Neotel working on Linux!

Linux Community, helping each other.

iandoug said:
Don't suppose they'd consider releasing the source code for their driver, would they? That would help solve a lot of issues (like init strings, hangup strings, etc...)

cheers, Ian
Click to expand...

Well I was hoping that the USB snoop would show something that we didn't know already. I would suggest perhaps taking a peak in side and see if you can report the chip set to some one online/irc including the usb information that you have. I'm sure that you can find a device developer on some channel on freenode.net

If not, here is way to assign someone to develop the driver for you. You of course will have to work with them like a community usually does, providing information, feedback etc... Neotel are you reading this!?
 
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chubster said:
Well I was hoping that the USB snoop would show something that we didn't know already. I would suggest perhaps taking a peak in side and see if you can report the chip set to some one online/irc including the usb information that you have. I'm sure that you can find a device this!?[/B]
Click to expand...

The Neotel modem reports itelf like this:

Qualcomm: 1S4
BC2703-R00-02-19 1
ESN 0xDEC64AA

My brief Googles didn't turn up anything particularly interesting.

I believe that the Neotel device is supplied by these guys

http://www.duponttelecom.co.za/

I sent Neotel an e-mail asking them to put me into contact with somebody how could supply me with specifications for a driver. As is becoming typical for them .. no response.

I've read posts about the Hauwie E220 responding very similarly to the Neotel device without a specific binary. I was planning to substitute the Neotel device ID's and strip out USB drive support from the E220 source file and see what happens. I was thwarted by the lack of a 2.4 kernel development platform (ipcop is shipped without a c compiler, my linux box runs 2.6), and a little bit of laziness. Also not actually being a programmer makes things difficult.
 
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FYI: To get my Neotel working (my iBurst settings are messing up my pppconf???) I connected using wvdial instead:

wvdial.conf

[Dialer Defaults]

Phone = #777
Username = [email protected]
Password = 1234
Stupid Mode = 1
Dial Command = ATDT

[Dialer neotel]

Modem = /dev/ttyUSB0
Baud = 460800
Modem Type = Analog Modem
Stupid Mode = 1
Click to expand...

then to connect:

$ wvdial neotel -C wvdial.conf
Click to expand...

--> WvDial: Internet dialer version 1.60
--> Carrier detected. Starting PPP immediately.
--> local IP address 41.174.2.160
--> remote IP address 2.2.2.2
--> primary DNS address 41.160.0.36
--> secondary DNS address 41.160.0.37
Click to expand...

Rather quick and easy and I also use the same script (diff config) to connect my wifes 3G.
 
locutis said:
Did a snoop,

Annoyingly I don't see anything funny.

AT
ATE0V1
AT
ATS0=0
AT
ATE0V1
AT
ATDT#777
Click to expand...

Anything visible when you disconnect?
Doesn't look like you need the username or password or does that happen after it connects?
 
Not that I can see. Definitely not the ATH I was expecting. When I manually dial using a serial terminal the modem stops responding after the ATDT command, even to the +++ escape sequence.

I can only guess that the modem driver issues some kind of USB reset command to the device. My knowledge ends at RS232 so I don't know if this is common practice or even possible. An interesting test would be to install the device on a fresh windows machine (no neotel software) and configuring it as a standard hayes modem. If it works then my prior hypothesis is invalid. I'm away on business at the moment, might give it a try when I get back.

Anybody know how to snoop/interpret USB commands?
 
To your question above:

chubster said:
Good if you only have one USB modem attached. Have you tried USB Snoop recently on windows to see what type of initialization commands it sends to the modem? There are some good articles on the web on how to use it. And here. And Another Huge List
Click to expand...

One of these posts contains links to several usb snoop utilities.
 
Has anyone had any luck resetting the device in linux yet?

I'm having the same problem on Ubuntu 8.10
 
How to get it working in 8.10:


ref: http://samat.org/weblog/20070127-high-speed-cellular-wireless-modems-in-ubuntu-linux-6-10.html

As root:

Code: 
   $ apt-get install linux-headers-`uname -r` linux-source build-essentials

    $ cd /usr/src

    $ tar xjvf linux-source-`uname -r`

    $ updatedb

    $ locate option.c

Code: 
    $ vi /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.24/drivers/usb/serial/option.c    #... for new ubuntu

Code: 
        // +++ chrisb 2008-10-24
        #define NEOTEL_DEVICE_VENDOR_ID                 0x1d09
        #define NEOTEL_DEVICE_PRODUCT_ID                0x4000
        // +++

        static struct usb_device_id option_ids[] = {

               { USB_DEVICE(NEOTEL_DEVICE_VENDOR_ID, NEOTEL_DEVICE_PRODUCT_ID) },

               ....
Code: 
     $  cd  /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.24/drivers/usb/serial/

     $  make -C /lib/modules/`uname -r`/build M=`pwd`

             make: Entering directory `/usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.24-21-generic'
               LD      /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.24/drivers/usb/serial/built-in.o
               CC [M]  /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.24/drivers/usb/serial/usb-serial.o
               CC [M]  /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.24/drivers/usb/serial/generic.o
               CC [M]  /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.24/drivers/usb/serial/bus.o
             ....
             make: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.24-21-generic'

Now move the drivers:

Code: 
mv /lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/kernel/drivers/usb/serial/option.ko ~/backup.option.ko
cp /usr/src/linux-source-2.6.24/drivers/usb/serial/option.ko /lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/kernel/drivers/usb/serial/option.ko

You also need to load the new option

Code: 
    $ vi /etc/modules

And just add

Code: 
        option

Reboot PC and all is well. Everytime there is a kernal upgrade you need to do this. If anybody can simplify this please do.

And yes you can substitute vi with emacs
 
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Awesome thanks! Was going to try the airprime driver but didnt know if it made a difference or not.

