Pandora <-> PC usb network broken by PC os upgrade


Agent K

Still Fresh
Joined
Apr 16, 2013
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After having  my Pandora for a few weeks I am quite pleased with it.  The help I got from all of you prior to buying the device allowed me to get it up in running as needed before a very important trip, and I am very thankful for that. 

As most of us do, I have a few bugs here and there, but most I have been able to work around.  Honestly, this problem I'm having with my Pandora is not really a 'Pandora problem' but a Debian talking to Pandora problem.   Thanks to Neelix I have a foolproof connection between my Pandora & my desktop (Debian Etch)  - thanks again for all that networking info, it really helped me get them talking!

Unfortunately I will be upgrading the desktop to Squeeze, and having learned from upgrades before, I'm using my laptop as a "test computer" of sorts to see what 'just works' and what needs tinkering.  USB networking seems to fall under the tinker catagory.  When I set everything up exactly the same as my Etch desktop,  the interface usb0 shows up, and ping packets make it from the laptop to the pandora, and (using WBs monitor) appear to be returning from the pandora, but never get acknowledged by the laptop.  The link just doesn't work.  Most of the info I've found on USB networking either doesn't cover computer to computer (since the Pandora is really a computer not a 'device' in this sense)  connections, or it covers methods that work on Etch but not on Squeeze.   I know its a long shot to ask this here, but I'm really hoping some here is well versed in Linux networking and can see what I'm missing.  I'm using static addresses, and the pandora is not able to get out to the rest of the network, I'm basically using the connection as  point to point, and that's all I need.  Here's the settings and my /var/log/messages entries on both the laptop and the desktop

Pandora /etc/network/interfaces(sans non usb stuff)

------------------------------------------------
auto usb0
iface usb0 inet static
address 172.16.1.3
netmask 255.255.255.0
broadcas 172.16.1.255
gateway 172.16.1.3
------------------------------------------------

Desktop (Debian Etch - works fine)
/etc/network/interfaces (sans non usb stuff)
------------------------------------------------
allow-hotplug usb0
mapping udev
        script grep
        map usb0
iface usb0 inet static
        address 172.16.1.4
        netmask 255.255.255.0
        broadcast 172.16.1.255
---------------------------------------------------
* /var/log/messages (etch - pluggin in pandora)
May 22 14:05:27 Zeek-S kernel: usb 2-3.1: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 24
May 22 14:05:27 Zeek-S kernel: usb 2-3.1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
May 22 14:05:27 Zeek-S kernel: usb0: register 'cdc_ether' at usb-0000:00:02.1-3.1, CDC Ethernet Device, 6a:48:a8:71:01:7d
May 22 14:05:27 Zeek-S kernel: cdc_acm 2-3.1:1.2: ttyACM0: USB ACM device
#  (etch) after ping test, usb0 stats:
ifconfig usb0
usb0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 6A:48:A8:71:01:7D 
          inet addr:172.16.1.4  Bcast:172.16.1.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          inet6 addr: fe80::6848:a8ff:fe71:17d/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:13 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:30 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:980 (980.0   TX bytes:3906 (3.8 KiB)
* /var/log/messages (etch - removing pandora)
May 22 14:06:55 Zeek-S kernel: usb 2-3.1: USB disconnect, address 24
May 22 14:06:55 Zeek-S kernel: usb0: unregister 'cdc_ether' usb-0000:00:02.1-3.1, CDC Ethernet Device
so all the above works FINE, there is a bit of network traffic right after I plug in the pandora, and then ping packets are sent and received as they should be, all network functions (ssh etc) work fine

the following is from my laptop (squeeze) and does not work, there is no burst of network traffic upon plugin of the pandora, and ping packets never get recorded as making it back to the laptop (though the pandora  network monitor sees incoming packets and sends response packets)
/etc/network/interfaces (sans non usb stuff)
------------------------------------------------
allow-hotplug usb0
mapping udev
        script grep
        map usb0
iface usb0 inet static
        address 172.16.1.4
        netmask 255.255.255.0
        broadcast 172.16.1.255
---------------------------------------------------
* /var/log/messages (squeeze - plug in pandora)
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  105.684090] usb 1-2: new full speed USB device using ohci_hcd and address 2
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  105.896118] usb 1-2: New USB device found, idVendor=0525, idProduct=a4aa
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  105.896128] usb 1-2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=0
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  105.896135] usb 1-2: Product: CDC Composite Gadget
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  105.896140] usb 1-2: Manufacturer: Linux 3.2.39 with musb-hdrc
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  105.896446] usb 1-2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  106.089805] cdc_acm 1-2:1.2: ttyACM0: USB ACM device
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  106.097901] usbcore: registered new interface driver cdc_acm
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  106.098680] cdc_acm: v0.26:USB Abstract Control Model driver for USB modems and ISDN adapters
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  106.219806] usb0: register 'cdc_ether' at usb-0000:00:02.0-2, CDC Ethernet Device, 6a:48:a8:71:01:7d
May 22 14:43:39 bentobox kernel: [  106.224865] usbcore: registered new interface driver cdc_ether
# usb0 stats BEFORE ping test
ifconfig usb0
usb0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 6a:48:a8:71:01:7d 
          inet addr:172.16.1.4  Bcast:172.16.1.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          inet6 addr: fe80::6848:a8ff:fe71:17d/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:0 errors:6 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:6
          TX packets:35 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:0 (0.0   TX bytes:6429 (6.2 KiB)
# usb0 stats AFTER ping test

