Very bad status of hardware (especially wifi) support in ubuntu, due to the too many accumulated regressions

[Mackenzie Morgan]

On Sun, 2008-11-09 at 17:19 +0000, Vincenzo Ciancia wrote:
> I am the unlucky owner of an intel 3945 network card, internal to my 
> laptop.

Interesting.  I'm hoping my current laptop uses the same interface as my
old one so I can put my Intel 3945 into this one.  The only difference I
see between ipw and ipl is that ipw has *much* better range.

Here's the status of the Intel 4965:
- Hardy: the manufacturer of my laptop says I am the only buyer to
report kernel panics.  They also say most people didn't decide to pay
extra for the 4965 to get 802.11n.  This makes it sound like the 4965
802.11n card is likely the issue.
- Intrepid:  It *will* kernel panic.  It'll panic on 802.11g and
802.11n.  If you install l-b-m, it'll kernel panic after a day or two
instead of 15 minutes, but it'll still kernel panic.  Current workaround
being suggested for a patch is to turn panics into warnings. The
side-effect?  /var/log grows at a rate of 1 GB/hr.

We also saw a chunk of Atheros cards lose support this time around.

I'm using Hardy because Intrepid seems like a downgrade to me.  I'm
still hopeful for Jaunty though.  Hopefully my webcam's driver and my
fingerprint reader's driver will be included in Jaunty, and the Intel
wireless will be fixed, so I'll have a laptop where all the parts work.
It's kind of disappointing that even following the "Intel always
releases open drivers, so use Intel" rule doesn't really help.

-- 
Mackenzie Morgan
http://ubuntulinuxtipstricks.blogspot.com
apt-get moo
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