Enabling the Wireless on a Laptop

[rlsj]

Equipment: An Acer laptop, originally Vista, now running Debian Etch. It has 802.11G wireless that worked with Vista but does not work with Debian. It also has a wired Ethernet connection to the LAN and thus to the Internet, which I am using now (eth0). I want to enable the wireless link for use while traveling.

"lspci" (as root) returns, among other things,
"00:14.0 Bridge: nVidia Corporation MCP51 Ethernet Controller (rev a3)"
which I assume is the wired NIC presently assigned as eth0, and
"04:05.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications, Inc. AR5005G 802.11abg NIC (rev 01)"
which I assume is the wireless NIC.

But "iwconfig" returns only
"lo no wireless extensions.

"eth0 no wireless extensions.

"sit0 no wireless extensions."

Apparently my kernel recognizes the wireless NIC but won't use it.

I hope there's a software switch somewhere with which I can enable wireless operations (the hardware switch is ON), but a couple days' reading of wireless HOW-TOs hasn't revealed it. I'd like to make eth1 mean the wireless NIC, perhaps using the "alias" command, but what device do I make eth1 reference? Ideally at boot the system would look for a wireless connection if the wired cable were disconnected.

Would someone please point me in the right direction?

--Robert Smith

[HROAdmin26]

You need to install a driver for the wireless NIC. For the Atheros chipset, most people use the MadWifi driver.

Debian Instructions

[rlsj]

Thank you very much, HROAdmin26! Problem solved! It turned out that Atheros and Madwifi were the keywords for this. Who would've thought it: "mad wifey?" Sheesh!

If anyone else runs across this problem, the total solution may be found at:
UserDocs/Distro/Debian/MadWifi]UserDocs/Distro/Debian/MadWifi]UserDocs/Distro/Debian/MadWifi - madwifi.org - Trac

I followed those instructions slavishly -- without the slightest idea of what I was doing -- and on the second reboot it worked perfectly. I don't understand that part either but have noticed that some Debian downloads only work after an immediate reboot AND sitting all night soaking in powerlessness.

--Robert Smith

[alethiophile]

Quick question: I have Intel PRO/Wireless 2100. Is this Atheros chipset?

[coopstah13]

should start your own thread instead of hijacking, but the answer is no

[emerica]

Quick question: I have Intel PRO/Wireless 2100. Is this Atheros chipset?

Google the ipw2100 drivers. There should be an install guide somewhere on the net.

[rlsj]

Quick question: I have Intel PRO/Wireless 2100. Is this Atheros chipset?

Somebody answers "no." Try running "lspci" as root and see if it reports anything supporting 802.11. That's how I found out I had the Atheros chipset.

--RS

[alethiophile]

Now starting new thread.