I started a earlier post
** “What file to set the config bitrate on a Netgear WG111v2”**
because I didn’t believe what I was seeing when I used the kNetworkmanager to configure my wlan0 wireless connection with my Netgear WG111v2. The signal strength meter was low and the adapter didn’t show the flickering light that says there is network activity. I thought the Netgear WG111v2 was connecting slow and had poor signal strength with the default openSuSE 11.1 desktop software installed with KDE v4.1.3, so I was determined to improve it.
I was working with lwfinger, a Parent Penguin on this site, and after running some tests he wanted me to try, Larry and I concluded the Netgear WG111v2 was connecting at a very acceptable Bit Rate of 54 Mb/s with TX signal power of Tx-Power=27 dBm.
Another words, a fast connection rate and good signal strength.
If you need to test your connection AFTER you use the DEFAULT installed kNetworkmanager then you can do as I was directed from lwfinger (Larry);
quote:
"…open one console and
enter the command
ping -s 1200 -i 0.2 <Your AP’s IP address>
In a second terminal, Enter the command
while 1 ] ; do /usr/sbin/iwconfig wlan0 | grep Mb ; sleep 1; done
Both commands will run forever, and need to be stopped with CTRL/C.
After a couple of minutes, what rates has the second window printed?
MY results, 1st command:
1208 bytes from 10.0.0.2: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.066 ms
2nd command:
Bit Rate=54 Mb/s Tx-Power=27 dBm
Again, configuring my Netgear WG111 v2 with kNetworkmanager worked for me. I’m using the default software installed with openSuSE 11.1 and the KDE 4.1.3 desktop environment.
openSuSE 11.1 is by far the prettiest, easiest, and stablest Linux Distro out there with KDE 4.1.3. ( no desktop crashes that caused the KDE 4 to automatically reboot/reload, I experienced this often with Kubuntu 8.10)
The kNetworkmanager is found on the software panel on the bottom right side of the screen. Very straight forward and easy to figure out and use, that is, of lol!course, if you have set up a wireless connection before.