W200 - Linux

[Kaj Gr]

If somebody has W200 working with linux (RH 8.0), please inform us.. I know that there are some persons whose W100 works ok, but there seems to be a driver-issue with this newer version.. So if this works, I would love to get some info, or else please HP help to get it some support in Linux!

[Hugo Haas]

I asked Agere Systems about Linux support a couple of weeks ago. They answered that only Windows drivers were provided, and didn't answer my question about future plans.

I keep an up-to-date log of my investigations at:

http://larve.net/people/hugo/2002/12/evo410

I would encourage people to bug Agere Systems and Compaq about it, because it would sure be nice to have the W200 work under Linux.

Regards,

Hugo

[Kaj Gr]

Thanks Hugo, for me the linux support is very important, and I would definitely want some support from hp/compaq to W200.

Getting wlan with multiport would be great, but because it doesn't work I may go with Dell notebook.. Too bad, but without workin multiport/w200 Compaq is not so competitive..

[Al Stone]

Howdy.

I work in one of the HP Linux Labs and have an Evo laptop running Debian. I've got the W100 and it works fine (except for encryption). I don't know if I can help with the W200 (I haven't been able to get my hands on one) but perhaps I can pass off the concerns to one of the folks that can do something about it -- I don't know if they will, but I can make sure they know it's a problem.

So, a couple of things would help me do this: (1) what distro are you running? (2) what kernel are you using? and (3) could you please send me as much hardware info as you can (e.g., like lspci and lsusb info, plus details on which device you actually have in your laptop)? While I'm trying to get some sort of response, perhaps we can take a look at the drivers and figure out what's up.

Thanks in advance.

[Hugo Haas]

I am running Debian with a vanilla 2.4.20 kernel.

I have a Evo N410c with a W200 in it.

Here are the output of lspci and lsusb:

http://larve.net/people/hugo/2003/02/lspci-vv

http://larve.net/people/hugo/2003/02/lsusb-vv

Let me know if you want to know anything else or if you need a guinea pig for any experiment.

Regards,

Hugo

[Al Stone]

Thanks, Hugo. Very helpful. I'm still waiting for some specifics on the hardware from some internal sources. In the meantime, as far as I know, the stock Debian kernels do not include the linux-wlan-ng drivers by default; I think you'll need to go to http://www.linux-wlan.com/linux-wlan and get the drivers from taht package installed first. Best I can tell from your PCI/LSB info is that (a) the device is showing up (always a good sign :), and (b) it is a USB device. According to some other docs, it looks like a USB2.0 device, on top of that. So, when building the linux-wlan drivers, see if you can get prism2 (or prism3) USB modules to work. I'll try to verify what module the W200 should respond to in the meantime.

Hope that helps...

[Hugo Haas]

Hi Al.

First, thanks a lot for your help.

So, I did try linux-wlan-ng a few months ago when I first got the machine and it didn't work. The problem AFAICT is that linux-wlan-ng is for cards with Prism chips, and the W200 has an Orinoco chip. I gathered this from several posts and my own experience seeing that the linux-wlan-ng does not see the W200 IIRC, and that running strings on the Windows driver shows "ORiNOCO".

Again, from what I have read on the Web, the USB Orinoco chipset has no support under Linux, and I think that this is where the problem lies.

Regards,

Hugo

[stefano argiro]

Hi Al,

great that you help us !
From what I got, the device has
the WLan radio chipset and a
CYPRESS EZ-USB FX chip for
the USB interface.

Hugo is right, there is no support
for this combination yet ... but it should be trivial to write a driver,
if only programming specs for
the USB interface and its firmware
was made available.
Best regards
Stefano

[Hugo Haas]

I found an interesting page today with a success story for the W200:

http://www.psychosis.net/evo-linux/

This person has flashed his W200 with a firmware from another vendor and apparently got it to work!

I am hesitating to try this though, but am interested to hear reports if somebody tries.

Regards,

Hugo

[Hugo Haas]

Actually, rereading his page, he seems to be using a Prism chipset.