Wi-Fi: works when security disabled, but not when enabled

Yousuf Khan

unread,

Sep 4, 2008, 2:04:34 AM9/4/08

to

Has anyone come up with a suitable checklist to get Wi-Fi connections
working with security enabled? I've seen too many times where a machine
will refuse to connect when a certain security protocol is enabled, but
other machines have no problems. For example, some machines will refuse
to work with WPA2, but may work with WPA1. Others might fuss with WPA1,
but work with WEP. Others will refuse to work with any security at all.

I'm talking mostly about Windows Wi-Fi of course, but also sometimes
this happens in Linux too.

Yousuf Khan

Bob Willard

unread,

Sep 4, 2008, 6:35:52 AM9/4/08

to

Here's the checklist: RTFM.

Old NICs and their drivers, that were designed before WPA2, probably
don't support WPA2. Very old NICs and their drivers, that were designed
before WPA1, probably don't support WPA1. Vintage NICs, that were
designed before WEP, probably don't support WEP. No surprise, eh?
--
Cheers, Bob

Yousuf Khan

unread,

Sep 4, 2008, 12:52:36 PM9/4/08

to

Bob Willard wrote:
> Here's the checklist: RTFM.
>
> Old NICs and their drivers, that were designed before WPA2, probably
> don't support WPA2. Very old NICs and their drivers, that were designed
> before WPA1, probably don't support WPA1. Vintage NICs, that were
> designed before WEP, probably don't support WEP. No surprise, eh?

Thanks for the uselessness, it's people like you who make newsgroups a joy.

Yousuf Khan

daytripper

unread,

Sep 4, 2008, 1:06:57 PM9/4/08

to

That's too harsh, you're being too sensitive...
...and Bob was too flippant by about four words ;-)

In truth (if not in execution) his response is spot on. If the user manual or
product specifications for a nic doesn't include words stating support for any
specific security scheme, it's nearly 100% certain not to support that scheme.

Further, it's worth checking the release notes for nic driver kits to see if
the marketing or technical documentation isn't just blowing fairy dust...

/daytripper

Jerry Peters

unread,

Sep 4, 2008, 5:00:55 PM9/4/08

to

He's being a bit flippant, but he's mainly correct. The other
factor for WEP at least, is that there are at least 2 different ways
to convert a pass phrase from text to a hex key.

Jerry

Franc Zabkar

unread,

Sep 4, 2008, 6:01:46 PM9/4/08

to

On Thu, 04 Sep 2008 13:06:57 -0400, daytripper
<day_t...@REMOVEyahoo.com> put finger to keyboard and composed:

Don't give up too easily. Sometimes driver support for a particular
product can be found within the driver set of another.

For example, the author of this document was able to locate WPA-2
support for all her cards even though it wasn't explicitly stated that
her cards were WPA-2 capable:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/security/expert/bowman_wirelesssecurity.mspx

- Franc Zabkar
--
Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.

YKhan

unread,

Sep 8, 2008, 6:37:31 PM9/8/08

to

On Sep 4, 1:06 pm, daytripper <day_tri...@REMOVEyahoo.com> wrote:
> In truth (if not in execution) his response is spot on. If the user manual or
> product specifications for a nic doesn't include words stating support for any
> specific security scheme, it's nearly 100% certain not to support that scheme.
>
> Further, it's worth checking the release notes for nic driver kits to see if
> the marketing or technical documentation isn't just blowing fairy dust...

The problem is stuff that does say it supports something, but for some
reason it never works or only works part of the time.