sudden WPA problem
Posted: Sat Nov 05, 2005 10:12 pm
I live with two roommates, and they use the internet wirelessly through a Linksys router attached to my computer.
Until today, we had the network set to wireless-G only, and the security mode set to "WPA pre-shared key" and everything worked fine.
As of this morning, whenever my roommates try to connect to the network, they get an error saying The network password needs to be 40bits or 104bits depending on your network configuration. This can be entered as 5 or 13 ascii charachters or 10 or 26 hexadecimal charachters.
But nothing has changed since yesterday: for the past two months we've been using the WPA pre-shared key, wireless-G, etc., and it all worked just fine.
I might add at this point that the whole hexadecimal thing doesn't make any sense to me: there are other security modes available through the router control panel which mention hexademical codes and crap, but the WPA Pre-shared key says nothing about that. For the past 2 months we were using a 9-character password (not 10 or 26) and it all worked fine. I didn't think there were any limitations on the format/size of the password used in this particular security mode.
My roommates can still connect to the network when I remove the password, but we want some level of security.
Any ideas what the problem is and what we should do about it?
Until today, we had the network set to wireless-G only, and the security mode set to "WPA pre-shared key" and everything worked fine.
As of this morning, whenever my roommates try to connect to the network, they get an error saying The network password needs to be 40bits or 104bits depending on your network configuration. This can be entered as 5 or 13 ascii charachters or 10 or 26 hexadecimal charachters.
But nothing has changed since yesterday: for the past two months we've been using the WPA pre-shared key, wireless-G, etc., and it all worked just fine.
I might add at this point that the whole hexadecimal thing doesn't make any sense to me: there are other security modes available through the router control panel which mention hexademical codes and crap, but the WPA Pre-shared key says nothing about that. For the past 2 months we were using a 9-character password (not 10 or 26) and it all worked fine. I didn't think there were any limitations on the format/size of the password used in this particular security mode.
My roommates can still connect to the network when I remove the password, but we want some level of security.
Any ideas what the problem is and what we should do about it?