Problems with Netgear wireless PCMCIA card

[Akira]

Hello guys,

If this has been asked before, I am sorry.
I recently purchased a Netgear wireless PCMCIA adapter, compatible with the prism2 driver.

I have an A1200 with an MX1230 030 accel which has 32MB in it, and I am running System 3.0

I am using Miami as my TCP/IP stack (Not Dx, I couldn't get it to run, dunno why, used to work fine before), and while configuring the card as a SANA-II device that uses the prism2.device interface, I could read the card's data and everything.

Now the problem lies when I try to get online. I face one of the following problems:

- Most frequently ocurring problem: when clicking "Online", card's "Link" light gets stuck in either ON or OFF position. Miggy gets frozen until I remove the card.

- Sometimes I get to be online and everything but then, if I try to ping any node in my network, I get no replies.

- Also, I cannot seem to be able to specify DNS servers manually in Miami. This will become a problem further on.

I am conencting to a Linksys Class B wireless access point + router. I have enabled MAC address filtering for security, adding the PCMCIA card's MAC address to the list of allowed addresses. I really don't know what else to do, maybe Miami is at afault (I am using an old version and all), maybe I am misconfiguring something?

Any help will be greatly apreciated. Cheers!

[Akira]

All network configuration is manual in my LAN, i gave the card an IP address, the subnet mask, and specified the address of the gateway. All I am missing from that is specifying the DNS servers manually, something I -cannot- find in Miami. even after all this, though, the card will still not receive replies when pinging other computers on the net.

Now, cardreset is not installed because I read I need another util to load first (Cardpatch?) and I do not have that one, and right now , i have no way to acquire it. Should i install it anyway withut Cardpatch? Wouldn't unplugging and re-plugging in the card after the Amiga has booted be the same?

Thanks for your prompt reply, looking forward to more answers

[Akira]

That is checked. It is PCMCIA friendly. Otherwise the card would not be even recognized.

I would apreciate input from those who have used this particular combo of items (A1200, Netgear wireless card, Miami) since speculation is going to take me nowhere.

[Akira]

Doctor, I am sorry, but at the time of replying, I DID NOT SEE your post!! I am sorry, no mean to be offensive here, just trying to narrow it down.

Now, regarding to your question...

I set the defaults. As far as I know all I had to specify was the network's SSID, which I added to the startup sequence with the specified parameter with the SetPrism2Defaults command. That's as far as strange goes in my network afaik, since I use no sort of keys, just MAC Address filtering.

Any ideas? Any sort of thing I am missing? Perhaps Miami needs to be configured differently as well?

[Akira]

Yes, I query the device EVERY time before going "online"

[Akira]

cool to know.
Thanks for going through this with me by the way.

Still, no bananas. Card would not connect to the bloody network.

[Akira]

Maybe Deluxe DOES make a difference. My old verison might be to blame. I'll try that as well. And read the guide. Thanks!

[Akira]

Arrrrrrgh I'm pulling my hair out here.

Changed a few things that I had different looking at your guide, but I still get same most happening error: When hitting online, LINK light freeszes in ON or OFF position, and Amiga cursor locks up unless I disconnect the card.

[Akira]

Trying, trying and trying...

managed to get MiamiDX working again.
Added the DNS servers just in case

Re-configured everything from scratch, just in case.

I click on online, and the card supposedly goes online, but LINK light is frozen in either ON or OFF position.

As soon as I try t ouse the card, or if I hit OFFLINE, system freezes until I disconnect the card.

What the hell is going on? This is a bog standard MA401 card, and your standard NTSC A1200. I doubt it's the expansion borad, but could it be? Nowhere in the net it says it's incompatible with PCMCIA.

I am crying alredy ;(

[Akira]

Still no luck. I am going to try to transfer the drivers to my A600 and see if it runs there. Could it be a faulty card?

[Akira]

I'll find someone with an old PC notebook, because all I have so far here is an A600 which I WILL TRY to load with the card as soon as I can transfer the drivers to it (it has no disk drive). It sure sounds like a h/w problem, strange thing is, sometimes it DOES behave normally, but still i cannot ping any machine. Maybe the card is at fault, I do not know. The A1200 so far has given no problems and it doesn't have any sign of it being faulty.

Cheers for your answer!

[Akira]

Well it seems the newest I could find is 1.1!
Checked aminet, and it says this:

"Changes in this version:

  - Added a reset handler for AmigaOS 4. This allows the system to restart
    if a soft reset occurs while the card is in use."

I do not know if it is much use to me if this is just the only change but it won't hurt to upgrade, thanks for the pointer.

[Akira]

Worth a try then! Thanks!!!!! Will report back

[Akira]

Why do you have to "run>NIL:" it?

I'll try, thanks!

[Akira]

It doesn't need to be run'ed in order for the output to be sent to  NIL:

I suppose he ran it just in case it fails, but at this point, I rather know everything that happens, having all commands as verbose as possible.

Cheers!