My Wi-Fi on Linux - the second try
Saturday, 31. May 2008, 14:39:16
Last friday I bought a Ralink RT2561 wireless PCI card for R$ 50.00 (about US$ 30.75) to put in my desktop computer. The card was said to be Linux compatible, and it should work with built-in drivers (although they require an external firmware).
Well, in fact this is not exactly what happened...
Well, in fact this is not exactly what happened...
Recompiling the kernel
I've inserted the PCI card and booted up the computer. lspci shows it:
00:0d.0 Network controller: RaLink RT2561/RT61 802.11g PCI
Then, I needed to compile the module for it. I'm using the latest vanilla kernel: 2.6.25.4
Device Drivers --->
[*] Network device support --->
Wireless LAN --->
[*] Wireless LAN (IEEE 802.11)
<M> Ralink driver support
<M> Ralink rt61 pci/pcmcia supportCompiling... Installing... Editing grub.conf... Rebooting... And, yeah! The rt61pci driver has been auto-loaded. iwconfig shows wmaster0 and wlan1.
The firmware
But then, I could not configure the card. When running ifconfig wlan1 up it said No such file or directory. Weird! Well, it seemed weird because I didn't know about the required firmware files.
Then I went to Ralink Linux support page, downloaded Firmware RT2501(RT2561/RT2661), uncompressed the RT61_Firmware_V1.2.zip file and moved all uncompressed files to /lib/firmware.
Then ifconfig began working!
I don't want managed mode
I've tried running iwlist wlan1 scanning, but it just printed wlan1 No scan results. Maybe there is no AP nearby. Maybe this antenna is not too powerful and is badly positioned. Well I don't want to connect to an AP anyway. I want make one AP, or at least configure the ad-hoc network.
And so I tried. As I supposed, master mode is not supported. Then I tried to set its mode to ad-hoc:
# iwconfig wlan1 mode ad-hoc # ifconfig wlan1 up SIOCSIFFLAGS: Operation not supported
What?! I've also tried setting this mode at /etc/conf.d/net (the Gentoo's network configuration file), with no success. Then I saw this at /var/log/messages (all of this was at the same line):
phy0 -> rt2x00mac_add_interface: Error - rt2x00 does not support Adhoc or Master mode<3> phy0 -> rt2x00mac_add_interface: Error - rt2x00 does not support Adhoc or Master mode<3> phy0 -> rt2x00mac_add_interface: Error - rt2x00 does not support Adhoc or Master mode<7> wlan1: Trigger new scan to find an IBSS to join
WTF? This damn card does not support the damn ad-hoc mode? So it only works with managed mode? How useless!
Looking at the web, I've just found the hardware page of rt2x00 project. That page lists different ralink-based cards and what has been tested. The ad-hoc mode is not listed in this page for rt61. Damn!
And there is more! At rt2x00 project FAQ, they explain that, according to "802.11 specifications, 11mb/s is the fastest rate you can obtain under an adhoc connection." Damn! I wish I knew this before! I guess I'm going to buy an expensive card later.
NdisWrapper to the rescue!
*Sigh*... I didn't want to use NdisWrapper, but I guess for now I will need it. At least I hope that ad-hoc mode is supported on Windows.
I go to Ralink Windows support page, I select PCI/mPCI/CB(RT256x/RT266x)... The download file is IS_AP_STA_6x_D-1.2.3.0_VA-2.1.0.0_2500_D-3.2.0.0_VA-3.2.0.0_RU-2.0.4.0_VA-2.0.4.0_AU-1.2.1.0_VA-1.0.4.0_101707_0.1.0.29.exe. Damn, this is a fucking huge filename. And it is a huge file too: 32MB. But wait! The extension is .exe?!?! <insert a lot of bad words here>
Ok, I give up. I can't make this card work in ad-hoc mode using linux native drivers, and I can't find windows drivers for using with NdisWrapper.
I swear I'm going to buy a decent card next time (probably next month)! (or a dedicated wi-fi router)
Translated it means something like, "Cheaply bought is expensively bought."
Sounds like you're having fun though.
By qlue, # 4. June 2008, 16:13:45
Another nice quotation would be "you get what you pay for".
Anyway, I'm planning to buy an Atheros card that is priced at R$ 45.00 (yes, cheaper than this ralink). I will post any progress.
BTW, I'm selling the cards that don't work for me to a friend, otherwise I wouldn't have enough money!
By CrazyTerabyte, # 4. June 2008, 18:32:05
So, any success on the new PCI you would have been bought by now? Or did you gave up and bought a router?
By anonymous user, # 16. August 2008, 00:57:18
To tell the truth, my Wi-Fi is now working! \o/
I've started to write a blog post documenting how it is working, but then I got busy and so on and I haven't finished it yet... Maybe I can finish it this weekend.
By CrazyTerabyte, # 16. August 2008, 01:17:22