Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

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Lenia

Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by Lenia »

Hi, long term windows user here :D. I want to use Linux to get a better performance from my Dell Inspiro Duo 1090. It came with Win7 and was horribly slow, after many attempts at improving performance I'd mostly given up on it. Then I thought about trying it out with a different OS. I installed first Zorin OS 9, then the latest Linux Mint alongside Windows 7, from a usb. Performance is a dream come true, with a small exception. With both these OS, I can't connect to Wifi. I can see all the networks, but when I try to connect to my own (WPA&WPA2 Personal, same password as on other working devices) it doesn't connect but keeps asking for the password. Wifi works in windows on this same netbook. What gives?

Please help me figure out a fix, I'd really love to use linux on this, but I must get the wifi working since the netbook doesn't have a port for wired LAN.
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JeremyB
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Re: Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by JeremyB »

What is the wireless card

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lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net
Lenia

Re: Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by Lenia »

Network controller: Qualcomm Atheros AR9285 Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) [168c:002b] (rev 01)
Subsystem: Qualcomm Atheros Device [168c:0205]
Kernel driver in use: ath9k

This is what comes up. Thnx for replying btw:D
JeremyB
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Re: Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by JeremyB »

Lenia wrote:Network controller: Qualcomm Atheros AR9285 Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) [168c:002b] (rev 01)
Subsystem: Qualcomm Atheros Device [168c:0205]
Kernel driver in use: ath9k

This is what comes up. Thnx for replying btw:D
You might need to change your wifi router encryption settings if you have WEP or TKIP enabled as Linux in general doesn't work well with it and Atheros wifi cards have even more issues. You can use

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iwlist scan
and look for your wifi SSID and there will be some lines that report the encryption being used, the following is from my network

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IE: IEEE 802.11i/WPA2 Version 1
                        Group Cipher : CCMP
                        Pairwise Ciphers (1) : CCMP
                        Authentication Suites (1) : PSK
Lenia

Re: Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by Lenia »

On my network it's

IE: IEEE 802.11i/WAP2 Version 1
Group Cipher : TKIP
Pairwise Ciphers (2) : CCMP TKIP
Authentication suites (1) : PSK

You think those ciphers being set to TKIP are what's causing the issue?
JeremyB
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Re: Re: Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by JeremyB »

Lenia wrote:On my network it's

IE: IEEE 802.11i/WAP2 Version 1
Group Cipher : TKIP
Pairwise Ciphers (2) : CCMP TKIP
Authentication suites (1) : PSK

You think those ciphers being set to TKIP are what's causing the issue?
Yes, I have helped many people on askubuntu with this issue and there aren't many parameters you can change with that wifi card. TKIP is less secure than CCMP which is sometimes refered to as AES and you might find entries in the message log

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dmesg | grep -i tkip
Lenia

Re: Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by Lenia »

In that case, I will change those settings and report the result. Hopefully it will be the fix :) (that command didn't bring up anything btw, I guess there are no entries) Thanks for the support, I'll let you know how things turn out.
JeremyB
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Posts: 13771
Joined: Fri Feb 21, 2014 8:17 am

Re: Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by JeremyB »

If it doesn't help post results from

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modinfo -p ath9k
Lenia

Re: Linux Mint Wifi Authentication loop

Post by Lenia »

I finally got round to changing the settings from automatic to AES. It did the trick! Now I can connect just fine, and as I said performance is very good on this type of notebook. Thank you very much for all the help Jeremy, you're awesome!
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