problem with ndis on Acer Aspire 1356LCi ( RTL8180L )

[Frank Staals]

Hello everyone,

I have got an Acer Aspire 1356LCi notebook. I'm verry pleased with it, 
allthough I don't see any possibility to get the internel WLAN card 
working. I found out it is using this Realtec chipset: RTL8180L. So I 
downloaded the WinXP driver from 
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloads1-3.aspx?Keyword=rtl8180 , 
installed ndis as described in the handbook : 
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/network-wireless.html 
. So far so good, it recognised my (internal ) WLAN card:

ndis0: <Realtek RTL8180 Wireless LAN (Mini-)PCI NIC> port 0x1000-0x10ff 
mem 0xd0004800-0xd00048ff irq 9 at device 9.0 on pci0
ndis0: NDIS API version: 5.1
ndis0: Ethernet address: 00:0b:6b:29:13:21
ndis0: 11b rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps

But when I try to connect with my AP this is what happens:

root at Riza# ifconfig ndis0
ndis0: flags=8802<BROADCAST,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500
        ether 00:0b:6b:29:13:21
        media: IEEE 802.11 Wireless Ethernet autoselect
        status: no carrier
        ssid ""
        channel -1 authmode OPEN powersavemode OFF powersavesleep 100
        rtsthreshold 2312 protmode CTS
        wepmode OFF weptxkey 1

root at Riza# ifconfig ndis0 inet 192.168.5.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 ssid 
FStaals.nl.eu.org channel 12

root at Riza# ifconfig ndis0
ndis0: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500
        inet 192.168.5.2 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.5.255
        ether 00:0b:6b:29:13:21
        media: IEEE 802.11 Wireless Ethernet autoselect
        status: no carrier
        ssid ""
        channel 12 authmode OPEN powersavemode OFF powersavesleep 100
        rtsthreshold 2312 protmode CTS
        wepmode OFF weptxkey 1
root at Riza#

It changes the IP, netmask and channel perfectly. But it won't connect 
to my accespoint, the ssid stays 'clean'.  What can I do to let it 
connect ?

additional data:

Laptop: Acer Aspire 1356LCi 
http://aac.acer.com/APP/AKC/INTERNET/AACPubli.nsf/0/8FE0B341F96B2A8A88256E9800629F91?OpenDocument#specs
WLAN Drivers: 
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloads1-3.aspx?Keyword=rtl8180

Also when I view statistcis for ndis ( systcl -a | grep ndis ) almost 
everything it returns has the value "UNSET" example:

dev.ndis.0.GCT_ACPR: UNSET

Does anyone know what I have to do to get my internal WLAN working ?

Thanks in Advance

-- 
Frank Staals

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The Greatest pleasure in life is doing things people say you cannot do  - Walter Bagehot
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With questions or comment mail to FrankStaals at GMX.Net or visit FStaals.nl.eu.org