Subject: [71attendees] ietf71 wireless

From: Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 10 Mar 2008 09:10:38 -0400

I'm having layer-2 problems with the wireless.
(I will have to go plugin at the terminal room to send this)
I tried most of Sunday to get online, but I never succeeded.  It is
no better this morning.  I am guessing on the noc email, I will send 
this again once I get web to find out what the noc email is.
I am sending this in the hope that 

It looks like there are just too many APs.
I am using an external orinoco 802.11b card "Lucent Technologies GOLD",
but I have similar experiences with cisco Aironet cards. (Yes, this is a
card from an ietf 40-something meeting).  The driver/orinoco-firmware
combination does not let me get a list of APs (too old), while the cisco
one does, but the cisco one never sees any AP, even though it can get a
list of them.

I've never had problems with wireless, and I'm pretty kernel competent,
and the same cards were last used 2008-03-06.   I'm running debian
"GNU/Linux" etch with a custom 2.6.20.6 kernel.  I suspect that my cards
might need firmware upgrades to deal with some new-fangled mechanism, but I am
ignorant of what that might be. 

(I am in the market for an external 802.11a card that has a sufficiently
enlightened policy about releasing details such that quality open source
drivers can be written. No binary blobs please. The last one I ran
overheated the internal radio, and destroyed my motherboard)

Sitting at one end of the breakfast area I get:
(note link quality)

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.412 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:3F:42   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:2
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:38:82   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:4
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.412 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:30:52   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:4
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.412 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:30:52   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:13
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.412 GHz  Access Point: None   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:17
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.437 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:36:12   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:28
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:38:80   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:30
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:38:82   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:34
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.412 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:A9:DA:52   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:36
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:""  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.412 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:A9:DA:52   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:38
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1 essid 'ietf'
marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:"ietf"  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:38:80   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:164
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

...

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:"ietf"  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:38:80   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:165
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

marajade:/home/mcr# iwconfig eth1
eth1      IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:"ietf"  Nickname:"HERMES I"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.412 GHz  Access Point: 00:17:DF:AA:30:50   
          Bit Rate:2 Mb/s   Sensitivity:1/3  
          Retry limit:4   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality=0/92  Signal level=134/153  Noise level=134/153
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:168
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

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