How to use ndiswrapper

[2k3autococker]

Everything I've seen about wireless networking all seems to be related to the specific wireless card, but from what I get from it, you can download windows drivers and run them through ndiswrapper and it should work... How exactly do I run / configure ndiswrapper with windows drivers?

[onemyndseye]

I havent messes with wireless under Linux so I cant be of much help...

I will say dont get your hopes up as Wireless networking under Linux is still pretty shaky

Take Care,
-Justin
One Mynds Eye

[kej]

I have just been working with this, and have found, for my specific case that wireless through the ndiswrapper can still work, if done properly. information on what I did is as follows:

system: hp pavillion zv5000
memory: 512MB
wireless card: Broadcom BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller
wireless router: linksys wrt54gl
firmware: v4.30.5, Apr. 27, 2006
wireless mode: mixed

disk: 100GB, 3 partitions, hda1 = /; hda2 = swap; hda3 = /home

notes:

I was not able to make bcm43xx work. It seems to fire up and connect, i.e. gets dhcp info, but can not do any thing farther. It seems that there is a one line kernel patch associated with 2.6.19.2 that speaks to this issue. I tried to make this work, by doing an hd (debian type) install, and then work with the kernel patch - but was not successful. Not enough time to pursue that farther. It has been a long time since I have built kernels. However, was able to finally make ndiswrapper to work.

Before I removed microsoft from this machine, I found the wireless driver information and copied that to my hda3 disk partition.


procedure:

boot knoppix 5.1.1 dvd screen=1280x800

open terminal window - issue su - command
mount the hda3 disk partition

#for general purposes:

rmmod bcm43xx

# need MS devide drivers - a variety of sources - bcmwl5a.inf, bcmwl5.sys
#
# in my case, wireless device fairly consistently comes up as eth2

cd to the directory on the hda3 drive where these are stored

ndiswrapper -i bcmwl5a.inf
modprobe ndiswrapper
ifup wlan0

Now, there are a number of more complete discussions about ndiswrapper and how to carry forward the installation to make things more permenant. These can be found in this forum in other places, or a google search on knoppix and ndiswrapper.

As a follow on note, this information is for the live dvd only.

I tried to do an HD install (knx2hd), following the above procesure, but the wireless setup info was not successfully preserved, and I have not figured a way round that yet. (This was the approach that I had used with an HD install of 4.0.2 and it worked great for that version). About the only thing that I can say is that I am understanding more, why the tools need to be re-written.


Finally, the drawback here is that since I was unable to either do an HD install, or to save the system configuration information, this procedure needs to be done each time knoppix 5.1.1 is loaded.

While this information is specific to my case, some of the ideas may be helpful to others.

Good Luck!

[2k3autococker]

Thanks for the help, I have the 5.1.1 DVD, so it should come in handy... thanks man

[2k3autococker]

I tried what you said, got an error saying that the file didn't exist at /usr/sbin/ndiswrapper at line 172
I tried using the configuration thing thats under the K menu -> Knoppix -> network/internet -> ndiswrapper configuration and it generated an error that said "su returned with error"

What to do?

[TR7110]

Kej
Good info, at long last I have gotten my bcm internal card to work in Knoppix. This time I used Live CD 5.1.1
I followed your instructions Opened Root Shell.

rmmod bcm43xx
#mounted the drive with my wireless adapter files. Same .inf that was used with XP
ndiswrapper -i /media/sda1/bcmwl5.inf
ndiswrapper -m
modprobe ndiswrapper
ifup wlan0 (got a failure there)

#Used Network Card Configuration to set up SSID and WEP and NWID. Wavelan and Wireless LAN didn't do the trick.

ifconfig

#Presto up and running, with an IP and everything. This is the first time I have had any success using Knoppix and I have tried numerous times.
#In previous versions there was a bcmwl5 in the ndiswrapper I used and I should have removed it then added my version.
Thanks again for the post.

[kej]

to 2k3autococker:

I am not sure what is happening, but it is very important to get the correct MS driver files and point to them properly when doing the ndiswrapper -i .... , as TR7110 reported.

You can point to the files by either cd to the specific directory and then use a relative path name, as I did, or by specifying the complete path, as in the case of TR7110.

Now, there are a couple of different version of the .inf file. Mine only works with the bcmwfl5a.inf version. Others may only work with the bcmwl5.inf version.

One other interesting point that I have encountered, is that if I mess something up along the process, i.e. forget to do something correctly, I have not found the proper way to undo these things without just doing a clean re-boot.
When things do not work correctly, there is enough information that gets into some places, but not others, and that is enough to keep everything from being undone.

The answer is a quick re-boot.

Good Luck!!

[ginoe]

where did you get the 5.1.1 dvd - did you purchase it?

i've been searching but cannot find the 4gb iso - all i can find are ones that claim to be 4gb but ends up only being 27mb or so...

Thanks for the help, I have the 5.1.1 DVD, so it should come in handy... thanks man

[Harry Kuhman]

i've been searching but cannot find the 4gb iso - all i can find are ones that claim to be 4gb but ends up only being 27mb or so...

You don't know what you are doing. You are either trying to download to a FAT partition or using a download tool that will not support a file this size. Don't save to FAT and try using a version of BitTorrent 4.0 or greater. Use the Get Knoppix link near the top of this page. And in the future try to kep your posts on topic, your post had nothing to do with ndswrapper, the subject of this thread.

[ginoe]

thanks for the insightful tip

google led me here; where the files show mismatching .md5 signifying damaged archives:
http://www.knopper.net/knoppix-mirrors/index-en.html

i was able to locate a download that was not corrupt (no special d/l tools needed): http://linux.softpedia.com/progDownl...load-2621.html

i was hoping the dvd would contain additional files with regards to networking, unlike the smaller cd version i have.

btw - discs are NTFS not FAT