Will try it out thanks!
 
Sentari said:
Awesome thanks! Was going to try the airprime driver but didnt know if it made a difference or not.

Will try it out thanks!
Click to expand...

Originaly tried the airprime, but this driver is going to be discontinued. Also the performance was not good. Any comments or improvements on my howto is always welcome.

BTW: I went from 700Kbps to 1200Kbps after compiling my own drivers.
 
Hi Guys,

I need help with this...linux is not my strong point. I`ve compiled the driver as stated above and restarted the pc (ubuntu 8.10).

after i run mobprobe command on first page i get this in dmesg
37.657297] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbserial
[ 37.657331] usbserial: USB Serial support registered for generic
[ 37.657562] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbserial_generic
[ 37.657566] usbserial: USB Serial Driver core
[ 37.687552] usbserial: USB Serial support registered for GSM modem (1-port)
[ 37.687588] option 3-2:1.0: GSM modem (1-port) converter detected
[ 37.688407] usb 3-2: GSM modem (1-port) converter now attached to ttyUSB0
[ 37.688434] option 3-2:1.1: GSM modem (1-port) converter detected
[ 37.689270] usb 3-2: GSM modem (1-port) converter now attached to ttyUSB1
[ 37.689305] usbcore: registered new interface driver option
[ 37.689309] option: USB Driver for GSM modems: v0.7.2

It seems the wrong driver is being loaded. How do i know i`ve loaded the option driver and what else can i try.

Thanks for the help guys!!

Rgds
Derick
 
I`ve disconnected the phone and plugged it back in. Where is this choice 1 it is talking about?

1151.999823] usb 3-2: USB disconnect, address 2
[ 1152.015257] option1 ttyUSB0: GSM modem (1-port) converter now disconnected from ttyUSB0
[ 1152.021240] option 3-2:1.0: device disconnected
[ 1152.026992] option1 ttyUSB1: GSM modem (1-port) converter now disconnected from ttyUSB1
[ 1152.032735] option 3-2:1.1: device disconnected
[ 1174.356048] usb 3-3: new full speed USB device using ohci_hcd and address 3
[ 1174.573772] usb 3-3: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 1174.579445] option 3-3:1.0: GSM modem (1-port) converter detected
[ 1174.581452] usb 3-3: GSM modem (1-port) converter now attached to ttyUSB0
[ 1174.589521] option 3-3:1.1: GSM modem (1-port) converter detected
[ 1174.595267] usb 3-3: GSM modem (1-port) converter now attached to ttyUSB1
 
This is why Linux will never be as big as Microsoft - they need to make drivers like they do in MS!

I wanted to use ubuntu as my NAS server & have my neotel connected to it. But after reading that the driver was not as easy to install as I had thought I decided to stay with Windows as my NAS device.

I have a proxy running on my Nas device which I make all my PC's use for upgrades & downloads

if the power goes off the windows pc restarts & reconnects to neotel & my downloads are back up & running.

Seems much harder to do in Linux & what is the real benefit? I don't have an XT pc running - my pc has 2Gigs of Ram and is an AMD 64 939 processor! that is now smaller then any entry level pc one can buy.

Linux needs to make simple things simple!

I do know my way around linux but don't have hours to configure a nas server - my windows PC took me an hour to have up & running & that was because of the install time of the OS!

This is not a rant - I wish Linux would work on the simple things!
 
Ok...got it working. the GSM drives seems to be fine. pon neotel didnt do anything initially and now after running wvdialconf it seems to work fine. But....

...i`m getting the strangest behaviour on the dial up. If i just issue a pon neotel the /var/log/syslog file shows averything connecting and it stays online so far for longer than 30 min (longest i was online). But if i change /etc/ppp/ip-up to include the

route del default
route add default gw $PPP_REMOTE

for the default gateway route it stops working randomly after 1.5-4 min. This is weird, i realize what i`m saying and it doesnt make sence.

As soon as i dail the connection, i can ssh into the neotel ip and all works fine and suddenly after 1.5-4 min it just drops.

Any ideas on this. I`m not to sure if it is because i can actually use the connection when the route if correct and then somehow neotel disconnects me based on some info/invalid info.

It is just damn strange.
 
i agree with you fully, but the thing is. I enjoy it...

I have some many scripts that does almost everything, this is just the last part of the equation. But if it isnt going to work, then windows is my only option.
 
Ok. Got things working fine.

I`ve recompiled the option driver.
and i`m using wvdial as :
[Dialer Defaults]
Init1 = ATZ
Init2 = ATQ0 V1 E1 S0=0 &C1 &D2 +FCLASS=0
Stupid Mode = 1
Modem Type = USB Modem
ISDN = 0
Phone = #777
Modem = /dev/ttyUSB0
Username = 011*******@neotel.co.za
Dial Command = ATDT
Password = 1234
Baud = 460800
PPPD Options = crtcts multilink usepeerdns lock defaultroute

[Dialer neotel]
Init1 = ATZ
Init2 = ATQ0 V1 E1 S0=0 &C1 &D2 +FCLASS=0
Baud = 460800
Stupid Mode = 1
Modem = /dev/ttyUSB0
Modem Type = USB Modem
Dial Command = ATDT
PPPD Options = crtcts multilink usepeerdns lock defaultroute

This seems to work very well. Neotel seems to drop the connection every working between 9-11 some where. I get clean disconnects and shutdown all my services, but this morning (after about 15 successful reconnects the last few days) i will not initialize.

I`m guessing i need to restart the usb stack and take it from there as i think the modem did not reset. Same issue as others.

Have anyone found a fix for this as yet?
 
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Neotel ets 2251

Hi

Got the latest one from Neotel which seems to be different from the device discussed previously. Has anyone got this model working?

M
 
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