My fault, I didn’t mean for you to actually type “athXX” I meant “Type the five letters found above that start with aht.” So in your case it would be dmesg|grep ath5k but that’s ok the data you provided is adaquate.
...
...
====================
*** ifconfig
ath0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr ##:##:##:##:##:#1
UP BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:354 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:238 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX bytes:38178 (37.2 Kb) TX bytes:32831 (32.0 Kb)
lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
RX packets:191 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:191 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX bytes:13291 (12.9 Kb) TX bytes:13291 (12.9 Kb)
wifi0 Link encap:UNSPEC HWaddr 00-19-7D-29-3E-BE-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:47310 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:5073
TX packets:2754 errors:131 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:280
RX bytes:10193038 (9.7 Mb) TX bytes:159661 (155.9 Kb)
Interrupt:18
==================================================================================================================
OK, we see the interfaces as UP and they are sending and receiving data. But the card, ath0, is not showing a valid MAC address. I’ve not seen this so I don’t know what that means. Unless you typed the ##s in there to obfuscate the MAC before posting? I would expect the wireless handler wifi0 and the NIC ath0 to report the same MAC of 00-19-7D-29-3E-BE. You might google “MAC cloning” together with “Atheros” and see if you come with something.
...
...
=================================================
*** cat /etc/sysconfig/network/ifcfg-ath0 | egrep -v ".*=''"
BOOTPROTO='dhcp'
INTERFACETYPE='wlan'
NAME='AR2413 802.11bg NIC'
STARTMODE='auto'
USERCONTROL='no'
WIRELESS_AUTH_MODE='no-encryption'
WIRELESS_BITRATE='auto'
WIRELESS_DEFAULT_KEY='0'
WIRELESS_ESSID='e#y#k#'
WIRELESS_KEY_LENGTH='@@@@@@'
WIRELESS_MODE='Managed'
WIRELESS_POWER='yes'
==================================================================================================================
Are these the settings that you want to see there? I am concerned about the KEY_LENGTH field. And the fact that you and the AP are running without encryption. While, in theory, this would make it easier to diagnose, in practice what happens is that we end up association with random routers causing parameter corruption and much confusion. Which AP did you mean to connect to?
*** iwconfig
lo no wireless extensions.
eth0 no wireless extensions.
wifi0 no wireless extensions.
ath0 IEEE 802.11g ESSID:"e#y#k#"
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.412 GHz Access Point: Not-Associated
Bit Rate:1 Mb/s Tx-Power:16 dBm Sensitivity=1/1
Retry:off RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Encryption key:off
Power Management:off
Link Quality=59/70 Signal level=-36 dBm Noise level=-95 dBm
Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0
==================================================================================================================
Here we see that the card has detected an AP and that the signal is strong but there is an error in the RX field “Rx invalid nwid:21546.” Again, the MAC code seems to be a problem. You might want to google that error and see if you come up with anything. Is there mac filtering on the router? Could that be blocking your connections? Check your router logs. Is there evidence there of your router seeing your card try to connect?
==================================================================================================================
*** grep 'eth|ath|wlan|ra' /etc/udev/rules.d/*net_persistent* /etc/udev/rules.d/*persistent-net*
/etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules:SUBSYSTEM=="net", ACTION=="add", DRIVERS=="?*", ATTR{address}=="##:##:##:##:##:#1", ATTR{type}=="1", KERNEL=="ath*", NAME="ath0"
/etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules:SUBSYSTEM=="net", ACTION=="add", DRIVERS=="?*", ATTR{address}=="##:##:##:##:##:#2", ATTR{type}=="1", KERNEL=="eth*", NAME="eth0"
==================================================================================================================
Again with the ##s. Does the MAC in your udev rules match that displayed in the output from ifconfig above?
...
...
*** iwlist scanning
ESSID:"B#H#m#H#b#A#A#"
Quality=15/70 Signal level=-80 dBm Noise level=-95 dBm
Encryption key:on
ESSID:"e#y#k#"
Quality=57/70 Signal level=-38 dBm Noise level=-95 dBm
Encryption key:off
ESSID:"S#x# #l#t"
Quality=12/70 Signal level=-83 dBm Noise level=-95 dBm
Encryption key:on
==================================================================================================================
*** NWElizaStates
IF:ath0 IM:2 DI:1 AP:1 dI:0 NIC:1 cNiC:1:1 NI:2 cNI:2 NIW:ath0-0 DHCP:2 CM:0 IP6:0 KM:0 WLW:0 RTDT:SuSE
The card seems to be working. It sees three access points. Two with encryption and one without. It would seem to me that what we have here is a configuration issue. All the elements, sysconfig, udev rules, MAC filtering, router settings, etc. need to be talking the same parameters.
How about it forum participants, anything I missed?