Configure Atheros AR9285 wireless in Gentoo
My laptop has an Atheros AR9285 wireless card. By following the “Network Configuration” section in the Gentoo handbook I chose the ath9k module. The modules seem to be loaded correctly:
# lsmod | grep ath ath9k 72172 0 ath9k_common 2345 1 ath9k mac80211 146807 2 ath9k,ath9k_common ath9k_hw 213153 2 ath9k,ath9k_common ath 8652 2 ath9k,ath9k_hw cfg80211 112782 4 ath9k,ath9k_common,mac80211,ath
And the interface also shows up in ifconfig:
wlan0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:22:43:61:a2:f0
UP BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:0 (0.0 B) TX bytes:0 (0.0 B)
However, I cannot do a network scan:
# iwlist wlan0 scanning wlan0 Interface doesn't support scanning.
And the interface doesn’t seem to be recognized:
# iwconfig wlan0 wlan0 no wireless extensions.
What can I try to make it work?
PS: I also have Ubuntu on this laptop and wireless is working fine.
If you use DE, it’s better to use NetworkManager (description of configuring NM on Gentoo).
Otherwise, you need to edit the net configuration file(/etc/conf.d/net):
config_wlan0=("dhcp")
modules=("iwconfig")
preferred_aps=("WI-FI_NAME")
config_WI-FI_NAME=("dhcp")
and then run /etc/init.d/net.wlan0 start to start it.
I got the solution on Gentoo Forums. It turned out to be a mis-configured kernel.
Here is the kernel configuration that works (from the post that I linked to above):
[*] Networking support --->
-*- Wireless --->
<*> cfg80211 - wireless configuration API
[*] enable powersave by default
[*] cfg80211 wireless extensions compatibility
[*] Wireless extensions sysfs files
<*> Common routines for IEEE802.11 drivers
<*> Generic IEEE 802.11 Networking Stack (mac80211)
Default rate control algorithm (Minstrel) --->
-*- Enable LED triggers
Device Drivers --->
[*] Network device support --->
[*] Wireless LAN --->
<*> Atheros Wireless Cards --->
<*> Atheros 802.11n wireless cards support