wireless keeps dropping (disconnecting)

[labrazil]

Hi,
I'm quite new to Linux (been a windows user for years and years) and I'm loving my experience so far. I installed Ubuntu on my dell machine via Wubi and my problem right now is my wireless connection. I have no problem with my router or connecting to the net using my machine running windows. This has only happened when I'm using Ubuntu. For no apparent reason, I stop getting internet, pages stop working and I have to disconnect from my router and reconnect to finally get back online. It's been quite annoying so far...any help?

Please see report below:

============ lspci ============
00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/PM/GMS, 943/940GML and 945GT Express Memory Controller Hub [8086:27a0] (rev 03)
	Kernel modules: intel-agp
00:01.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/PM/GMS, 943/940GML and 945GT Express PCI Express Root Port [8086:27a1] (rev 03)
	Kernel driver in use: pcieport-driver
	Kernel modules: shpchp
00:1b.0 Audio device [0403]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) High Definition Audio Controller [8086:27d8] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: HDA Intel
	Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel
00:1c.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 1 [8086:27d0] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: pcieport-driver
	Kernel modules: shpchp
00:1c.1 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 2 [8086:27d2] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: pcieport-driver
	Kernel modules: shpchp
00:1c.3 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 4 [8086:27d6] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: pcieport-driver
	Kernel modules: shpchp
00:1d.0 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 [8086:27c8] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.1 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 [8086:27c9] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.2 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 [8086:27ca] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.3 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 [8086:27cb] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.7 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller [8086:27cc] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: ehci_hcd
00:1e.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge [8086:2448] (rev e1)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge [0601]: Intel Corporation 82801GBM (ICH7-M) LPC Interface Bridge [8086:27b9] (rev 01)
	Kernel modules: iTCO_wdt, intel-rng
00:1f.2 IDE interface [0101]: Intel Corporation 82801GBM/GHM (ICH7 Family) SATA IDE Controller [8086:27c4] (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: ata_piix
00:1f.3 SMBus [0c05]: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) SMBus Controller [8086:27da] (rev 01)
	Kernel modules: i2c-i801
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon Mobility X1400 [1002:7145]
03:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4401-B0 100Base-TX [14e4:170c] (rev 02)
	Kernel driver in use: b44
	Kernel modules: b44
03:01.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394) [0c00]: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller [1180:0832]
	Kernel driver in use: ohci1394
	Kernel modules: firewire-ohci, ohci1394
03:01.1 SD Host controller [0805]: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C822 SD/SDIO/MMC/MS/MSPro Host Adapter [1180:0822] (rev 19)
	Kernel driver in use: sdhci-pci
	Kernel modules: sdhci-pci
03:01.2 System peripheral [0880]: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C843 MMC Host Controller [1180:0843] (rev 0a)
	Kernel driver in use: ricoh-mmc
	Kernel modules: ricoh_mmc
03:01.3 System peripheral [0880]: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C592 Memory Stick Bus Host Adapter [1180:0592] (rev 05)
03:01.4 System peripheral [0880]: Ricoh Co Ltd xD-Picture Card Controller [1180:0852] (rev ff)
0c:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Intel Corporation PRO/Wireless 3945ABG [Golan] Network Connection [8086:4222] (rev 02)
	Kernel driver in use: iwl3945
	Kernel modules: iwl3945

============ lsusb ============
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 413c:a005 Dell Computer Corp. Internal 2.0 Hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 005 Device 002: ID 046d:c01b Logitech, Inc. MX310 Optical Mouse
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub

