Non-Classmate Will not wirelessly connect

[Rikard023]

I have try almost everything I could possibly think of to get our non-classmate laptop to connect to the robot so our team can run it.

The Driverstation on the classmate still connects and runs fine, and From the non-Classmate laptop we can still run the robot from wired connection.

Is there anyone out there that can provide some help?

[BigJ]

Dumb questions first :):

Did you make sure your wireless card is on/enabled?
Is your wireless card set to a proper static IP?

[Rikard023]

Yes I have set up the new laptop and fixed all the IP's to be correct. I do get an error saying watch dog not fed but that is only on the new laptop not the classmate

[Alan Anderson]

When you say "will not wirelessly connect", what exactly do you mean? Where in the process is it breaking? Is the laptop unable to see the robot's wireless network? Does it show an error when you tell it to connect to the network (which I assume is named "522")? Does it successfully establish the wireless connection but not show communication with the robot?

Tell us in detail what you are doing, and what you expect to happen, and what happens instead.

[Rikard023]

Ok ill try... The problem is when I try to connect the new non classmate laptop to the d-link router currently hooked up to the cRio it will connect and disconnect repeatedly. All the Ip's are set up correctly and i folowed the FIRST manual to the letter on how to connect a non-classmate laptop to the robot.
I expect the non-classmate laptop to function like the classmate but it currently is not. But the network is seen and the connection is excellent.

[Alan Anderson]

Ok ill try... The problem is when I try to connect the new non classmate laptop to the d-link router currently hooked up to the cRio it will connect and disconnect repeatedly.

I still don't know what you mean by that, especially when you follow it with "the connection is excellent." Help me out here -- just tell me what I would see happening if I watched over your shoulder. Don't try to interpret it for me. Don't try to use words other than those showing on the screen. Don't distill it down into a simpler description. Just report the facts and let me apply my knowledge of the system to try to form a theory of why it's not working the way you want it to.

[Rikard023]

Ok...I turn the robot on and double click the icon on the dekstop to open the driver station program. The connection light on the left goes green for a few seconds then it goes red and repeats this many times. When the same is done on the classmate laptop, the connection light holds a steady green and i can operate the robot using the joysticks.

[Alan Anderson]

When you say "connection light", do you mean the "Communications" indicator on the Driver Station screen?

It sounds like you might have a firewall program on the computer preventing it from communicating with the robot. Make sure you've turned that off.

[Rikard023]

yes the communications light, i Turned off all firewalls and virus protection programs and still the same problem

[DavidGitz]

Do you have the classmate laptop and the non-classmate laptop running the Driver Station software at the same time?

What is the IP settings for your non-classmate laptop?

[Rikard023]

Both are not running at the same time and the ip on the non classmate laptop is 10.5.22.6

[BigJ]

Did you set the team number correctly inside the driver station on the one that doesn't work?

[Rikard023]

i know this may be weird to say but it just so happened the wireless card in the newer laptop was not compatible with the radio. I got a usb wireless adapter and its up and running well

[Alan Anderson]

Thank you for following up and letting us know what made it work for you.

[Seth Mallory]

AT Chesapeake none of our laptops would connect with the field. After 2 bad match's and working thru lunch with the field supervisor we switched to a First loaner Class Mate and had no more problems. Our laptops kept searching for IP addresses.

[dsherw00d]

Is the DLINK in AP or Bridge mode. It needs to be in AP mode to connect directly to it using wireless. In Bridge mode, it connects to another AP (the field AP) and bridges you across. You can also try pinging the below addresses:

.1 - Dlink
.2 - CRio
.11 - Camera
.5 - DS - yes, try to ping your self just to make sure protocols are up

If you can't ping the Dlink, nothing else will work. I believe it works tethered, which eliminates Dlink to cRIO issues.

If the wired port on the DS and Wireless are both enable, you can try disabling the Ethernet port and trying wireless again. I've seen some laptops that have issues with both active at the same time even if one is not connected.

[Alan Anderson]

Our laptops kept searching for IP addresses.

I'm not completely sure what that means, but it sounds a little like you had set the laptop's network adapter properties to use a dynamically-assigned address (using "DHCP") instead of setting it to a static 10.1.92.5 as it should have been. Since the field staff should have been able to find that quickly, though, I doubt that's what you meant.

[Seth Mallory]

I'm not completely sure what that means, but it sounds a little like you had set the laptop's network adapter properties to use a dynamically-assigned address (using "DHCP") instead of setting it to a static 10.1.92.5 as it should have been. Since the field staff should have been able to find that quickly, though, I doubt that's what you meant.

What you say is what the field crew did. Then when our laptops were rebooted they would go back to searching. After spending all of lunch trying to get the laptops to not keep changing back the students decided that using the First loaner Classmate was better then trying to fix the problem and risk further matches. I have not checked with students since to see if they found the problem. That is their problem to work on and I will at some point be told they have found the problem and it will probably be some thing else.:rolleyes:

I am sure Alan you are far better at this subject then I am. My daughter tells me I am a little out of date. The last program I wrote was with punch cards. Now I just report what I am told.