Copyright (c) 2002-2003 Stichting Wireless Leiden, All rights reserved. License: http://wleiden.webweaving.org:8080/svn/node-config/install/LICENSE Written by: Marten Vijn, 15-10-03 Hardware issues on i386 machines Content: 1. Background 2. Good hardware 3. Pentium issues: 3.1.1 Bios 3.1.2 Power supply 3.2 Cards + firmware 3.3 PCI->PCMCIA card 4. Testing hardware 1. In this paper I would like to help people building very cheap network nodes. Of course it is easier to buy embedded boards and to standardise all hardware. It will cost a lot more and saves lot of time. We are a group of volunteers. We don't have a lot of money. But time we have. Issues on hardware change fast. So this is probably off-dated at writing time. There is a lot of old fashioned hardware that is very useful for wireless nodes. Most of the systems we use are Pentium l, 64Mb memory, 500Mb harddisks. If you would to contribute to this paper an email to me . 2. The hardware I preferably would choose is: - Pentium board 166 MHz with AWARD bios - 4 or more PCI slots - 1 or more ISA slots - 1 or more serial port - 4 PCI->PCMCIA with Ricoh chip (5c475) - 4 Senao cards with firmware: primary 1.1.1 secondary 1.5.6 - 3com ( or any other ISA) hard configured on port 300 irq 10 (my standard) when having trouble with a ISA card (e.g.: dhclient works but no pings) you might consider settings like irq 5 port 300. This is most likely when dealing with a Phoenix bios. Remember to set irq and io in: card, bios, /boot/device.hints. To configure an ISA nic you will need to boot in dos and use a config floppy (look for 3c5x9cfg.exe for such 3com cards) - AT power supply - ATX cut the green wire and connect it to the chassis, (at your own risk!!) to make it behave like an AT power supply. 3.0 issues on the Pentium machine 3.1.1 bios settings: - no halt on all errors - ISA legacy irq 10 - Serial port (I use port 3h8 irq 4) - Secondary IDE controller, usb, second serial port, printer port off 3.1.2 power: AT-powersupply. If using an ATX-powersupply you will need a with bios Setup that boots the machine after a power dip. I have not found this option on many boards. An other option is to cut the green wire and connect it to the chassis or a black one. The power supply will act as an AT: it is always on. :) 3.2 CARDs Some useful cards at this moment: - wl200 PCI+PCMCIA - senao PCMCIA - (old!) wmp11 PCI - (old!) e-tech PCI - avaya / lucent PCMCIA In the Wireless Leiden network we to versions of firmware - on wl200 primary: 0.0.3 secondary: 0.8.0 - on other prism cards primary: 1.1.1 secondary: 1.5.6 Flashing card's is done under the wings of the Evil Empire O.S. and winupdate. If the machine hangs while writing the primary firmware, the card is broken card. Repairing can be done; sending it to the manufacture is an option. If the machine hangs while writing the secondary firmware just retry. Precautions: - Use power adapter for the laptop - Close other programs - Switch the card to no radioactivity if possible - Close the wireless-adapter configuration utility Then flash...and prey :) I found the firmware here: - http://www.netgate.com/support/prism_firmware/ - http://linux.junsun.net/intersil-prism/firmware/ - http://www.red-bean.com/~proski/firmware/ Versions: - 1.3.2 AP-modus hangs after a while - 1.4.2 Buggy in AP-modus - 1.4.9 No AP-modus - 1.5.4 Please tell me - 1.5.6 Runs AP-modus, a few error reports in AP-modus, no hangs - 1.7.1 Please tell me - 1.7.4 Kismet reports it as an AP; AP-mode works using hostap-0.1.0 using Linux; AP-mode doesn't work with FreeBSD 5.0 PCI-cards tends to change chip from prism to broadcom: - wmp 11 - e-tech The following cards have a Harris chip and work fine but only in client mode: - Lucent - Avaye - many others (USB, PCI, and PCMCIA) 3.3 PCI2PCMCIA cards/ PCMCIA adapters: - Ricoh chip (5c475) works with Award bios but not with the Pentium l machines from Compaq, having a phoenix bios. - Belkin adapters are fine (also with Phoenix en Compaq's) and act like true PCI! Unfortunately they are out of production - ISA card I have seem work but I did not have / find dos config tools to set irq and ports properly. 4. Testing hardware Most of our hardware is donated. The hardware status is illusive. Testing memory and harddrives is wanted. - Memory with memtest http://www.memtest86.com/ - Test harddisks and removing data from harddrives: hd-tester-script that works on Debian GNU / Linux http://wleiden.webweaving.org:8080/svn/node-config/tools/badblocks.sh