Wifi on Fujitsu-Siemens (Atheros chipset) - can't make it going

[MikeTbob]

I'm following along but that doesn't mean I understand it all! =-)
I thought all this crap was done by software like Madwifi, NDIS, and HAL. I guess if I had a laptop I would know more about this stuff, thanks for the heads up.

[lopata]

Is it the rf_kill suppose to be somewhere on my hdd as a standard file included with fedora or do I need to download and install it somehow? I have no rf_kill on the address /sys/bus/pci/devices/0000\:03\:00.0/rf_kill. I made some progress though. The command lsmode worked. See below Thanks.

[root@localhost ~]# lsmod
Module Size Used by
vfat 13056 1
fat 43040 1 vfat
usb_storage 79880 1
cdc_acm 16260 0
nls_utf8 5632 1
bridge 45336 0
bnep 14336 2
rfcomm 34064 4
l2cap 21632 16 bnep,rfcomm
bluetooth 46308 5 bnep,rfcomm,l2cap
fuse 47516 7
sunrpc 153876 3
ipt_REJECT 6656 2
nf_conntrack_ipv4 11528 2
iptable_filter 6528 1
ip_tables 13840 1 iptable_filter
ip6t_REJECT 7296 2
xt_tcpudp 6656 2
nf_conntrack_ipv6 15992 2
xt_state 5888 4
nf_conntrack 50132 3 nf_conntrack_ipv4,nf_conntrack_ipv6,xt_state
ip6table_filter 6400 1
ip6_tables 14864 1 ip6table_filter
x_tables 15236 6 ipt_REJECT,ip_tables,ip6t_REJECT,xt_tcpudp,xt_stat e,ip6_tables
cpufreq_ondemand 10124 2
acpi_cpufreq 11660 0
loop 17164 0
dm_multipath 18056 0
radeon 125956 2
drm 145380 3 radeon
ipv6 234428 16 ip6t_REJECT,nf_conntrack_ipv6
sr_mod 17064 1
cdrom 33304 1 sr_mod
snd_hda_intel 321692 5
snd_seq_dummy 6532 0
snd_seq_oss 29212 0
snd_seq_midi_event 9600 1 snd_seq_oss
snd_seq 44736 5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi_event
snd_seq_device 9740 3 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq
8139cp 20864 0
snd_pcm_oss 36480 0
8139too 23808 0
mii 8192 2 8139cp,8139too
snd_mixer_oss 16384 1 snd_pcm_oss
pcspkr 6272 0
snd_pcm 60676 3 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm_oss
joydev 12480 0
serio_raw 8708 0
snd_timer 20744 2 snd_seq,snd_pcm
snd_page_alloc 11016 2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm
snd_hwdep 10244 1 snd_hda_intel
snd 46136 18 snd_hda_intel,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq,snd_seq_device,s nd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_pcm,snd_timer,snd_hwd ep
soundcore 9288 1 snd
pata_atiixp 8320 1
i2c_piix4 11152 0
battery 14212 0
ac 8068 0
video 20240 0
i2c_core 20500 2 drm,i2c_piix4
output 6656 1 video
arc4 5760 2
ecb 6528 2
crypto_blkcipher 18052 1 ecb
wmi 9640 0
ath5k 111240 0
mac80211 174312 1 ath5k
cfg80211 24584 2 ath5k,mac80211
sg 30900 0
dm_snapshot 18468 0
dm_zero 5632 0
dm_mirror 20096 0
dm_log 12036 1 dm_mirror
dm_mod 47924 10 dm_multipath,dm_snapshot,dm_zero,dm_mirror,dm_log
ata_generic 8452 0
pata_acpi 7680 0
sata_sil 11016 4
libata 132328 4 pata_atiixp,ata_generic,pata_acpi,sata_sil
sd_mod 26008 6
scsi_mod 122876 5 usb_storage,sr_mod,sg,libata,sd_mod
ext3 108680 2
jbd 40852 1 ext3
mbcache 10116 1 ext3
uhci_hcd 22928 0
ohci_hcd 22532 0
ehci_hcd 32780 0
[root@localhost ~]#

[waterhead]

I think that I may see why it isn't working. It is loading the ath5k driver module for the wireless. My Eee Pc is using the ath_pci driver for the same wireless.

The ath_pci driver is from the MadWifi driver project. It is not completely open source, so the ath5k driver was developed. Even though it is now included in the kernel, I don't know of too many people who have success with this driver.

I would normally recommend downloading and compiling the latest SVN version of the MadWifidriver. But that may be too much to ask a newbie to do. The other option is to install the driver from repositories. Because of the MadWifi driver is non-open source, you will need to add a third party repository to download it from.

First, go to this page and install the Livna repository rpm for Fedora 9:
MyStartingPage - Rpm.livna.org wiki

I think that will add the Livna repository to YUM. You can check with this command.

yum repolist

If Livna is listed, then install Madwifi and the Madwifi kernel module. Use su to get root privileges first.

yum install madwifi kmod-madwifi

If this fails, you may first have to upgrade the kernel to one from the Livna repository.