============ lsmod ============
Module                  Size  Used by
aes_i586               15744  2 
aes_generic            35880  1 aes_i586
binfmt_misc            16776  1 
radeon                342816  2 
drm                    96424  3 radeon
ppdev                  15620  0 
bridge                 56212  0 
stp                    10500  1 bridge
bnep                   20224  2 
input_polldev          11912  0 
joydev                 18368  0 
lp                     17156  0 
parport                42220  2 ppdev,lp
snd_hda_intel         434228  3 
arc4                    9856  2 
ecb                    10752  2 
snd_pcm_oss            46336  0 
snd_mixer_oss          22656  1 snd_pcm_oss
snd_pcm                83076  2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm_oss
snd_seq_dummy          10756  0 
snd_seq_oss            37760  0 
snd_seq_midi           14336  0 
snd_rawmidi            29696  1 snd_seq_midi
snd_seq_midi_event     15104  2 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi
iwl3945                97912  0 
snd_seq                56880  6 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi,snd_seq_midi_event
iTCO_wdt               19108  0 
snd_timer              29704  2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
snd_seq_device         14988  5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq
iTCO_vendor_support    11652  1 iTCO_wdt
psmouse                61972  0 
mac80211              217592  1 iwl3945
sdhci_pci              15232  0 
video                  25360  0 
led_class              12036  1 iwl3945
snd                    62756  15 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_pcm,snd_seq_oss,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq,snd_timer,snd_seq_device
ricoh_mmc              11904  0 
sdhci                  23940  1 sdhci_pci
pcspkr                 10496  0 
intel_agp              34108  0 
serio_raw              13444  0 
dcdbas                 15264  0 
output                 11008  1 video
soundcore              15200  1 snd
snd_page_alloc         16904  2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm
agpgart                42696  2 drm,intel_agp
cfg80211               38288  2 iwl3945,mac80211
usbhid                 42336  0 
ohci1394               38576  0 
ieee1394               94660  1 ohci1394
b44                    35984  0 
ssb                    41220  1 b44
mii                    13312  1 b44
fbcon                  46112  0 
tileblit               10752  1 fbcon
font                   16384  1 fbcon
bitblit                13824  1 fbcon
softcursor              9984  1 bitblit

============ dmesg-firmware ============
[   23.665152] iwl3945 0000:0c:00.0: firmware: requesting iwlwifi-3945-1.ucode

============ kernel version ============
2.6.28-14-generic

[saivin]

From my personal experience, wireless under linux is a pain. For me its working only under Ubuntu.

Anyway, have you enabled encryption? If yes, disable it and try. I had problem with wireless (not exactly as experience by you) but removing encryption helped.

Edit: What do you mean by disconnecting from router and reconnecting? How do you do that for a wireless connection?

[labrazil]

From my personal experience, wireless under linux is a pain. For me its working only under Ubuntu.

I'm starting to feel the pain as well....

Anyway, have you enabled encryption? If yes, disable it and try. I had problem with wireless (not exactly as experience by you) but removing encryption helped.

I can't disable it since my router requires it. I have three other PCs in my home and all connect fine. Even my wife's where I put Linux on it, has no problem connecting and it stays connected as it should. But my computer is a different story.

Edit: What do you mean by disconnecting from router and reconnecting? How do you do that for a wireless connection?

When I notice none of my pages load up, and after about a minute or two, my browser comes back saying can't connect to page. I know its not my ISP as all my other computers can connect fine... So what I end up doing is disconnecting my computer from my router via my wireless setting (I use wicd tray icon 1.5.9) on my computer (icon next to the clock on the task bar...) and then I select my router and reconnect. Then, I'm able to launch the pages. But then this whole thing happens again.

I hope someone can help me out here.

Thanks!

[saivin]

May be you can post dmesg output and wicd log when this happens. Somebody will be able to make sense out of them.

[labrazil]

Hi, I'm not sure how to do that. This is becoming very annoying and I wonder if this would ever work on my machine. I'm stuck now with vista till a solution presents itself.

[waterhead]

Try using a different network connection manager. The default is NetworkManager, but I recommend trying Wicd.

It can be installed using the Synaptic Package Manager, found in the menu:

System-->Administration-->Synaptic Package Manager

When it installs Wicd, it should automatically uninstall NetworkManager.

[labrazil]

Try using a different network connection manager. The default is NetworkManager, but I recommend trying Wicd.

It can be installed using the Synaptic Package Manager, found in the menu:

System-->Administration-->Synaptic Package Manager

When it installs Wicd, it should automatically uninstall NetworkManager.

Thank you but as I stated in post #3 above, I'm using Wicd.

version:
wicd tray icon 1.5.9

What else could be wrong??? I'm so fustrated with this.

[waterhead]

You could try compiling the latest wireless drivers.

Download - Linux Wireless