WiFi broken.. giving up!

[December]

My USB wifi card stopped working properly after some kernel upgrades a while back (WUSB11 v2.8) and I have tried everything to get it working again.. but the Berlios driver ( http://at76c503a.berlios.de/ ) wont compile with the current Kernel.

make -C /usr/src/kernels/2.6.25.11-60.fc8-i686 M=/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a KERNELRELEASE=2.6.25.11-60.fc8 modules
make[1]: Entering directory `/usr/src/kernels/2.6.25.11-60.fc8-i686'
  CC [M]  /home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.o
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c: In function ‘at76_iw_handler_get_scan’:
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2332: warning: passing argument 1 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2332: warning: passing argument 3 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2332: warning: passing argument 4 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ makes pointer from integer without a cast
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2332: error: too few arguments to function ‘iwe_stream_add_event’
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2340: warning: passing argument 1 of ‘iwe_stream_add_point’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2340: warning: passing argument 3 of ‘iwe_stream_add_point’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2340: warning: passing argument 4 of ‘iwe_stream_add_point’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2340: error: too few arguments to function ‘iwe_stream_add_point’
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2351: warning: passing argument 1 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2351: warning: passing argument 3 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2351: warning: passing argument 4 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ makes pointer from integer without a cast
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2351: error: too few arguments to function ‘iwe_stream_add_event’
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2358: warning: passing argument 1 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2358: warning: passing argument 3 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2358: warning: passing argument 4 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ makes pointer from integer without a cast
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2358: error: too few arguments to function ‘iwe_stream_add_event’
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2369: warning: passing argument 1 of ‘iwe_stream_add_point’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2369: warning: passing argument 3 of ‘iwe_stream_add_point’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2369: error: too few arguments to function ‘iwe_stream_add_point’
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2388: warning: passing argument 1 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2388: warning: passing argument 3 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2388: warning: passing argument 4 of ‘iwe_stream_add_event’ makes pointer from integer without a cast
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2388: error: too few arguments to function ‘iwe_stream_add_event’
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2407: warning: passing argument 1 of ‘iwe_stream_add_value’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2407: warning: passing argument 4 of ‘iwe_stream_add_value’ from incompatible pointer type
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2407: warning: passing argument 5 of ‘iwe_stream_add_value’ makes pointer from integer without a cast
/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.c:2407: error: too few arguments to function ‘iwe_stream_add_value’
make[2]: *** [/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a/at76_usb.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** [_module_/home/stephan/RPMS/Source/at76_usb-0.17/at76c503a] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/kernels/2.6.25.11-60.fc8-i686'
make: *** [modules] Error 2

I read some post here about how the some changes to the kernel basically broke Wifi, but no updates seem to be forth coming, and I am fed up with a long LAN cable running across 2 doorways to get to my PC from my Wireless router.

I have literally wasted days and days trying to get this to work again, it used to work fine, and I am fed up.. why can't WiFi just work. Its one of the few times I regret using Linux (the other was when I upgraded to F9 on my work PC and KDE4 was just so terrible!).

I am using F8 on this computer, Kernel 2.6.25.11-60.fc8.

Can anyone tell me if there are ANY WiFi cards that work well on F8 (and I guess F9) without having to spend hours / days in a terminal compiling and trouble shooting? If so, I'll throw this one away and go buy a new one.

Thanks

[bbfuller]

Hello December

Before you consider spending money have you thought of giving ndiswrapper a go with it?

[December]

My card is not listed as working on the NDIS Wrapper website, but I did give it a go anyway.

I get this error in the system log:

Aug 3 18:36:48 localhost loadndisdriver: loadndisdriver: load_driver(325): too many .sys files for driver netusb
Aug 3 18:36:48 localhost loadndisdriver: loadndisdriver: load_driver(358): couldn't load driver netusb
Aug 3 18:36:48 localhost kernel: ndiswrapper (load_wrap_driver:108): couldn't load driver netusb; check system log for messages from 'loadndisdriver'
Aug 3 18:36:48 localhost kernel: usbcore: registered new interface driver ndiswrapper

Googling that doesn't yield any useful info. The NDISWrapper forum didn't have anything useful.

Tried editing the .inf file for the windows driver to limit the number of .sys files, but no luck getting it to work.

I noticed some people got v2.6 of the card (I have 2.8) working by recompiling the kernel with a stacksize of 8k (apparently Fedora has 4k), but that sounds like a huge amount of work, having to manually compile the kernel each time a new version comes out.

[jtang613]

Dlink WUA-1340 USB adapters work out of the box with the rt73usb-firmware package, and can usually be found for $35 - $50.

The key is to do your research before purchasing any hardware - wifi adapter or otherwise.

[December]

Thanks, I'll try and fine one of those tomorrow. I had the other one because it's what I had before I moved over to Linux. I always research new hardware before I buy now.

I've spent 6 hours on this today, total of about 30 hours on trying to get this working. It annoys me that it used to work, and now doesn't. I guess the lesson is not to update anything on your computer if it's working! I did try to go back to an earlier kernel but ran into all sorts of Nvidia driver problems then.

I managed to get rid of the "too many .sys files" error by trying 1 sys file at a time. Each one caused the computer to hang so badly I had to hard-reset. After 7 reboots I've had enough. Been more then patient with this hardware, but I just want to USE my computer, not spend my whole weekend fixing it.

<rant>
30 hours to get some hardware that used to work, working again, and still it doesn't - that's why Linux is sadly not ready for the mainstream just yet. The card works great on my friends XP laptop (I tested to make sure it was not the actual hardware at fault). Of course it's not the developers fault by any means, if the hardware manufacturers would just make Linux drivers, we'd be fine.
</rant>

Are any wifi chips supported in the linux kernel, or are they all as add-on drivers?

[venumus]

Originally Posted by December

<rant>
30 hours to get some hardware that used to work, working again, and still it doesn't - that's why Linux is sadly not ready for the mainstream just yet. The card works great on my friends XP laptop (I tested to make sure it was not the actual hardware at fault). Of course it's not the developers fault by any means, if the hardware manufacturers would just make Linux drivers, we'd be fine.
</rant>
?

i feel ya bud. it but i think that most of us like the fact its not mainstream. people who dont care about HOW there computers and just want to listen to surf the web, listen to music, watch movies. can and should use osx and windows vista to there hearts content. but your right i dont understand why more companies dont let people WHO ARE BUYING the hardware use it to its full potential.

oh well i hope you got this sorted out...