Cardbus, Extreme, and me

[Putnam59]

Hi Ric,

Several momths ago I worked on this project, and lo, it has reared it's head again :biggrin:

I am working on a project to use a cardbus 802.11g card on a PBG4. Here is the scenario: If I boot off of the Tiger 10.4 CD, and then restart boot from the hard drive, my proto type card works everytime.

Question: what is the net config of the Tiger CD, and how can I replicate it? It appears that the only network service enabled is the onboard ethernet, and for some reason, restarting after that allows my cardbus card to be recognized.

Any thoughts or pointing of in the right direction would be deeply appreciated.

Jack

 

[Ric]

Hi there Jack.

I'm not entirely sure of what you are trying to achieve ?

Question: what is the net config of the Tiger CD, and how can I replicate it? It appears that the only network service enabled is the onboard ethernet, and for some reason, restarting after that allows my cardbus card to be recognized.

Can you refresh my memory ?

regards

Ric

 

[Putnam59]

Sure, Ric.

I am wishing to use a cardbus 802.11b/g card in an aluminum PB G4 15". If PB boots direct from hard disk with 802.11b/g card installed, the result is a kernel panic. It appears there is a race condition that occurs between the internal AirPort Extreme and the cardbus 802.11b/g device.


Just by divine providence, I was reloading the OS on my test computer, and I had the card installed. The re-install of the OS finished, and the the PowerBook restarted, low and behold, the cardbus card was on and working. It is repeatable, if I boot off the system CD and then restart, my card works. I have poured over the system config and the only thing I can put my hands on is that when booted from the OS 10.4 CD, the configuration for networking is local host and the onboard ethernet. FireWire and AirPort are disabled, and it appears the AirPort.kext driver doesn't get loaded.

But, on the next boot after that, >90% of the time the cardbus 802.11b/g card comes up working, and to my untrained eye, the internal extreme on the motherboard is disabled.

My goal is to replicate that event (but of course without having to have our target customers go through the rigors of booting from a system CD) to use an 802.11bg card.

Happy Friday to you and yours,


Jack

 

[Ric]

Hi there Jack,

what driver are you using ? what cards are you using ?

This might be a daft idea, but have you tried just deleting :

/System/Library/Extensions/AppleAirPort.kext
/System/Library/Extensions/AppleAirPort2.kext

on the relevant Macs ?

You could write a script that did a 'kextunload' of the Airport driver on boot...

I use a few different cards, mainly for security work, I tend to use the http://wirelessdriver.sourceforge.net This allows me to use both cards at the same time...

Let me know what you think about deleting it ?

regards & happy Friday to you and yours ;-)

Ric

 

[Putnam59]

Hey Ric,

I am using the Apple provided AirPort drivers. My proto card uses the same Broadcom chipset that Apple uses, that is where I believe the race condition occurs.

I have tried doing a kextunload on:
/System/Library/Extensions/AppleAirPort.kext
/System/Library/Extensions/AppleAirPort2.kext

and deleting Extensions.kextcache and Extensions.mkext and then creating a new blank Extensions.kextcache, all to no avail.

I have looked into using the SourceForge driver, but I dont' find any evidence that it supports the Broadcom chipset, plus, if I can resolve this issue, it would certainly be cleaner moving forward to have the cardbus 802.11b/g card work with the AirPort drivers.

I have tried several configurations of deleting the files, but not have had any repeatable success. In other words, on occasion, after deleting the files the card will work... but I can also acheive the same thing if I shut down the machine and restart, on a random boot, mycard works. The only repeatability I really have is the booting from CD.

I wonder if the CD does some sort of ioreg scan and since the AirPort networking is turned off, there is no conflict and then on the next boot, the OS has a clear picture of what hardware is available? Where as if I just boot up with the AP Extreme and the Cardbus card installed, it is not getting an accurate report of what is out there.

Would I look into open firmware device tree, or ioreg to see if one of these two is providing misinformation?

Jack

Hi there Jack,

what driver are you using ? what cards are you using ?

This might be a daft idea, but have you tried just deleting :

/System/Library/Extensions/AppleAirPort.kext
/System/Library/Extensions/AppleAirPort2.kext

on the relevant Macs ?

You could write a script that did a 'kextunload' of the Airport driver on boot...

I use a few different cards, mainly for security work, I tend to use the http://wirelessdriver.sourceforge.net This allows me to use both cards at the same time...

