Networking: don't get WLAN working; connection manager freezing [x-post]

[x-post from alt.os.linux.mandrake]

Dear All

You may consider may following question as very basic problem ...but I
need a little push to "the right path".

Here we go:
I have dificulties to attach my wireless lan card to my access point.
Mandriva 10.1 recognized my card as a "Intersil PRISM" card.

I'd like to do the following:
Have my W-LAN card using dhcp, wep "cfabababcf", default network
device.

Problem:
If I use the grafical network configuration tool (opened by clicking
the network-taskbar icon), it seems to "do nothing". This happens when
I save the changes by clicking OK. As root, it closes but I cannot open
any application (not even a terminal) afterwards. As user, it does not
close but freeze.
If I restart the laptop after a while, some of the changes seemed to be
applied.
Though, I cannot (haven't figured out) connect eth1 (my wlan card)
right click the network icon... It keeps displaying eth1 although I've
disabled eth1 from system start.

If I do the settings manually [1] through a terminal, I can get a
connection work but no routings or communication is going through eth1,
even my AccessPoint confirms the connection. This means the connection
is up but e.g ping (local network) does not work.

To my question now:
1. Shouldn't I use the grafical konfiguration tool?
2. How can I have eth1 as the standard network interface?
3. How can I have the parameters from [1] permanently set for all
users?
4. How can I have DHCP permanently enabled for eth1

[1] Manual connection settings
notebook# iwconfig eth1 essid WIRELESS_LAN
notebook# iwconfig eth1 mode managed
notebook# iwconfig eth1 key cfabababcg [3]
notebook# iwconfig eth1 key [3]
notebook# ifconfig eth1 192.168.3.29 netmask 255.255.255.0
notebook# route add default gw 192.168.3.1

(prefere to have last two steps from dhcp)

Kind Regards
Oliver

Ok. figured out meanwhile that the grafical configuration tool only
crashes if no IP adress is assigned to (eg. no DHCP lease).
This answers my question from 3. and 2. as well - the wirless card uses
the same settings as a "Normal" network card. (ifconfig ...).

I guess, gonna reinstall XP to have my card wlan working ... :-(

Oliver

Just a quick feedback to round up the picture (althoughI think its a
bit OT in this NG)

I tryed it with the ndiswrapper... an amazing tool!
But anyway, it says, that "no hardware for this driver was found". I
tryed on both Knoppix and Mandriva 10.1.

My conclusion now is, that "it" does not work with that particular WLAN

card from Toshiba Tecra 91000.


[Guess 1]
I am certainly not a Linux or Hardware Crack but I guess, that the
hardware isn't properly designed for 802.11b and that the driver fixed
this on Windows xp.
[Guess 2]
I faced issues with the WLAN connectivity when the Bluetooth device was

enabled under Windows 2000 and XP. So I guess, this might be the issue
too as the Bluetooth device is loaded on start up. (... will try
another 4 hrs to disable that ... ;-) ).


So long...


Oliver