Wifi stupidity: "The signal level is low." Options

[orthogonal]

(Zaurus 5600 special ROM v1.3 based on Sharp ROM)

I'm having a frustrating time with wifi; specifically, I want to be able to turn off the wifi card (Ambicom WL1100C) when I'm out of range of my base station.

1. manually turning off the wifi via the network applet doesn't always work; sometimes it reports that "Network device is busy", but once it reports this, it no longer shows network status as "Connected", which means I can't disconnect.

2. cardctl suspend physically turns off the wifi card's light, but rather than resulting in a disconnection, the network icon turns red and the system bar periodically gets overwritten with the "helpful" message: "The signal level is low." Worse yet, when this message comes up, stylus or keyboard input is ignored for several seconds, and the "helpful" message repeats every few seconds.


Yes, I KNOW the signal level is low -- don't freeze the entire machine TELLING me! How do I turn off this ridiculous misfeature??
3. cardctl scheme default or cardctl scheme CardSuspend gives results similar to that in 1), above.

All I want to do is to turn of the physical connection when I'm (going to be) out of range, and preferably I'd like any software processes using the connection to see the failure and deal with it accordingly. Instead, I get my entire system hung up over this spurious "emergency", making what should be an inconvenience -- losing the network -- into a full-fledged denial of all use, usually requiring a reboot.

What can I do?

Can anyone help me?

Thanks!

[Synfin0]

I don't know how much help it is, but since it wasn't mentioned under your list: "cardctl eject" might get around some of the problems of "cardctl suspend", but might also come with additional hassles

[ChanSecodina]

I agree with Synfin0.

CODE

cardctl eject

will shut it down and

CODE

cardctl insert

will bring it back online. It will disable the interface and also treat the wireless card like its not there. If you wanted you could make a couple icons that executed those commands just so you wouldn't have to open a terminal window and pull out the keyboard to run them. Now that I think about it I think I'll do exactly that. Thanks for the inspiration :mrgreen:

-Mr. Secodina

[orthogonal]

eject does work, if nothing is using the netwirk.

But I didn't mention eject because it gives worse results than suspend -- it gives "device busy" -- if anything is using teh network.

[jdv]

Try starting a console session and typing:

ifconfig eth0 down

That works for me.

[orthogonal]

Try starting a console session and typing:

ifconfig eth0 down

That works for me.

Oh yes! Thank you!

Let me push my luck a bit? What can I do at the command line to re-establish the connection? None of ifconfig eth0 up. cardctl resume, and cardctl scheme qpewlan1 work.

[ernestjw]

Let me push my luck a bit? What can I do at the command line to re-establish the connection? None of ifconfig eth0 up. cardctl resume, and cardctl scheme qpewlan1 work.

I suspect inserting should cause an implicite ifconfig up.

ifconfig up will not work until the card is found. So the insert command as described previously should be done first. This in turn should 'up' automagically ethx.

[carric]

I am having a similar problem.. after about 5 minutes of good signal and web surfing (it starts telling me signal is low even though I have not moved), and all networking comes to a halt. I have tried the Sharp ROM, the Sharp ROM with pre-emptive kernel, and Zynergy. I just tried OZ 3.3.5, BUT something hosed during the process, and it still says Zynergy on bootup, and I can no longer connect to it.. it also appears to have either wiped my CF card, or it can't read it, and OF COURSE my USB CF reader had bent pins in it last night, so I had to throw it away...

Just wondering if I have a defective unit, or if it's heat due to the faster CPU, or what.. I want to try OZ, but I guess I'll have to wait until I can get a new CF reader. Off I go to the store!!

[carric]

Ooops!! Forgot - the card is the Linksys WCF12, and I have a 128MB CF, and 128MB SD card. I JUST got the 5600, and never had these problems with the 5500.

[dz]

carric, i have the same exact card and problem.. all will run smooth, and then it'll randomly say signal is low

i use tkcRom, have a 5600 with pxa255 and same wifi card

[carric]

I have looked for other people having this problem, but you are the first one that has confirmed the same symptoms. I would LIKE to know if it's the card, or if it's the new Zaurus, because the 5500 and this card went together like "spaghetti and meatball".. I was a wireless network scanning fool, and now I can't do anything. Kismet does not register any nets (even though I see them on a laptop running Kismet), and Wellenreiter doesn't want to work either.. this is the main thing I want to do with my Zaurus, and if I can't do that, it will make the justification for this toy tough to pull off... I have a PPC Phone for the Windows integration, but that was an after thought... I would really like to see a stable release of OZ... What drew you to tkcRom?

[Mickeyl]

Didn't I already explain the cause for the signal-low error in Qtopia/Sharp? Please use the archives.

[carric]

When I do a search for "signal-low", all that comes back is this thread, so I hope you are not referring to the solution of "eject and reinsert the card" as an explanation... Is there additional data on this? I have looked for weeks now...

[slickcat]

I have the same issue and have searched the archives for the post mickeyl referred to but I could not find it.

[Mickeyl]

Bummer. Can't find it no longer myself. Ok, once again, the signal too low error is a bug in Qtopia/Sharp which doesn't query the driver for the range of expected signal strength values but instead uses a fixed range, which is... wrong.