wow, wireless go BOOM!

[elw at stderr.org]

today i updated my b4 to the latest firmware, then installed ship-2 via 
usb, then olpc-updated to the latest joyride build that i could find.

[the impetus for the updates, today, beyond the RTC bug, was that the 
wireless on the B4 didn't seem to want to come on.  Empty neighborhood 
screen, etc.  There were some libertas error messages in the dmesg output, 
which were initially somewhat concerning.  Now, I wish that I'd written 
them down.  Oops.]

a minute ago my ubuntu laptop (an aging dell inspiron 8200, with 802.11b 
truemobile mini-pci card, running 2.6.22...) started spewing error 
messages and the card began frequently resetting itself.  LOTS of spewage.

turning the b4 off seems to have eliminated the issue.  huh.  :-)


possible complicating factors:

My local network has a BUNCH of 802.11g devices on it.  A d-link pci card, 
several different belkin and linksys usb dongles, etc.  All talking to the 
one AP.  And there are several, several, several APs RF-visible from here 
- typically 20-30, depending on which window of the house you happen to be 
closest to.

There's also a B2-1 here, running 406.15, with very non-current-ish 
firmware on it.

the AP to which the laptop and the B4 were both connected is a Netgear 
WGR614v6, running firmware V2.0.13_1.0.13NA.  The B2-1 was disconnected 
and at a point where it would have liked for me to type in a WEP key.

The AP is WEP, as there are several devices that don't do WPA and still 
need to work.

This sounds a little bit like the reported WDS/frame/mesh scenarios that 
I've seen mentioned on a couple of occasions recently... but not exactly.

I am happy to do further testing - and endure further possible crashes of 
my non-XO laptop - to help get this stable again.  :-)

--elijah