Wireless on Atheros 5213A drops often, is slow, and ath5k_pci consumes large amounts of CPU

Hi Mike,

Can you attach you dmesg output as well. You may also want to test installing the madwifi package that is available in one of our developers PPA's - https://launchpad.net/~timg-tpi/+archive . Thanks.

Thanks for helping me debug this Leann. Attached is the dmesg output. I'll see if I can test the madwifi PPA but I'll have to find a wired network to get it in the first place :)

I am still experiencing this after upgrading to the Linux 27-4 packages; is the PPA still useful for me to test?

My wireless seems to lag around 10-45kB whereas in Hardy on the same network speeds are closer to 500kB, and I am still noticing periods of ath5k_pci usage around 85% that make the computer unusable for a short period of time.

Hi Mike,

I think it would actually be good if you would still be willing to test the madwifi package in Tim's PPA. I realize that ath5k is intended to replace madwifi going forward, but it would be interesting to know if it provides a stable solution for you in the mean time.

Thanks Leann. I don't see an Intrepid option for that PPA, can I just change Hardy to Intrepid in the sources entry and have it work? I would expect to see Intrepid listed in the drop-down and in the series below, if it was built for Intrepid. Let me know and I can test the madwifi PPA.

After updating today (the first time I updated in about a week) and restarting, network-manager doesn't show any wireless networks at all (and there are usually about 4-6 here). How interesting. I will try the madwifi PPA later tonight.

Okay, after a second restart ath5k was functional again (though with the same problems as above). I then installed madwifi from svn snapshot and blacklisted ath5k, and my wireless experience is much better! Much faster speeds, no CPU spikes, et cetera. However this bug is probably still good to solve since ath5k is the future anyway, as I understand it.

Same problem for me, logs in a post here: http://forum.ubuntu-fr.org/viewtopic.php?id=256441

I'm surprised by a thing too: lspci give "Atheros Communications Inc. AR5212/AR5213" but dmesg gives "ath5k phy0: Atheros AR2413 chip". Is it normal?

Thanks coubi64, I will Confirm thanks to your input.

As an update for Leann, after more use with the madwifi it is an improvement but still a definite regression from Hardy. It is slower and doesn't seem to get as strong of a connection; I have had to reboot into my Hardy install to connect to lower signal networks or get faster speeds.

Found a related bug report here: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux-restricted-modules/+bug/275423

Still have the problem with the 2.6.27-6 kernel

I'm getting the same issue on a fresh install of Intrepid Beta, fully updated.

Connection keeps dropping, passwords are asked each time and performance of the network is quite bad. lspci shows:

njpatel@njp-laptop:~$ lspci | grep Atheros
0b:00.0 Network controller: Atheros Communications Inc. AR5418 802.11abgn Wireless PCI Express Adapter (rev 01)

I'll try the madwifi drivers and update.

Experiencing similar poor networking performance and periodic short-duration freezes with an AR5212 on Intrepid. Mike mentioned building madwifi from svn and blacklisting ath5k. As I understand it, madwifi should still be installed with Intrepid. How do I tell Ubuntu to use the madwifi driver INSTEAD of the ath5k driver? Even if I have to build madwifi, how do I blacklist ath5k ?

To blacklist ath5k, at this line to /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist:

blacklist ath5k

Hi Guys,

Care to try installing the linux-backports-modules-intrepid package as it recently pulled in an updated version of the compat-wireless stack and ath5k driver.

The ath5k in backports-modules worked much better than the one we have in the current ubuntu kernel but I think the new compat-wireless stack is making trouble. I had the same backtraces in my dmesg as they were mentioned in https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux-restricted-modules/+bug/275423/comments/10 so I'm back at ath_pci.

For me the new ath5k works much better, however every couple of hours of use I get kicked off the network and have to rmmod ath5k, modprobe ath5k, and restart networking to get it back. I don't know where this might log a bug for tracking. The WiFi Signal Strength Meter Plasmoid is consistently reporting ca. 90% strength, where previously it was around 30%, so that's better.

I did a fresh install of Intrepid today and my wireless seems to work very well out of the box. Since I originally reported this I'll mark it as fixed; if it isn't for others it might be a different issue.