[Prism54-users] Ghost ESSIDs

[Nicolai Langfeldt]

Hi,

I have an existing ad-hoc LAN.  I got my prism54 (smc2802W pci) up on it 
yesterday, running perfectly and at full 11Mbit p.s.  Good range too.

Today two things have happened:
- First my powerbook airport (orinoco/hermes) wifi freaked out and went 
to bed.  It appeared to have a hardware problem.  Later my wife's laptop 
Orinoco wifi freaked the same way.  Random? Hardly.

After Googeling it seemed that this could happen if the firmware was 
confused to death... After considering this I took down the prism54 
interface and removed the kernel module.  After a cold boot both my 
wifes and my laptops were OK.

I brought the prism54 up again and it ran fine for several hours.  Now 
I'm seeing problems, all wifi devices seem to be up but not all of them 
can talk to eachother.  The orinoco diagnostics suck but the prism54 
shows this:

# iwlist eth1 scanning
eth1      Scan completed :
           Cell 01 - Address: 00:E0:98:4C:71:24
                     ESSID:"Untitled"
                     Mode:Master
                     Encryption key:off
                     Frequency:2.457GHz
                     Quality:253/0  Signal level:-74 dBm  Noise 
level:-71 dBm
           Cell 02 - Address: 02:00:6F:A7:24:2C
                     ESSID:"LangfeldtWLLan"
                     Mode:Ad-Hoc
                     Encryption key:off
                     Frequency:2.457GHz
                     Quality:57/0  Signal level:-14 dBm  Noise level:-71 dBm
           Cell 03 - Address: 02:00:39:3E:72:B5
                     ESSID:"LangfeldtWLLan"
                     Mode:Ad-Hoc
                     Encryption key:off
                     Frequency:2.457GHz
                     Quality:3/0  Signal level:-68 dBm  Noise level:-71 dBm

The managed "Untitled" cell is some neighbour.  The second cell, with 
address 02:00:6F:A7:24:2C is the right one.  Cell 3 is a ghost, I can 
only assume that it's something the prism54 created.  If I take it down 
again all will be in order.

I've used the firmware posted on the SMC website, version 1.0.3.0.  I 
guess I'll try two different things:
- 1.0.4.3 which I found at some other web site.
- I think I'll put my prism54 in ap mode next and all the other units
   in managed mode.  See if that settles everything.

Other ideas? Things to test?

Regards,
   Nicolai