes ready
[   32.573367] ip_tables: (C) 2000-2006 Netfilter Core Team
[   33.001876] No dock devices found.
[   34.068232] apm: BIOS not found.
[   34.197023] ppdev: user-space parallel port driver
[   34.338681] audit(1226620360.341:2): type=1503
operation="inode_permission" requested_mask="a::" denied_mask="a::"
name="/dev/tty" pid=5452 profile="/usr/sbin/cupsd" namespace="default"
[   37.766259] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:0b:00.0[A] -> GSI 17 (level,
low) -> IRQ 17
[   37.766401] PM: Writing back config space on device 0000:0b:00.0 at
offset 1 (was 100102, writing 100106)
[   37.811838] Registered led device: iwl-phy0:radio
[   37.811874] Registered led device: iwl-phy0:assoc
[   37.811902] Registered led device: iwl-phy0:RX
[   37.811930] Registered led device: iwl-phy0:TX
[   37.832919] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): wlan0: link is not ready
[   37.891912] Bluetooth: L2CAP ver 2.9
[   37.891919] Bluetooth: L2CAP socket layer initialized
[   37.983255] Bluetooth: RFCOMM socket layer initialized
[   37.983272] Bluetooth: RFCOMM TTY layer initialized
[   37.983275] Bluetooth: RFCOMM ver 1.8
[   40.545170] eth0: no IPv6 routers present
[   52.559516] CPU0 attaching NULL sched-domain.
[   52.559525] CPU1 attaching NULL sched-domain.
[   52.586829] CPU0 attaching sched-domain:
[   52.586837]  domain 0: span 03
[   52.586841]   groups: 01 02
[   52.586847] CPU1 attaching sched-domain:
[   52.586850]  domain 0: span 03
[   52.586853]   groups: 02 01
[  138.668074] sky2 eth0: Link is down.
[  169.265804] sky2 eth0: disabling interface
[  169.285421] sky2 eth0: enabling interface
[  169.289859] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready
[  238.063518] sky2 eth0: Link is up at 10 Mbps, half duplex, flow
control none
[  238.066985] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_CHANGE): eth0: link becomes ready
[  241.006159] eth0: no IPv6 routers present

> > > 
> > > At this point I believe that iwl is blacklisted and ipw is loaded.
> > 
> > This is probably the problem, I think you are loading the wrong drivers.
> >   What happens when you modprobe iwl3945?
> > 

See above

> > Also, check the /lib/firmware directory as this card requires firmware
> > to be loaded thanks to your FCC.
> > > 

ls /lib/firmware
2.6.24-16-generic  2.6.24-21-rt                 mixart
vx
2.6.24-19-generic  digiface_firmware.bin        multiface_firmware.bin
2.6.24-19-rt       digiface_firmware_rev11.bin
multiface_firmware_rev11.bin
2.6.24-21-generic  ea    

At the time was booted in 2.6.24-21-generic

ls /lib/firmware/2.6.24-21-generic
....
ipw2100-1.3.fw
ipw2100-1.3-i.fw
ipw2100-1.3-p.fw
ipw2200-bss.fw
ipw2200-ibss.fw
ipw2200-sniffer.fw
isl3877
isl3886
isl3887usb_bare
isl3890
isl3890usb
iwlwifi-3945-1-lbm.ucode
iwlwifi-3945-1.ucode
iwlwifi-3945.ucode
iwlwifi-4965-1.ucode
iwlwifi-4965-2-lbm.ucode
iwlwifi-4965.ucode
iwlwifi-5000-1-lbm.ucode
....

> > > This is after installing a back port then doing the iwl remove/add
> > > ipw by hand and lots of etc.
> > > 
> > I am going to guess that you messed something up.  I can tell you that I
> >  use the iwl3945 everyday (I also put an iwl4965 in my Acer One netbook,
> > and it is also rock solid).  I did nothing complicated in either of
> > these cases to get the Intel WiFI adaptors working.
> > 
> > > I'm 30 mile away from that machine at the moment, so I can't qoute
> > > the results from a lsmod, modprobe, etc.
> > > 
> > Let us know what you find when you get back to that machine.
> > 
> > > One clue that I've not had time to chase is: my gateway box is an
> > > openbsd machine running packet filtering. On occasion, when I reboot
> > > the machine in question or possibly  = unplug the wired and do a
> > > network restart, I see a message on the gateway machine that says the
> > > arp info for the ip address of the wired interface had been over
> > > written. (I have wireless set to a different ip than the wired
> > > interface.)
> > 
> > Before chasing this down, double check the basics.  Likely something
> > simple is the culprit (IMO the likely candidate is that you have no
> > firmware installed in /lib/firmware/).

Gustin,

I have included the output from the commands you asked about.

Does this provide any clue?

Below is the content of my hosts file:

127.0.0.1 localhost

# The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts
127.0.1.1 dell-desktop
::1 ip6-localhost ip6-loopback
fe00::0 ip6-localnet
ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
ff01::1 ip6-allnodes
ff02::2 ip6-allrouters
ff03::3 ip6-allhosts

When I got the machine Dell had left a bunch of their hosts defined, I
got over eager and whacked a bunch so I figure I'll cover all the
bases...

Mac