Intel 2200BG card and AP 420

[Reggie Gilbert]

I have a Sony Vaio that uses an Intel 2200BG wireless card. It works fine as long as I don't reboot. It seems like the AP doesn't disassociate the client even when the computer is completely off. The station status will show it as authenticated and associated long after the shutdown. I have upgraded the firmware to 2.1.7 on the AP and I have installed the latest driver for wireless card from Sony. The strangest thing about this situation is that after restarting the computer I get an error message stating that there is no wireless network available. But when I look at the station status on the AP420, everything is as it should be. No errors in the log. I'm using WPA-PSK-AES. Does anyone have any ideas?

[Matt Hobbs]

I've got a 2200BG as well in an HP NC6220 and it's working well with my 420 also on 2.1.7. I'm using the drivers direct from Intel so I'd give that a try.

[MarkNZ]

I'm also having the same problem with a HP Pavilion dv6122, and in the past a HP NC4400. The Pavilion uses the Intel 3945ABG WLAN card and I have loaded the latest drivers V10.5.2.0 from Intel.

If the machine is rebooted, or hibernated, it can't connect to the AP, although the AP still shows it as associated. I think the reboot is not de-associating and so when it tries to re-associate the AP isn't letting it as it already has an existing connection listed. The only way to get it to re-associate is to reset the AP.

Am running AP firmware V2.1.7

Any other ideas anyone?

[Reggie Gilbert]

Mark,

I have a workaround. It's seems to do exactly what you are saying as longs as you are using WPA-PSK-AES. If you take the security away or if you use WPA-PSK-TKIP, the computer will connect just fine. Because I already have a number of clients using WPA-PSK-AES, I created another SSID and used the WPA-PSK-TKIP for the Intel Pro clients. Obviously this wasn't my first choice but now I have a stable and secure connection. I hope this helps.

Reggie

[MarkNZ]

Hi Reggie,

Thanks for your reply. I'm actually using 64bit WEP (I know, it's not especially secure, but I have an old client card/OS and that's all it supports). I will try setting up a different SSID for the Intel clients as you suggest and hopefully that will work. Time to upgrade the old client perhaps too ;)

Mark

[MarkNZ]

It looks like the Intel driver updgrade might have actually resolved it after all. The problem had always the most hassle as it affected the PC when it was hibernated. Over the past few days it hasn't failed once coming out of hibernate. The testing I initially did was on a Windows restart, but that's not as much of an issue.

Will stick with things as is for now.

Thanks for the info.