[lug] When to try rebooting Linux

[Ferdinand Schmid]

Daniel Webb wrote:
> The wireless networking is acting very stragely.  It will connect fine for
> a while, then suddenly I get very long ping times (1-2 seconds and 50%
> packet loss) even though the signal is -32dB and the noise is -90dB.  It
> will show the WEP key turning off by itself (as reported by iwconfig).
> syslog shows "Access point out of range" followed by "access point in
> range" over and over.  I have tried with several identical wireless cards
> (orinoco gold with hermes chipset), and it's all the same.  I'm using an
> Actiontec GT701-WG which comes with Qwest DSL nowadays, and set it to
> 802.11b only.  I'm switching to a netgear AP to see if that makes a
> difference, and so far it's working... but so did the other setup for a
> while.

I use the same Actiontec access point / router and never saw any trouble.  Like you I am 
also using WEP.  Things worked fine using SuSE 9.0 (2.4 kernel) and now on 9.1 (using a 
2.6 kernel).  I had used a PCMCIA card before (atmel chipset) and now I am using an Intel 
(Centrino) wlan card.  The Centrino setup is still pretty new but I feel that you may have 
a configuration issue going.  It could also be the version of the PCMCIA sub-system.  Are 
you using kernel PCMCIA?  You could try external PCMCIA if you feel like experimenting. 
Kernel PCMCIA works well for me though.

In fact I have some remote systems using T-Mobile (Sierra Wireless 750) cellular Internet 
access cards.  These cards sometimes don't respond after they lose connection.  A script 
that reboots the pcmcia subsystem (and thereby turns off power to the card for some period 
of time) has so far always been able to get the card back online.

Try to find hints in your syslog if you haven't done this already.

Good luck,
Ferdinand

-- 
Ferdinand Schmid
Architectural Energy Corporation
Celebrating over 20 Years of Improving Building Energy Performance
http://www.archenergy.com