[Madwifi-users] interrupt handling issues ?

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Hi,

I've been working on getting my new D-Link DWL-G520 card working under 
debian testing with a 2.6.7 kernel, with limited success.

First I tried the HEAD version from CVS as of today (8/16/04):

wlan: 0.8.3.0 (EXPERIMENTAL)
ath_hal: module license 'Proprietary' taints kernel.
ath_hal: 0.9.11.6
ath_pci: no version for "ieee80211_ioctl_siwrate" found: kernel tainted.
ath_pci: 0.9.3.1 (EXPERIMENTAL)
ath0: 11b rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps
ath0: 11g rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps 
24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: mac 5.9 phy 4.3 5ghz radio 4.6
ath0: 802.11 address: 00:0f:3d:a9:2a:72
ath0: Use hw queue 0 for WME_AC_BE traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 1 for WME_AC_BK traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 2 for WME_AC_VI traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 3 for WME_AC_VO traffic
ath0: Atheros 5212: mem=0xfffa0000, irq=5

The driver load fine and the card is setup (using WEP) and I can ping my 
othe hosts on the LAN. However, I run into serious trouble trying to do 
anything more then this. For example, trying to NFS mount (over UDP) a 
filesystem I get zero to no throughput. What starts happening though are 
a number of error messages from the kernel:

hdc: lost interrupt
hdc: lost interrupt
hdc: task_out_intr: status=0x75 { DriveReady DeviceFault SeekComplete 
CorrectedError Error }
hdc: task_out_intr: error=0x04 { DriveStatusError }
ide1: reset: success
hdc: lost interrupt
hdc: task_out_intr: status=0x75 { DriveReady DeviceFault SeekComplete 
CorrectedError Error }
hdc: task_out_intr: error=0x04 { DriveStatusError }
ide1: reset: success

These error messages are not present when a wireless card is not in use 
(the modules can be loaded though, just not active), moreover I can 
produce these error by just copying files around on the local harddrive 
while the driver is active. As soon as I do a 'ifconfig ath0 down' the 
error messages dissapear and the system works fine again.

I tried reverting to an older version:

wlan: 0.7.3.2 BETA
ath_hal: module license 'Proprietary' taints kernel.
ath_hal: 0.9.9.3
ath_pci: no version for "ieee80211_encap" found: kernel tainted.
ath_pci: 0.8.5.5 BETA
ath_pci: 0.8.5.5 BETA
Setup queue (0) for WME_AC_BK
Setup queue (1) for WME_AC_BE
Setup queue (2) for WME_AC_VI
Setup queue (3) for WME_AC_VO
ath0: mac 5.9 phy 4.3 5ghz radio 4.6
ath0: 11b rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps
ath0: 11g rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps 
24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: 802.11 address: 00:0f:3d:a9:2a:72
ath0: Atheros 5212: mem=0xfffa0000, irq=3

This gives the same problem though (note that the IRQ changed from the 
newer to newer driver, this was since I have also tried running the card 
  on many different IRQ with the same results, the above printouts are 
just snapshots in time).

The computer is an older Pentium 150 machine with an Intel 430FX 
chipset. Why would the madwifi driver cause IDE interrupt issues ? Any 
ideas ? The motherboard is made by Intel, BTW.

Here's the printout of iwconfig and lspci:

heimdal:~# iwconfig
lo        no wireless extensions.

ath0      IEEE 802.11g  ESSID:"nilsson"  Nickname:"home-setup"
           Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.442GHz  Access Point: 00:00:AA:BB:CC:0D
           Bit Rate:11Mb/s   Tx-Power:off   Sensitivity=0/3
           Retry:off   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
           Encryption key:XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX   Security mode:open
           Power Management:off
           Link Quality=48/94  Signal level=-47 dBm  Noise level=-95 dBm
           Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
           Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

heimdal:~# lspci -v
0000:00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 430FX - 82437FX TSC [Triton I] 
(rev 02)
         Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 64

0000:00:07.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82371FB PIIX ISA [Triton I] (rev 02)
         Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0

0000:00:07.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82371FB PIIX IDE [Triton I] (rev 
02) (prog-if 80 [Master])
         Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 64
         I/O ports at ffa0 [size=16]

0000:00:0d.0 VGA compatible controller: Matrox Graphics, Inc. MGA 1064SG 
[Mystique] (rev 02) (prog-if 00 [VGA])
         Flags: bus master, stepping, medium devsel, latency 64, IRQ 10
         Memory at ffbec000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
         Memory at ff000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=8M]
         Memory at fe800000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=8M]

0000:00:0e.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications, Inc. AR5212 
802.11abg NIC (rev 01)
         Subsystem: D-Link System Inc: Unknown device 3a13
         Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 168, IRQ 3
         Memory at fffa0000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
         Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2

0000:00:10.0 Ethernet controller: Digital Equipment Corporation DECchip 
21140 [FasterNet] (rev 22)
         Subsystem: Digital Equipment Corporation: Unknown device 500a
         Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 66, IRQ 9
         I/O ports at fc80 [size=128]
         Memory at fffbfc00 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=128]

Thanks
Daniel Nilsson