Wireless ipw2200 in FC6

[R. G. Newbury]

fedora-list-request at redhat.com wrote:

> Subject: Re: Wireless ipw2200 in FC6
> To: fedora-list at redhat.com

>>>> I have FC5 and FC6 installed on my laptop.  It has an Intel 2915AB
>>>> wireless card.  I am completely up-to-date on both FC5 and FC6.  The
>>>> wireless works great on FC5.  In FC6, however, it has problems.
<snip>
  >> A program called nm-applet will run automatically when you log in and
>> place its icon in the upper right side of the upper panel.
>> Click on that icon and choose your wireless connection form the list.
>> At that point you will be able to enter a WEP key if you want to and add
>> a security passwd for accessing the access point.

I had a Cisco Aironet 350 card in my Thinkpad T40 which never worked 
well. I replaced it with an Intel Pro 2915ABG (Rev 5) card and once I 
figured out how to set it up, it runs beautifully. Took a while to cover 
all of the bases however.
I suggest you update to the lastest Bios for the card (the rev 
05..whatever). Install the latest firmware from Intel, or IBM if it is 
an IBM/Lenovo laptop. Update the Bios for the laptop too.
I eventually discovered one horrendous problem was that if the laptop 
attempted to connect to my wireless router, and failed, the dhcp lease 
was NOT dropped by the router. Also, it helped to take down the wired 
link. I have never seen the 'nm-applet' referred to above...but the 
NetworkManager services are required. The killer bit is to restart the 
network after starting the NetworkManager services. I don't know why 
that should make a difference but it seems to.
Here is my script. I call it upwifi (and the parts which swap the 
resolv.conf and fstab entries for my home and office setups have been 
chopped off).
Hope this helps.

Geoff

# upwifi script
ifdown eth0
/sbin/modprobe ipw2200     #doing it again, just to make sure
# start NetworkManager services
/sbin/service NetworkManagerDispatcher start
/sbin/service NetworkManager start
/sbin/service network restart  # this seems to be necessary
# Just in case
dhclient -r         # kill any left-over lease entries *on the router*
# commence configuring wireless
#/sbin/iwconfig eth1 key on
/sbin/iwconfig eth1 mode managed rate auto key 1 
12345678901234567890123455 channel 11 essid whateveryourssidis
echo "Mode, rate, channel, key and ssid now set."
# Only now bring up the card
ifup eth1
# For testing purposes
#/sbin/iwconfig
#/sbin/ifconfig