weird bcm43xx behaviior in FC5

[arc2v]

Okay, with very little fuss I got the bcm43xx driver working on my gateway M675 laptop. Once I got the firmware ripped, it setup like a breeze.

After some minor trial and error, I got it to come up on boot automatically and I was surprised how fast it linked with the router and got an IP address (this takes minutes on Win).

However, that was at home this weekend. Now I am at work and not using the wireless. It tries to come up, but since my SSID is not available it aborts and I get an IP address from the ethernet cable.

Last night I go home and fire up the laptop. Nothing. It tries to get an IP address but fails. I boot to windows and that works with the wireless, so I know it's not a hardware issue. I open the Network configuration tool and delete the device. When I re-add it, nothing. So I remove the device, reboot, then readd it and it works. Weird.

Now I'm back at work and of course, the wireless doesn't boot. I'm wondering if it will work when I get home again.

Any ideas why this would happen? The key, SSID, and all looked fine in the config tool and the files.

All help appreciated,
AC

[landoncz]

I think maybe you don't have your wireless eth setup to come "up" on bootup automatically. To do this type system-config-network as root and open up the network configuration manager. Select your wireless eth device and click the "Edit" button. There you will see options for "activate on boot" and "allow users to activate", etc. You probably just need to check that box...

[arc2v]

No, it's setup to come up on boot. During the boot process, it says: trying to get IP information for eth1. The wireless light comes on, then the status message says Failed, and the light goes off. The error is "no link present: check ethernet cable?".

During a "good" bootup, it gets to that item and takes about 5 seconds to light up, get the IP address, and move on. As long as I stayed home, it came up at startup multiple times. It was only when I went to work where the wireless could find no router to link to that I had problems. It seems like somehow a failed bootup is ruining the configuration. Although I don't see how . . .

[arc2v]

Okay, a follow-up.

It seems if I turn off the radio for the wireless card in Windows, it affects bootup in Linux. If I have it on in Windows then reboot to linux, everything is fine. So there must be some sort of "state" flag that can only be set in windows and even though Linux seems to have the ability to turn the radio on and off, this flag can somehow affect the reliability at startup. Weird.

I don't like hassels to make things work, but since I found a solution, it's still better than relying on Microsoft :)

AC

[King Austria]

I`ve got the same problem with ndiswrapper well i had to write a shell script because the startup script does not work!
Sometimes the network config works sometimes not! I was not able to find out why but I`m thinking that there is a problem with my wep keys in direction dhclient in my case!