wireless linux on a zv5230us, BCM94306, ndiswrapper. can't set accesspoint

[Kirk Ross]

I appear to have most things working on the zv5230 using slackware 10, but for some reason I can't get the wireless to connect to the DLINK DI-524 router. The module seems to load OK and ifconfig and iwconfig look good, but using iwconfig to set the access point seems to have no effect. By that I mean that iwconfig continues to show my access point as all 0's. iwlist wlan0 scan does detect the router, though. When I use a cable to connect to the same router, everything is fine. Any ideas?

[Bruce Copeland]

Kirk:

If you haven't already done so, look at:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/hcl/showproduct.php?product=810

Bruce

[Kirk Ross]

Thanks for the quick response Bruce.
Yes, that was where I started. And I went through this (and other places) also:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/showthread.php?s=&threadid=207469
Both of them appear to be fairly complete and following them appears to give me good results except for the fact that I can't successfully ping the router. Because I am no expert at this I would suspect that I didn't configure the network correctly except that it looks just like eth0 and eth0 (when it's up) works just fine.
So, if ndiswrapper appears to load, iwconfig appears to configure, iwlist shows the router, and the route looks the same for eth0 and wlan0, what else can there be? Does it matter that iwconfig shows 0's for my Access Point even though I've set it to the real address? Even though I don't get any feedback, when I "iwconfig wlan ap" it does not show up in iwevent. I am about to post questions over at linuxquestions, too.

[Bruce Copeland · Accepted solution]

How do you have the wireless part of the router set up? Is it in infrastructure mode? Is WEP turned off? Do you have MAC restrictions off?

Since you're having problems connecting, I suggest you set up the (wireless part of the) router to be pretty permissive (as above) until you can get your connection settings worked out.

Also you may need to turn off eth0. I couldn't get my wifi card (a prism not a broadcom) to work until I did that.

Bruce

[Kirk Ross]

Good suggestions. Thanks. It looks like I had something wrong with the WEP. It works now, it 's just that I feel a bit exposed that way. I guess I can live with it until I figure out how to set it up properly. I must need something more than the man pages to make it work.

Thanks again.

[Kirk Ross]

The problem appears to have been something to do with setting the key. I don't know exactly what fixed it, but I began by reconfiguring the ap without wep and with the default essid. I added wep back and changed the key. It looks just like I had it configured originally, only now it works. Obviously, something changed, I just am not willing to hunt it down. The important thing is that everything works now.