Let me know what you think about deleting it ?

regards & happy Friday to you and yours ;-)

Ric

 

[Ric]

Hi Jack,

My proto card

Can I have a make and model number...before I continue !

;-)

regards

Ric

 

[Putnam59]

Hey Ric,

Surely, sir. I am using a Buffalo model WLI-CB-G54HP. It works well on a Pismo and a Titanium PB G4. I have a simple Automator/AppleScript that does the necessary hardware configuration.

But that same technique will not work on the aluminum PB G4. The difference is that when used on the Pismo and the TiBook, upon card insertion the card is registered and given the BSD designation of en2 for ethernet.
However, on the aluminum PB G4, that does not occur. It seems as if the card is not being properly identified, and so working backwards through the PC I driver matching mechanism, it seems to be an issue of incorrect identification of the card as a potential network host adapter.

My limited understanding is that the hardware is first identified at boot up time by Open Firmware creating a device tree, and then that database is used by the bootloader and then eventually the kernel to enable hardware as needed. That's where I am poking around now.

I wonder if it would be any easier to create, or pay someone with the experience to create an NKE for the card?

Jack

Hi Jack,



Can I have a make and model number...before I continue !

;-)

regards

Ric

 

[$iddie]

I would be extremely interested to know the outcome of this. I have a 17" powerbook and have been trying to use the same card. I have not managed to get it to work at all. All I get it the kernel panic everytime starting with the card in the slot. If I add the card after the mac has started it is not recognised at all.
Obviously there is a conflict with the airport. I have even gone to the extreme of opening up the powerbook to try to remove the airport card, but it is too buried on the 17" model.
I want to use the buffalo because it is powerful and I have an external antenna to use, and the card has the antenna connection.
Other than that, is there a buffalo card still available with a prism chipset and an antenna connection that will work on the Mac? There used to be an 11 mbps (b) one, but I cannot find one now.
Any suggestions please?

 

[Ric]

Hi there $iddie and welcome !

I shall have another look at this tonight !

What do you need the external card for (software ?) kismac ?

Or point to point connections ?

Let us know and we can advise further...

regards

Ric

 

[$iddie]

For two reasons -
For kismac (but this is not the most important...)
For getting a good signal when I am working away.

I work away a lot, and to keep in contact with my family I use the internet thru GPRS (mobile phone) with the powerbook. This is getting too expensive and there are lots of open networks around where I am staying. But the standard airport (extreme) card is not powerful enough to get a reliable and constant signal. I have just bought a yagi cantenna with the card, and was told that the card would work in the powerbook, but it won't. So I must either try to get it working (which is the preferred way) or sell the card on ebay and buy another with an antenna port (the same connection so I don't have to buy another pigtail) that will work with the powerbook.
I know that this card works with older powerbooks but not with the latest ones. Mine is an aluminum 17" about 2 years old.

I hope that there is some way to get this working.

Best wishes,

$iddie

 

[Ric]

Hi there,

First off, I presume you are aware of the legal implications ! ;-)

Second, be aware that some people leave networks 'open' to see who will connect to them and see what they do...if you connected to a 'open' network and they were running a packet capture app and you logged into your email account...they would then have your username and password...depending on how your mail server is set up.

Thirdly, your MAC address is unique to your NIC...ie your wireless card has a unique address and so you could be traced...unless of course you use something like SpoofMac.

If you are still happy going down this route...some people do leave their wireless networks open on purpose, so that the 'community' can use them, if you find one that is like this then you should be okay.

What is the exact model PowerBook that you have and the Exact model Buffalo card that you have, also do you know what pigtail connection you have ?

Once we know these we can advise further, I personally would say get an Orinoco Gold Card if you can get one, I have one Kismac loves it, but you may need a new pigtail depending on what you have.

regards

Ric

 

[$iddie]

Hi again Ric,

Yes, I do realise the legal implications.

The buffalo card is a WLI-CB-G54HP (the EU version)

My powerbook is a 1.33gHz 17" g4 aluminum with 2gb ram.

The pigtail connector has what I think is called an MC card connector.

$iddie.

 

[$iddie]

Ric,

Which Orinoco Gold card do you have? I have been looking and there seems to be more than one.

$iddie

 

[Ric]

I haven't got it with me at the minute...

I shall have to double check the model number on Monday, I also have a few Yagi's, Omni's and a nice little mag mount for the car !

It works with all the major apps ;-)

regards

Ric