[Madwifi-users] Netgear WG511T: A lot of frames lose with WEP/restricted madwifi and madwifi-BSD

[TOTILA <to...@gm...>]

Hi,
i own a Netgear WG511T cardbus, pci-id 168c:0013. I tried this card in 
an unencrypted network and madwifi and all works fine...
then i am tring to use with a WEP/restricted network and i get a lot of 
trouble! i loss a lot of frames! I couldn't associate with my AP. Then i 
read the FAQ at the address 
http://www.mattfoster.clara.co.uk/madwifi-8.htm#11
and i tried
iwconfig ath0 key restricted
iwpriv ath0 authmode 2

in this way i succeded in associating with AP but i still lose a lot of 
frames! in addiction all that frames lost make grow the noise level and 
fall the signal level... so the bitrate fall from 54M to 1M...and after 
a while lose also the association with the AP. If i set manually the 
rate is a little more stable

now i am connected in this way but.... you can evaluate the value of 
lost frames!
===CUT====
root@atlantide linux-2.6.9 # ifconfig ath0
ath0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:0F:B5:XX:XX:XX
           inet addr:10.0.1.2  Bcast:10.255.255.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
           inet6 addr: fe80::20f:b5ff:xxxx:xxxx/64 Scope:Link
           UP BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
           RX packets:6332 errors:11622 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:11622
           TX packets:6069 errors:1467 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
           collisions:0 txqueuelen:200
           RX bytes:8151659 (7.7 Mb)  TX bytes:547229 (534.4 Kb)
           Interrupt:11 Memory:e20e0000-e20f0000
=========

on 6332 packet recived correctly 11622 are lost! the double!
this beavhiour is equal for madwifi and madwifi-BSD. I tried with linux 
2.6.9 and also with 2.6.11.7. No difference!

There are also errors in trasmission... but i think that are fakes 
because, when i ping my AP, i get a lot of DUP ping reply, so i think 
that the ping request are sent more times (and i get ping reply with the 
same icmp sequence number)
as you can see

===CUT===
root@atlantide tools # ping 10.0.1.6
PING 10.0.1.6 (10.0.1.6) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=1 ttl=127 time=22.8 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=2 ttl=127 time=21.8 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=2 ttl=127 time=25.6 ms (DUP!)
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=3 ttl=127 time=13.0 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=4 ttl=127 time=24.4 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=6 ttl=127 time=20.7 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=9 ttl=127 time=27.3 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=10 ttl=127 time=36.9 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=12 ttl=127 time=24.3 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.6: icmp_seq=13 ttl=127 time=10.5 ms

--- 10.0.1.6 ping statistics ---
13 packets transmitted, 9 received, +1 duplicates, 30% packet loss, time 
12006ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 10.506/22.765/36.955/6.976 ms
=========

some icmp_seq are missed (probably due to error in incoming) and some 
icmp_seq are dup (probably for fake errors in outcoming).

the output of iwconfig, after i set manually the essid, the key 
(obviusly :-), the rate and the channel is

==CUT====
root@atlantide tools # iwconfig ath0
ath0      IEEE 802.11g  ESSID:"giganet"
           Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.462 GHz  Access Point: 
00:0F:3D:XX:XX:XX
           Bit Rate=54 Mb/s   Tx-Power:17 dBm   Sensitivity=0/3
           Retry:off   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
           Encryption key:xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xx   Security 
mode:restricted
           Power Management:off
           Link Quality=10/94  Signal level=-85 dBm  Noise level=-95 dBm
           Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
           Tx excessive retries:1467  Invalid misc:1467   Missed beacon:18
=========


so i tried the test boundled, wep_test, and tells that 1/1 tests are passed.
I tried also the tools i cut there the outputs

===CUT===
root@atlantide tools # ./80211stats
954 rx discard 'cuz dup
451 rx discard mgt frames
5793 rx beacon frames
25 rx sta auth failure
1 rx discard 'cuz port unauthorized
29 active scans started
=========
===CUT===
root@atlantide tools # ./athstats
18      beacon miss interrupts
3016    mib interrupts
6069    packet sent on the interface
106     tx management frames
157     tx frames discarded prior to association
1467    tx failed 'cuz too many retries
52408   long on-chip tx retries
62      tx frames with no ack marked
6147    tx frames with short preamble
4602    tx frames with an alternate rate
12685   rx failed 'cuz of bad CRC
6332    packet recv on the interface
3       rx PHY errors:
     3 CCK restart
37      periodic calibrations
1       rfgain value change
rssi of last ack: 10
rssi of last rcv: 10
Antenna profile:
[1] tx     3797 rx    10201
[2] tx      910 rx     3715
=========

Please help me, If i have to make more tests please tell me what i have 
to do and i will do. Thank you for your time!

Marco