# Cisco Aironet MiniPCI 350

## heathkit

I've noticed that there's now a mpi350 driver in portage.  I wish I'd known about it before spending half an hour wading through Cisco's site to get the download  :Smile: 

Does anyone know how to get this card working with WEP under linux?  It connects to unencrypted networks just fine for me, but I can't get it to connect to my SMC access point under linux (windows works just fine).  I'm getting increasingly pissed off at this card, anyway.

Can anyone recommend a good, cheap miniPCI WiFi card?  Preferably Orinoco or Prism2?

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## jessem77

I have been trying for weeks to get my card working.    :Embarassed: 

After I do an emerge mpi350-driver when I do a modprobe mpi350 I get a segfualt. If I go to cisco's site and download and compile their driver and do a modprobe mpi350 my laptop just powers off. 

Bummer deal..........

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## jessem77

I have recently purchased an IBM Thinkpad T-30. I planned to run Linux

on this machine and I saw that Cisco provide Linux drivers for the 350

series adapters. So, opted for the Cisco miniPCI card instead of the

Intel card (and paid the extra money).

I have had the laptop for two weeks now and still cannot get the card

working. I download the Linux-ACU-Driver-v2.0 from Cisco.com, compiled

the modules and when I install the mpi350 module I get a segmentation

fault, or the machine just instantly powers down. I have had a few

people look at the problem with me and I don't think that I am doing

anything wrong. The module just cannot be inserted into the kernel

without crashing the whole system. I have tried it on Mandrake, Redhat,

Slackware, and Gentoo. I get a varying amount of failure with the

different flavors of Linux e.g. Segmentation Fault, System-Freeze,

instant Power-off, 100% CPU utilization until I remove the module etc. 

If the modules (i.e. airo, mpi350) don't work properly why release them?

Any suggestions?

My current setup is:

Gentoo Linux 

Kernel Version = 2.4.20

Aironet Drivers = 2.0 

Client Adapter = 350 series Mini PCI

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## KiloLima

Hi,

i also use the Cisco Aironet 350 Mini-PCI card in my Notebook. It is a Toshiba Satellite Pro 4600. At the beginning i also got some serious problems, like kernel crashes and so on, but now it works perfect for me here.

I use to connect to a D-Link 614+ AP with VPN-passthrou, because i am running IPSec over the WLAN....

Okay this are the steps for me. Kernel used is 2.4.20-r2, but i also used other kernels...no problems at all.

```

as root:

1) Download the Linux-ACU-Driver-v2.0.tar.gz from Cisco's Site.

2) unpack this one in /tmp

3) run kpciinstall  [color=red]NOT cwiinstall[/color]. This will build the drivers without forking with pcmcia-cs etc...

4) cp ethX.cfg to /etc/eth1.cfg (assuming you use your wlan card as eth1 like me)

5) modprobe mpi350....should work and gives you some information that this modules is copyrighted and tainted by the kernel etc...

6) set up your card with eg. ifconfig eth1 192.168.99.100 

7) set default route with eg. ifconfig add default gw 192.168.99.1

as user:

8) run /opt/bin/cisco/acu and configure your card once (SSID etc). The config information will be saved to /eth/eth1.cfg, which you hopefully have copied above.

9) ping your access point or restart acu and see the status of your card (link level etc.)

To restore the settings in /etc/eth1.cfg (after reboot for example) you should run /opt/cisco/bin/bcard

```

This should be all to have the card running. Of course if you like more comfort you could automatically made the network init setup with the gentoo conf.d system. If you demand this i can describe this as well.

good luck,

KiloLima  :Very Happy: 

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## jessem77

Thanks for the input. You didnt really specify what you did to stop the kernel panics. For me the kernel panics stopped only when 

A: I removed the DHCP reference for eth1 from /etc/conf.d/net  

B: When I copied the ethX.cfg to the /etc folder

Then when I want wireless I just

modprobe mpi350

/opt/cisco/bin/bcard

dhcpd eth1

/opt/cisco/acu

Whoohoo it works.

I would get a kernel OOPS and or system freeze if the process dhcpd eth1 is started before I run bcard. I stopped that by removing eth1 from /etc/conf.d/net. 

I am sure there are many more little nuances that I had to go through that am not mentioning to get this up and running. I am watching 

http://sourceforge.net/projects/airo-linux/ closely for a more STABLE driver. Theirs is called airo_mpi. 

Man it was a pain to get this up and running. The driver is still a little buggy but Ill live with it.     :Confused:  [/url]

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## KiloLima

Well the answe rhow i stopped the kernel panics is easy: i can't remember it...but what i do remember is what you've already said. The cisco driver seems to be very beta IMHO.

I also can't wait when the airo-linux team release their support for the mpi350 card in their airo driver. I know that Ben is still working on that, and that in the cvs version they have support, but this is also just some kind of pre-alpha and didn't worked for me. 

So the only solution for now is, either use the cisco drive or just be a little bit more patient and wait for the final airo-linux implementation, which i am sure will be finished in the next few months. 

bye,

KiloLima

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## griffi9

I too have an IBM Thinkpad T30 with the Cisco Aironet 350 MiniPCI Wireless card ... and I too have been VERY frustrated by the cisco driver (seems very beta to me as well).  I am almost to the point of searching for a new wireless miniPCI card.

I am currently running RH9 on my T30 but I'm strongly considering a switch to Gentoo (which I just installed on a server) because of it's optimization and package management.  I was hoping Gentoo had figured out some of the issues with the Cisco card but from the sounds of it things are still developing.  

KiloLima ... if you have any breaking news from the airo-linux team I would really appreciate it.  I have had this machine (and problems with the wireless card) for what seems like an eternity in the technology world ...  :Smile: 

In the mean time I'll try to be patient too.

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## tlianza

 *jessem77 wrote:*   

>  I download the Linux-ACU-Driver-v2.0 from Cisco.com, compiled
> 
> the modules and when I install the mpi350 module I get a segmentation
> 
> fault, or the machine just instantly powers down. 

 

I realize this is an older post, but I just went to cisco.com and the driver they're giving me is v2.1 - not 2.0 anymore.  Problem is, portage expects the file to be named with "2.0" and have a specific signature (which this new version doesn't have).  How do we go about getting this updated by gentoo?

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## gorjusborg

I have been using wireless with WEP on my Aironet 350 miniPCI card built into my thinkpad X31 for a couple years now.  

It used to be difficult to keep up with all the changes and confusing hacks needed to get the card to work, but now it is relatively easy to get the card working since the airo.c driver distributed with newer linux kernels (i'm using 2.6.10) has been modified to support minipci 350 cards.  

The only thing I'm not sure of is whether newer firmware versions work with the airo.c driver.  I am using 5.00.03 and have been using it for some time.  However, I had to downgrade to this version once.  I made the mistake of upgrading the Aironet 350 windows drivers with Cisco's automagical installer.  This program automagically upgraded the firmware for the card.  Since (at the time, at least) the linux aironet drivers only worked with the older firmware, the card would not work any longer.  I remember banging my head against the wall for a long time trying to figure out what I did to make the card inoperable and I was peeved when I discovered that the firmware had been upgraded behind my back.

While newer firmware is desireable for many people, I have not had any problems (except rfmon doesn't work correctly) with the older version, so being tied to 5.00.03 is not a problem for me.

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