AETHRA STARMODEM ADSL USB with LINUX

last update: 25 DIC 2004

AETHRA sell an ADSL USB modem. This model of this modem is called "STARMODEM". If you use Windows there are not problem beacuse the driver are selled with the modem. Instead if you want to use this modem with Linux you have to know the chipset of your modem. Infact STARMODEM can have three different chipset: CONEXANT, GLOBESPAN and ADI(Analog Device) . To know the chipset you have to mount the USB FileSystem with the command

>mount -t usbdevfs none /proc/bus/usb

You need to enable the USB File System in the USB kernel options. Than you can use the utility usbview or lsusb to investigate about your chipset.

To compile the  driver you need the following packages:

linux-atm-2.4.1.tar.gz
ppp-2.4.3.tar.gz
cxacru-2003-10-05-src.gz

Now you have to uncompress the packages and compile them.  Note that  you can don't worry if you are not able to compile the "bridged" and "panel" directory. I have tested the driver with slackware 9.0 and kernel 2.4.22. Note also that the cxacru packages comtains two driver called module and module2. The first one is the older and it works fine, the second DOESN'T work.  It is important to compile the directory init (setup of the modem to get the ADSL line) and module (to enable a networrk interface).

The driver is contained in the archive cxacru-2003-10-05-scr.gz. I advice you to download also the archives ppp-2.4.1-6plf.i586.rpm and linux-atm-2.4.1-1.i386.rpm because they contain some libreries needed to ppp daemon (pppd) .
To use the ppp plugin I have also needed the PAM library. You could not need this library because you linux distribution could already have installed it.

If you use the PPPOATM (I have got the TIN ISP in Italy) you can don't worry if you are not able to compile the "bridged" and "panel" directory. I have tested the driver with slackware 9.0 and kernel 2.4.22.

You can download my kernel-2.4.22-config. My configuration is bare enough, that is I have included just some basic options. Remember to modify the configuration according your processor, BUSes (ISA, USB UHCI or OHCI), sound driver, COM ports, parallel ports, mouse, .... Note that in the kernel configuration I have enabled some options to overcome IP Masqueranding, that is the abilty of a PC to share an internet connection with other PCs of the LAN. This feature is not necessary for use ACCESSRUNNER driver.
As you can see I have choosen to insert PointToPoint options into the kernel and not compile them as modules. The only option I have inserted as module is USB-OHCI because driver needs to remove USB-OHCI to reset the ADSL modem. Without removing USB-OHCI you cannot remove the cxacru module. If you decide to compile PointToPoint options into the kernel like me, you have to modify the /usr/sbin/cxnet2up.sh script otherwise it will stop and you could not establish the connection. Edit this script and use the character "#" to avoid the modprobe ppp_generic and modprobe pppoatm commands. Obviously you can choose to compile PointToPoint options as module, so you have not to modify the /usr/sbin/cxnet2up.sh.
You can dowload my /etc/ppp/options, /etc/cxacru, /etc/ppp/chap-secrets, /etc/ppp/pap-secrets.

I have tested the driver with slackware 9.0 with kernel 2.4.20.
I know that to compile the driver with kernel 2.4.22 you have to do a small change in the driver code. I will publish this little changes to apply. The STARMODEM was not supported from the ACCESSRUNNER driver.
Infact you had to make a small change in the source code. If you see the C souce code, you can find some check about VID and PID. These are two code and they are used to identify an USB device. VID stands for "Vendor ID" and is a code of the maker of the device, PID stands for "Product ID" and is a code to identify a device of a particular makers. The VID of my STARMODEM (with CONEXANT chipset) is 0x0572 and the PID is 0xCB06. Note that these numbers are in exadecimal form. When I was able to use my modem there were not the support for STARMODEM. So I contacted the programmers of the driver and I sayed that my modem could be used with his driver. It can be that now you see that the STARMODEM is in the list of supported modems.

Home page: http://www.olitec.com/adsl-linux.html
Secial thanks to Fabio Sfuncia because he explained in a forum how get work the OLITEC driver with AETHRA-STARMODEM.
There are two versions of this driver. In the french home page of this driver there are the instruction to choose your version related to your linux distribution. The files are:

After untar the driver you have to modify the source. There is a file "customer.h". You have to insert the VID=0x0572 and PID=0xCB06. After this change, you can compile the driver and follow the instruction of the maual (written only in french).
I include the text of an e-mail received from Fontanelli Andrea that explain how to install the OLITEC driver.

Fai una cosa scarica questi driver che ti ho allegato li ho già modificati io... mettili in una cartella tipo /tmp poi esegui da shell questi comandi (megli se ti logghi da root) # tar xvfz adsl.tgz dovrebbe decomprimerli in una directory USBADSL # cd USBADSL in questo modo ti sei spostato nella directory # make dovresti così compilare i sorgenti, l'importante è che tu abbia i sorgenti del kernel altrimenti ottieni errori. ora potresti seguire le indicazioni sul sito: http://www.olitec.com/adsl-linux.html [dove ho scaricato i drivers originali...] ma non è detto proprio tutto....oppure... se tutto è andato bene... supponendo di sì: metti i driver o meglio il file e2.o nella cartella dei moduli usb... come devi fare? allora i moduli si trovano in /lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/usb uname -r sostiituisce la versione del tuo kernel nel mio caso per esempio il percorso è: /lib/modules/2.4.20/kernel/drivers/usb quindi devi fare: # cp e2.o /lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/usb e devi copiare il file CnxE2Fw.bin in /etc # cp CnxE2Fw.bin /etc/ a questo punto devi digitare questi comandi [questi devi essere necessariamente root): # insmod e2 dovrebbe caricarti il modulo e2, verifica (se c'è nell''elenco dei moduli caricati) con: # lsmod a questo punto dovresti essere capace di avviare l'ìinterfaccia del modem con # ifconfig hsb up potrebbe dirti qualcosa come "risorsa occupata..." aspetta un po' e riprova... se pure aspettando non funziona allora smonta e rimonta il dispositivo usb, nel mio pc si rifa' al modulo usb-ohci, ma potrebbe essere anche usb-uhci (dipende dal controller...), mettiamo caso che è come il mio... # rmmod usb-ohci # insmod usb-ohci in questo modo hai scollegato e ricollegato il dispositivo usb...aspetta un attimo e riprova con # ifconfig hsb0 up dovrebbe funzionare a questo punto (senza nessun messaggio) se tutto è andato bene devi applicare il dhcp sull'interfaccia hsb con # ./dhcpcd hsb0 a questo punto con il comando ifconfig dovresti visualizzare l'interfaccia hsb0 con un ip assegnato 10.0.0.3 # ifconfig a questo punto puoi settare i parametri loggandoti a http://10.0.0.2 user:admin password:adslolitec e settare le configurazioni del caso...[stessa procedura che hai fatto su windows, con un'interfaccia un po' diversa...] .......... .......... Allora una volta configurati i dati (nome, password,impostazioni...riscrivili e salvali).... puoi o dalla pagina principale (bottone Connecter) oppure da una shell: # rm /etc/dhcpc/dhcpcd-hsb0.pid # dhcpcd hsb0 poi fai #ifconfig per accertarti della connessione .... dovresti visualizzare un numero ip assegnato da tiscali nel campo "inet addr"dell'interfaccia hsb0... non piu' 10.0.0.3 ... ora sei on-line! ....... ....... Successivamente devi da una shell inserire i comandi che hai uilizzato finora per caricare l'interfaccia e per farti assegnare l'ip.... senza andare nell'interfaccia web...