ath0 setup on Thinkpad T41p

[j***@panix.com]

I have an IBM Thinkpad T41p with the following card, according to dmesg:

ath0: <Atheros 5212> mem 0xc0210000-0xc021ffff irq 11 at device 2.0 on pci2
ath0: mac 5.6 phy 4.1 5ghz radio 1.7 2ghz radio 2.3
ath0: 11a rates: 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps 24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: 11g rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps 24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: 802.11 address: 00:05:4e:xx:xx:xx

I have enabled "device ath" and "device ath_hal" in my
kernel. There don't seem to be any errors as such, but I can't
seem to get the card to work. I've removed all WEP from my WAP
(802.11b only) to get started, and when I issue a command like

# ifconfig ath0 inet 192.168.1.109 netmask 255.255.255.255

It configures things OK, but I get a "no carrier" message at
the "status" line of ifconfig. Repeatedly running ifconfig
will show that occasionally I will get a "status: associated",
with info showing the SSID of my WAP, but this seems to last
for only an instant before dropping back to "no carrier" (this
is in the same room as my WAP, with a strong signal).

Someone with a T40p has a web page suggesting that all you
have to do is add "mode 11b" to the ifconfig command, but for
me this returns "ifconfig: SIOCSIFMEDIA (mode): Device not
configured".

Oh, I'm running FreeBSD 5.2.1.

Any thoughts? Could this be a hardware problem, or is there
something I'm not doing right?

Thanks very much.

Jesse Sheidlower

[s***@errno.com]

Post by j***@panix.com
ath0: <Atheros 5212> mem 0xc0210000-0xc021ffff irq 11 at device 2.0 on pci2
ath0: mac 5.6 phy 4.1 5ghz radio 1.7 2ghz radio 2.3
ath0: 11a rates: 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps 24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: 11g rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps
24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: 802.11 address: 00:05:4e:xx:xx:xx
I have enabled "device ath" and "device ath_hal" in my
kernel. There don't seem to be any errors as such, but I can't
seem to get the card to work. I've removed all WEP from my WAP
(802.11b only) to get started, and when I issue a command like
# ifconfig ath0 inet 192.168.1.109 netmask 255.255.255.255
It configures things OK, but I get a "no carrier" message at
the "status" line of ifconfig. Repeatedly running ifconfig
will show that occasionally I will get a "status: associated",
with info showing the SSID of my WAP, but this seems to last
for only an instant before dropping back to "no carrier" (this
is in the same room as my WAP, with a strong signal).
Someone with a T40p has a web page suggesting that all you
have to do is add "mode 11b" to the ifconfig command, but for
me this returns "ifconfig: SIOCSIFMEDIA (mode): Device not
configured".
Oh, I'm running FreeBSD 5.2.1.
Any thoughts? Could this be a hardware problem, or is there
something I'm not doing right?

This appears to be a hal problem. Anytime you can use 11g you should
also be able to use 11b so the fact that you're not seeing 11b
operation listed at boot is bad. It likely means you're trying to use
11g when you should instead be operating in 111b.

I was working with someone else that had the identical symptoms but
he's been unresponsive. I'll contact you offline to see if we can
resolve this.

Sam