ifconfig usb0
usb0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 6a:48:a8:71:01:7d 
          inet addr:172.16.1.4  Bcast:172.16.1.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          inet6 addr: fe80::6848:a8ff:fe71:17d/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:2 errors:18 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:18
          TX packets:49 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:56 (56.0   TX bytes:7689 (7.5 KiB)
 

# /var/log/messages (squeeze - remove pandora)
May 22 14:45:50 bentobox kernel: [  236.933003] usb 1-2: USB disconnect, address 2
May 22 14:45:50 bentobox kernel: [  236.933241] usb0: unregister 'cdc_ether' usb-0000:00:02.0-2, CDC Ethernet DeviceSomething is definitely wrong, the "frame:18" isn't right, I don't remember what that means, but it almost seems like packets are getting stuck in some sort of an incoming cache and never get released?  I'm lost I really hope someone can look at this and make sense of it.
Added

Code:
 tags to stop the forum software automatically turning "B[COLOR=rgb(255,255,255)][B][SIZE=0px].[/COLOR][/B][/SIZE][COLOR=rgb(0,128,0)][B])" into  - Binky[/B][/COLOR]
 
Last edited by a moderator:
How odd...

Based on the information provided I tend to wonder if it's actually a configuration issue at all.

Did you have a working USB Networking connection to the laptop previously?

As odd as it may sound, the first thing I'd suggest is to try using a different USB socket on the laptop.

- Neelix
 
Neelix, you got me thinking about that, maybe its a hardware issue.  I re tried the test on both of the 2 usb ports on the laptop, and got the same result for each.  Following your logic, maybe its something with the laptop usb controller hardware it self, so I tested using my wife’s computer, which I recently re-installed using squeeze, same result there.  Just to be through I’ve tried 2 different usb cables as well, both work fine with the Etch computer, none with any of the Squeeze computers.  I'm still baffled by why this is not working!


Unfortunately I’ve never messed with USB networking like this before, I just hook the laptop to the local network and do syncing that way.  So I have no baseline to say if usb networking works at all on the laptop.  If I were going to try to test this, I believe there is a special cable setup (not just a gender changer etc) needed to hook 2 host ports together, is that right? 

Another thought, I’m comfortable digging around in /var/log to get to the bottom of linux problems, but I noticed the pandora is missing my goto “what happened” logs,  something along the lines of the content of /var/log/messages would be a useful tool, is it just stored elsewhere, or something I have to turn on at boot etc?

Thanks again!

K.

Binky - thanks for making my post net friendly!
 
When you connect, you should see messages on both PC and pandora's dmesg. If you don't, check if g_cdc module is loaded on pandora (lsmod). If it is, you may need to do a cold reboot on pandora, if that still doesn't help, remove it's battery for 5+ minutes.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
As an experiment I booted my netbook into a "live CD"  version of squeeze. 

I didn't try setting up a config file for it, but I was able to establish a static IP connection manually as follows:

On the Pandora:


sudo ifconfig usb0 192.168.2.3

On the netbook:


sudo busybox ifconfig usb0 192.168.2.4

I was then able to ping the pandora from the netbook and vice versa without any issues.

One thing I did notice was that Network Manager (which kept trying to auto connect wifi or something)  seemed to kill the IP if it failed whatever it was trying to do.

- Neelix
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Neelix,  

Thanks for testing the live cd,  based on that I threw a spare HDD in my main computer and did a standard install, usb networking works out of the box.  Very strange, its almost like there some relation between them on a hardware level, which doesn't make sense since the mac address is made up for usb0. What ever it is,  thanks to your help I've gotten it working now.  I was offline for the last month dew to a unrelated problem, sorry to wait so long to get back to you.  

Thanks again!

K.
 
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