Quozl's Maxon on Linux Community Support Page

This is a project community page for Quozl's Maxon MM-5100 & MM-5500U on Linux, here you can read comments made by others, make comments yourself, or help other people solve their problems.

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Comments

--- 31-7-6

Have had my PCMCIA MM-5500C working under Debian for some time using Quozl's instructions Quozl's Maxon MM-5100 & MM-5500U on Linux.

Found that it was not running EVDO speeds, so I commented out the "AT+CRM=150" line in the chatfile and now it works on EVDO also. Obviously I guess.

--- 16-10-2006

Some additional hints/info on getting the mm-5500c working under linux (in my case, Gentoo, but I'll try to make it distro non-specific):

ensure ppp support enabled in kernel - either as a module or compiled into kernel, and also ensure pccard support is enabled in kernel - either as a module or compiled into kernel (some distributions do all the above by default, others don't. Your milage/kilometerage may vary!)

insert card into laptop and wait for lights to settle down - solid blue, then flash blue, then red, then solid blue

type dmesg|grep tty - this should show a line similar to: cdc_acm 5-1:1.0: ttyACM0: USB ACM device this indicates that the pc card has been detected properly, and loaded up as the device ttyACM0. Depending on your distribution, this may be located in /dev/usb or /dev or somewhere else. For me (at time of writing, gentoo kernel 2.6.17-gentoo-r8), it is /dev/ttyACM0. If you see nothing, then you don't have support for pc cards (pcmcia) in the kernel. Consult your distro docs on how to do this.

if you want to be able to access this device as a normal user (ie if you don't do the next step, you may only be able to establish connections as the "root" user) type chmod a+rw /dev/ttyACM0. Note - depending on how your server/workstation handles the creation/recreation of these devices as the card is plugged in/removed/plugged in again - it is possible that you may lose this setting. If you do, then you can always add the above command into a startup script or perhaps as part of the script you use to start networking.... again consult the distro docs to find out what is the recommendation on how to do this if you're not sure.Of course the "cheat" way to do things would be, for example if using something like "kppp", you create a link on your desktop that launches the app but as root....

You should now hopefully be able to use the card to connect on! The main things to be aware of are: The username & password to use are your name@bigpond.com and current password The number to dial is #777 The authentication is chap

There are examples of using all sorts of ways of establishing a session using various diallers out there. I'll add to the mix the following:

get wvdial edit /etc/wvdial.conf as follows:

[Dialer Defaults]
Init2 = ATQ0 V1 E1 S0=0 &C1 &D2 +FCLASS=0
Modem Type = USB Modem
Phone = #777
ISDN = 0
Username = nnnnnnn@bigpond.com
Init1 = ATZ
Password = pppppp
Modem = /dev/ttyACM0
Baud = 460800

Where nnnnnnn=your bigpond user name, and pppppp=your bigpond password

To connect, type "wvdial". If you get an error message, check it for clues as to what's happening. For example it might indicate a typo in your username or password. Or something like "No ppp module error (exit code = 4)" indicates that there is no support for ppp either built into the kernel, or the loadable module has not been installed (in which case try a "modprobe ppp" then give wvdial another go). Once connected you should see a string of messages, including your local IP address and dns server addresses. To shut the connection, a "ctrl c" will do it! If you believe it should be working, but still can't get it to fire up properly - try doing it as the "root" user to rule out the possibility that you are being blocked by permissions issues...

By the way, personally I like using KPPP as it can keep track of data being transferred so I make sure that I keep within my plan.

Other info on the card: You can get external antenna to fit the card from maxon You can also get patch leads that connect to the pc card and that end in a standard fme adaptor so you can then in turn walk into pretty much any radio parts store and get an antenna off the shelf. Advantage of an antenna straight from Maxon would be no adapter required. Disadvantage would be that combined cost of adapter (less than $20) and an antenna (probably about the same from eBay) would be cheaper plus would be easy enough to have an antenna for the car, one for the house, one for portable use.... etc... FYI I bought a patch lead (Cellink CAL713) and 5dbm antenna (Cellink ANT480), total cost of about Aus$54 inc postage, and - as an example - saw an improvement under windows from one bar to three bars, or under linux (by opening a terminal session to the modem and typing "at$$rssi") an improvement in RSSI from 84 to 76.

Cheers - Richard

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