Wireless nightmare - ipw2200

[Jamon Camisso]

Kihara Muriithi wrote:
> Hi pals,
> 
> I have a laptop that I have been using for a long time - 2 years - a
> Toshiba satellite Pro. I haven't had a reason to complain until now. I
> have been using an ethernet cable all along, but I am in a situation
> where I seriously need wireless connection. This have proved to be not
> that easy.
> 
> The card the laptop have is ipw2200 from Intel. I have the necessary
> driver and firmware, according to the numerous web pages I have come
> across. The OS even does see it, but it wouldn't work. I have searched
> the net for a couple of days, but don't have a solution yet. Here is
> what I have:

I've had it running just fine with Fedora 8 as I mentioned, Debian, 
Kubuntu, FreeBSD even.

> dmesg info:
> [root at kerberos kihara]# dmesg | grep ipw
> ipw2200: Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 2200/2915 Network Driver, 1.2.0kmprq
> ipw2200: Copyright(c) 2003-2006 Intel Corporation
> ipw2200: Detected Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG Network Connection
> ipw2200: Radio Frequency Kill Switch is On:
> ipw2200: Detected geography ZZM (11 802.11bg channels, 0 802.11a channels)
> 
> iwconfig
>           radio off  ESSID:off/any
>           Mode:Managed  Channel:0  Access Point: Not-Associated
>           Bit Rate:0 kb/s   Tx-Power=off   Sensitivity=8/0
>           Retry limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
>           Encryption key:off
>           Power Management:off
>           Link Quality:0  Signal level:0  Noise level:0
>           Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
>           Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0
> 
> [root at kerberos kihara]# dmesg | grep eth1
> eth1: RealTek RTL8139 at 0xf8a86000, 00:0f:b0:9a:5c:47, IRQ 23
> eth1:  Identified 8139 chip type 'RTL-8100B/8139D'

eth1 must not be your wireless device as the ipw220 chipset is just 
that, the ipw2200 chipset and not realtek (which looks like your ethernet).

What does eth0 show up as?

> The issue seem to be this line 'ipw2200: Radio Frequency Kill Switch is On:'
> I am at a loss how to fix it. I have looked at the bios and they don't
> have anything that could help. I have a feeling re-installing might
> not help also. See, I have tried using live ubuntu and hit the same
> snag, the kill switch. What am I missing? Would there be someone here
> who have came across this problem and has a fix? I would be very
> grateful for any help.

Do you have version 3.0 of the firmware in /lib/firmware?
http://ipw2200.sourceforge.net/firmware.php?fid=7 If you've upgraded 
from Fedora 5 or 6, it may be that the firmware is out of date and you 
need the newest version 3.0.

Regards,
Jamon
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