To: linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org
From: James Womack <james.c.womack@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: r8187se panic
Date: Sat, 13 Nov 2010 19:27:54 +0000
Message-ID: <ibmosc$4au$1@dough.gmane.org>
References: <slrnidp3ae.79c.rb-oss-3@mal.justgohome.co.uk> <4CDC9FA5.10002@lwfinger.net> <slrnidq7u0.9ic.rb-oss-3@mal.justgohome.co.uk> <4CDD3BC4.7070102@lwfinger.net> <slrnidqorp.dlr.rb-oss-3@mal.justgohome.co.uk> <4CDD66C4.10603@lwfinger.net> <slrnidqsld.dlr.rb-oss-3@mal.justgohome.co.uk> <4CDD7945.70005@lwfinger.net> <slrnidqv0k.g21.rb-oss-3@mal.justgohome.co.uk> <loom.20101113T191727-421@post.gmane.org> <4CDEDC74.3040902@lwfinger.net>
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On 13/11/10 18:44, Larry Finger wrote:
> On 11/13/2010 12:18 PM, James Womack wrote:
>>
>> It's good to see that this problem is being examined closely. I have been living
>> with this issue on my EeePC 701SD for some time and it has been very
>> frustrating. I can confirm that the same issue Robie describes occur for my
>> 701SD with r8187se wireless card (Fn+F2 causes a kernel panic when turning the
>> wireless card off -- this doesn't seem to occur when turning it on if the
>> netbook starts up with the wireless adapter off). This has occured in Ubuntu
>> versions 9.04 through to 10.10. I recently switched to Debian Squeeze (testing,
>> beta1), currently running 2.6.32-5-686 kernel and am experiencing an identical
>> problem. I'm not experienced in debugging this type of issue myself, but would
>> be happy to test any suggested fixes for the issue and report back results
>> (though you would need to advise as to how to do this and what to include in
>> replies).
>
> Testing would require that you have kernel source, apply the patches, and build
> a new kernel with those included. On some distros, these steps are easier than
> for others. Is your skill set up to this?
>
> I will push the patch that changes the panic/crash into a simple warning with
> the request that this be applied to stable. If/when this happens, you will have
> that fix in your standard kernel. How long it takes will depend on the distro.
>
> It is strange that I was not aware of this problem until Robie recently posted
> in this list. Running the RTL8187SE on my computer has been a pain as the BIOS
> in my computer does not have that device in its whitelist of approved devices.
> As such, rebooting with it required that I shut down, remove the card, boot to
> GRUB, and then hot-plug the card while being careful not to short it. That
> changed in the past 2 days as I now have an ExpressCard to mini PCIe extender
> that allows me to boot with the card installed. Unfortunately, I do not yet know
> how to change the RFKILL setting with this device.
>
> Larry
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>
If building a kernel is as simple as building other programs from source 
(i.e. configure, make, make install), I could do that. I'm using Debian 
at the moment. Presumably I'd need a compiler of some kind, which I 
could obtain from the repos. I am not sure how one would apply patches 
to the kernel, however. Would I be able to compile a modified kernel and 
add this to grub whilst retaining the ability to boot in the unmodified 
kernel?

James