New install with no ethernet or wifi

[cornbread]

I am new to Vector linux.  I have pentium 4 laptop that I want to use as a netbook and am having trouble getting a distro together that handles wifi.

Firstly, Vector linux doesnt seem to recognize my eth0 connection that is auto with other distros.  It also doesn't connect wirelessly.  Other distros all have that problem.

It is vector standard gold 5.9

I tried following the wireless howto but it ended when i tried the lspci command.  I tried

sudo lspci

command not found

. 

I don't think I left anything out of the installation.

The wireless card is supposedly well supported.  It is the Airlink 101 awlh 4130 in bright green.

I would love to get ethernet working ASAP so that trouble shooting from the laptop could be more easily accomplished with cut and paste from the command line output..

[M0E-lnx]

First thing to do is drop the "sudo lspci" stuff

in VL, you're either root or your'e not.. so su to the root account

Code:

su
<password>

then execute your lspci command
post the output here
also post the output of ifconfig

[bigpaws]

You need to run lspci as root. So in a terminal use su and then enter
root password.

Actually listing the laptop name, and model # would help with
googling.

The wireless appears to need to use madwifi. You can check out
madwifi.org.

You can also look at Linux laptops which may have information to help
get you going.

Bigpaws

[caitlyn]

@M0E-lnx:  Huh?  I use sudo all the time.  

Code:

sudo /sbin/lspci

will definitely work if he has sudo configured correctly.

What type of ethernet chipset does that laptop have for wired networking?  Can you provide the brand name and model of the laptop?

[M0E-lnx]

Sudo will only work after tweaking a VL installation to make that happen... seems he's just finished installing, out of the box, sudo doesn't work on VL

[cornbread]

Excellent!  thank you!  the "su" did the trick.  I am currently following the walkthrough for the wifi set up with all the tools at my command.

I would love to post the lspci output(it worked!) but right now my ethernet doesnt connect.  I pulled up the pc specs on the web and i didnt find out much about the ethernet card.

it is a jetbook model 9400a (also under the manufacturer name jetta)

Here is a listing of the older models

I tried setting up my network manually after the dhcp didn't work.

It is a vanilla wired set-up with my router at 192.168.0.1 and a subnet of 255.255.255.0  Vector seemed real keen on making sure my pc name to the network was "vector.linux.net"  Thats not showing up on my router's web page when I look at my live network.  I don't really know how a ping works but in vector at the command line i typed

ping 192.168.0.1

and

64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq(n+1 every sec) ttl=64 time=0.038-45 ms

Does that mean anything?

[cornbread]

i ran lspci and my ethernet card is a realtek semiconductor rtl-8139/8139c/8139

[bigpaws]

64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq(n+1 every sec) ttl=64 time=0.038-45 ms

That shows a response from your router, hence the ethernet card
is connected.

Bigpaws

[cornbread]

Still no internet for me.

I did some additional research and found some common issues people had with the 8139too module (the one loaded in /etc/modprobe.conf) and the 2.6 kernel.

8139too or 8139cp?
8139too not working in 2.6?

it looks like my kernal is 2.6.22.14 ( i ran modinfo e100)

Wirelessly speaking...

I have the ath_pci module loaded.  That looks like the right one for ar5212 chipsets like mine.

But an updated one, ath5k is shipping with vector 6.0

Since I cant get the ath_pci working, when I get the eth0 connected, will I be able to download the ath5k module and get wireless working?

[wcs]

If you can ping a host, then there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with your card or connection.

Try

Code:

ping 216.239.59.103

It will keep on pinging, then hit ctrl-c to cancel and it will tell you how many packets were transmitted.
If this works, there's no need to worry about anything like modules and kernels and the like.

Maybe a dns problem?...
Try

Code:

ping www.google.com

It's the same as the above, see if it works the same way.

[wcs]

I assume that for wireless you tried running vlwifi? That should be the first step.

[wcs]

Just one more thing.
Make sure that the lspci command shows the same vendor and product codes as the ones on that webpage.

man: 168c dev: 0013

If that's the case you should be good to go with the right driver.

[GrannyGeek]

@M0E-lnx:  Huh?  I use sudo all the time. 

Code:

sudo /sbin/lspci

will definitely work if he has sudo configured correctly.

If you type the command's complete path (/sbin/lspci rather than lspci), you can run the command as user--no su or sudo needed. The results look about the same whether I run as root or run /sbin/lspci as user, but I didn't do a line-by-line comparison.
--GrannyGeek

[cornbread]

If you can ping a host, then there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with your card or connection.

Try

Code:

ping 216.239.59.103

It will keep on pinging, then hit ctrl-c to cancel and it will tell you how many packets were transmitted.
If this works, there's no need to worry about anything like modules and kernels and the like.

Maybe a dns problem?...
Try

Code:

ping www.google.com

It's the same as the above, see if it works the same way.

Pinging 216.239.59.103 produced only errors.  I changed my dns to the open dns ips inside my router.

but if I can get my router to ping...  why doesnt the laptop work like everything else that is wired to it?  I don't understand.  I want to solve this because it feels like i am missing something stupid.  Other distros handle eth0 without a problem... it has got to be some type of user error.

Just one more thing.
Make sure that the lspci command shows the same vendor and product codes as the ones on that webpage.

man: 168c dev: 0013

If that's the case you should be good to go with the right driver.

I ran lspci and nothing resembling that showed up.  

it looked like this:

02:03.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)

[hata_ph]

Pinging 216.239.59.103 produced only errors.  I changed my dns to the open dns ips inside my router.

but if I can get my router to ping...  why doesnt the laptop work like everything else that is wired to it?  I don't understand.  I want to solve this because it feels like i am missing something stupid.  Other distros handle eth0 without a problem... it has got to be some type of user error.

So does it work after set up the DNS?