# AR928X - wireless card problem

## Prospero_s

Heya mates. 

First - excuse my poor English  :Smile: 

Sooo, i am totaly new in Gentoo and i encounter a big big problem - cannot make my wireless card to work.

from lspci: 

 *Quote:*   

> 03:00.0 Network controller: Atheros Communications Inc. AR928X Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01)
> 
> 

 

the options in the kernel are with [M] for ath9k drivers.

from lsmod: 

 *Quote:*   

> Module                  Size  Used by
> 
> ath_pci                             60345  0 
> 
> wlan                                133356  1 ath_pci
> ...

 

As you can see - did not load ath9k .... when i try to load it by - modprobe ath9k it gives me that bummer:

 *Quote:*   

> FATAL: Error inserting ath9k (/lib/modules/3.0.3-gentoo/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/ath/ath9k/ath9k.ko): Unknown symbol in module, or unknown parameter (see dmesg)
> 
> 

 

from dmesg: 

 *Quote:*   

> [  163.220178] ath_hal: 0.9.18.0 (AR5210, AR5211, AR5212, RF5111, RF5112, RF2413, RF5413)
> 
> [  163.244958] wlan: svn r4136 (branch madwifi-0.9.4)
> 
> [  163.266838] ath_pci: svn r4136 (branch madwifi-0.9.4)
> ...

 

i tried to install madwifi drivers but the result was, as you can see, nada  :Very Happy: 

when i type "ifconfig wlan0 up" - it says:

 *Quote:*   

> wlan0: ERROR while getting interface flags: No such device
> 
> 

 

I reaaaly wanna use Gentoo, but without wireless i'm stuck in the kitchen  :Very Happy: 

P.S. Do know that i install my Gentoo 2 days ago  :Smile:  I am realy noob at it, so be kind  :Smile: 

----------

## DONAHUE

Are you trying to get wifi connection with the cd booted? If so, make it easy on yourself, make a System Rescue CD and boot it to an xfce GUI and a network connection. Network Manager icon is in the lower right of the desktop. 

If you have already installed gentoo but can't connect wifi, do you have wired connection to work with while setting up wifi?

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## Prospero_s

Yes i have installed gentoo on my hard drive and a wired connection - I am using it right now. 

But the main problem is that it cannot find my wireless card 

ifconfig: 

 *Quote:*   

> eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:1d:72:c5:ac:0d  
> 
>           inet addr:192.168.1.102  Bcast:192.168.1.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
> 
>           UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
> ...

 

iwconfig:

 *Quote:*   

> lo        no wireless extensions.
> 
> eth0      no wireless extensions.
> 
> 

 

----------

## DONAHUE

```
emerge pciutils wgetpaste

lspci -k | wgetpaste
```

post the url returned. 

What is your kernel version?

Does System Rescue CD make a connection? If it does, it would show there is no fundamental incompatibility. Network manager icon in the lower right of the xfce desktop.

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## chithanh

```
FATAL: Error inserting ath9k (/lib/modules/3.0.3-gentoo/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/ath/ath9k/ath9k.ko): Unknown symbol in module, or unknown parameter (see dmesg) 
```

means that the module does not match your kernel, probably because they were built with different config / compiler / at different times.

Verify with "uname -a" that you are running the kernel you think you are, and that the build date and time matches with the ath9k.ko module.

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## djdunn

its very possible that you may have a separate partition for /boot, and you did not mount /boot when you installed the kernel, so when you boot it mounts the partition "over top of" the /boot where you new kernel is and when you installed the modules you got the new modules, but an old kernel because your /boot partition lays on top of /boot where your new kernel is.

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## Prospero_s

Well thx for the answers mates. In the end I just downgrade the kernel to 2.6.37 (I was on 3.0.3) and it turned out that this is the problem. Now my card is up and i am fighting to connect it to my wifi network  :Smile: 

Again - thx for the help  :Smile:  Great community you have here  :Smile: 

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## mario.franic

For anyone else with this problem, PCI bus support in ath9k must be enabled also.

$ zgrep ATH9K_PCI /proc/config.gz 

CONFIG_ATH9K_PCI=y

----------

## mimosinnet

 *mario.franic wrote:*   

> For anyone else with this problem, PCI bus support in ath9k must be enabled also.
> 
> $ zgrep ATH9K_PCI /proc/config.gz 
> 
> CONFIG_ATH9K_PCI=y

 

I do not seem to have this option in my kernel :

```
# zgrep ATH9K /proc/config.gz  

CONFIG_ATH9K_HW=m

CONFIG_ATH9K_COMMON=m

CONFIG_ATH9K=m

# CONFIG_ATH9K_DEBUGFS is not set

CONFIG_ATH9K_RATE_CONTROL=y

# CONFIG_ATH9K_HTC is not set
```

My kernel is gentoo-sources-2.6.39-gentoo-r3. Which one are you using?

Thanks!

----------

## mario.franic

I first encountered this problem when I switched kernel to 3.x.x version, so this is solution for 3.x.x versions of kernel. In you're case problem is probably something else.

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## mimosinnet

 *mario.franic wrote:*   

> I first encountered this problem when I switched kernel to 3.x.x version, so this is solution for 3.x.x versions of kernel. In you're case problem is probably something else.

 

Thanks for the tip!   :Very Happy:   I will keep and eye when kernel 3.x.x gets stable! 

Cheers!

----------

