PCMCIA NICS and Wireless

[Net Llama!]

Bill Campbell wrote:
> On Sat, Sep 28, 2002 at 12:34:12PM -0700, Net Llama! wrote:
> 
>>If you're determined to use only Caldera's kernel & pcmcia packages, 
>>then you might be out of luck.  From the reports that i've seen all over 
>>usenet, Caldera's pcmcia-cs package shipped completely broken.
> 
> 
> I've never had any significant problems with them since OpenLinux 1.1 or so
> other than the occassional new revision of a card that would require that I
> manually edit the /etc/pcmcia/config file to get it recognized (I did this
> first doing NFS installs of COL 1.1 on a Toshiba laptop and new 3COM card).
> 
> When I look at the syslog output, the Netgear FA511 doesn't seem to report
> an identity string so there's nothing to match.

Which is why i suggested trying to brute force loading of the module to 
route around this identity problem.  If the card is otherwise 
functional, then it should work once the module is loaded, identity be 
damned.

>>Looks like you're using the latest pcmcia-cs, but the kernel might be 
>>questionable.  Are you looking to get a working pcmcia NIC, or a 
>>wireless card or both?  I've had pretty good success with Linksys pcmcia 
>>NICs, and Cisco wireless cards.  But, this is under RH-7.2/3 not Caldera.
> 
> 
> I'm looking for both wireless and LAN cards.  It would be nice if the LAN
> cards don't use dongles since they're always getting broken.  I really
> don't want to use cards that hog both slots, although that's not absolutely
> critical for most of our customer applications where we're using the
> laptops primarily as data entry terminals and servers for our auction
> accounting software.

yea, that's the big limitation.  generally you either get a 1 slot card 
that requires a dongle, or a 2 slot card that doesn't.  i use Xircom 
cards for wired networking, which do use both slots, but i dont' care 
since i'm either on cat5 or i'm wireless, but never both simultaneously.

> My experience with LinkSys cards has been mixed.  Most of their PCMCIA
> cards have worked pretty well, but the PCI cards have been problematic
> (recently we had severe problems with several different Tulip PCI cards
> that went away when we switched to a 3C905 card and drivers).  On the other
> hand, we're in the LinkSys reseller program so I'll try getting some of
> their current cards here to test.

i've only used a PCMCIA Linksys, and its been rock solid (uses the tulip 
module).  Yes, it has a dongle, which is a pain.

> 
> I would like to stick with commodity cards that are readily available in
> the retail stores so that they can be replaced easily in a pinch.

the Cisco Aironet cards are fairly widespread, and have an excellent 
reputation for quality, and work well under linux.  they are 1 slot 
802.11b cards.

-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
L. Friedman                       	       netllama at linux-sxs.org
Linux Step-by-step & TyGeMo: 		    http://netllama.ipfox.com

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