Problem with WLAN interface

[mt]

Having a real headache getting a WES2009 (Eval) image working with a
particular WLAN device. It's a Ralink 2680 chipset.

I have a set of driver files and INF file, which if I install through device
manager on a vanilla XP Pro SP3 image, the device works fine.

If I do exactly the same thing (post FBA) on my WES image, the drivers seem
to install OK - everything looks OK at the driver level, but when selecting
the Wireless connection option, it does not find any wireless networks.

There are no errors reported in the event log.

My suspicion is that there is some subtle element missing from my image. All
the obvious documented components are there including Wireless Zero Config,
network provisioning etc. The Zero Config service seems to be running OK.

There are no unresolved component dependencies in my target.

I have tried this with MinLogin, Full WinLogin, Command Shell, Explorer
Shell ... all same result.

Installing the driver as an embedded component (i.e through FBA) produces
the same result, which supports the proposition that it's not anything
relating to the drivers themselves.

At this point I'm really not sure how to go about diagnosing what is the
culprit here. Possibilities I considered: is the SENS service needed?
Missing WMI components other than the core ones? Is there a crypto component
that is needed that somehow I've overlooked?

Any ideas most welcome!

Cheers...

 

[mt]

Well for the hell of it I added the compatability macros to the target,
effectively dragging in most of the XP Pro components, and lo and behold the
WLAN works.

So there is definitely some type of component interdependency that is
missing in relation to WLAN support.

The narrowing down is going to be a bit painful I suspect...

MT

 

[Henning]

Well for the hell of it I added the compatability macros to the target,
effectively dragging in most of the XP Pro components, and lo and behold
the
WLAN works.

So there is definitely some type of component interdependency that is
missing in relation to WLAN support.

The narrowing down is going to be a bit painful I suspect...

MT

Good luck, but I call it Mission Impossible.

/Henning

 

[mt]

Pretty much given up on this. .. it's just as well the wlan support is not
that critical for this project, for the time being anyway.

I got as far as the tray icon saying that it had detected Wireless networks,
but the actual list of wireless networks comes up empty.

I also tried disabling ms zero config and using Ralink wireless manager
util... interestingly it could make a connection to an open unsecured network
OK and get dhcp, but not to our own network which is WPA2-PSK. Link just kept
going up and down, almost as if the key was not correct. But I think the real
reason is that there some other bit not there that it needs.

Which leads me to wonder whether there is some missing encryption element in
the build that might account for this. The obvious things appear to be there
and running, but there is clearly some subtle difference between the full XP
Pro style build and my partially stripped down one. Arghh!

 

[Henning]

Pretty much given up on this. .. it's just as well the wlan support is not
that critical for this project, for the time being anyway.

I got as far as the tray icon saying that it had detected Wireless
networks,
but the actual list of wireless networks comes up empty.

I also tried disabling ms zero config and using Ralink wireless manager
util... interestingly it could make a connection to an open unsecured
network
OK and get dhcp, but not to our own network which is WPA2-PSK. Link just
kept
going up and down, almost as if the key was not correct. But I think the
real
reason is that there some other bit not there that it needs.

Which leads me to wonder whether there is some missing encryption element
in
the build that might account for this. The obvious things appear to be
there
and running, but there is clearly some subtle difference between the full
XP
Pro style build and my partially stripped down one. Arghh!

I've given up trying to strip down the FullXP component after days and days
of work, getting nowhere. Our product isn't short of resources, so I've
decided bigger-is-better We are running Wlan on the Gigabyte AirCruiser
Ultra USB dongle, using the Gigabyte setup utility, with no problems.

Have you looked in the windows logs, if there are any errors reported?

/Henning

 

[mt]

I suspect that part of the problem is that the zero config wireless support
was a latecomer addon to XP, and maybe the componentisation by the embedded
team hasn't properly ironed out the dependencies.

We might get a clue by looking at the BartPE wlan support is structured,
since the process of figuring out the required files and registry entries is
much the same.

MT