trouble detecting my wireless card!

07-28-2008	#1 (permalink)
ArbaK Just Joined! Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 9	trouble detecting my wireless card! I am new to the forum and have read many threads concerning this shared problem. I have tried several the things I have read about but none seem to be working. Here are some examples of commands used some with multiple arguments but none have seemed to work for me.

07-28-2008	#2 (permalink)
deltaflyer Linux Enthusiast Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 577	don't see any examples,but, a bit more info please. 1 ) operating system 2 ) make & model of wireless device 3 ) desktop or laptop 4 ) output of lspci -nn ( command done in a console ) 5 ) if a usb device,plug it in & post the output of lsusb ( command done in a console ) __________________ SLOMO: Samsung p10 lappy,suse 11.0,512mb ram 1.7ghz cpu.20gb hdd(my test machine)using wireless SPEEDY: homebrew desktop,sempron 3300,2gb ram,200gb +1tb( 2x500gb) hdd suse 11.0,8mb adsl registered linux user #401845

07-28-2008	#3 (permalink)
ArbaK Just Joined! Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 9	Sorry I mucked this thread up and put up a new one with the same header but I can't seem to locate it. I have windows xp as dedicated os but am running knoppix 5.1 live cd. I have a Dell Inspiron E1705 with Broadcom 440x 10/100, 802.11n WLAN card. This is what happens when I use some of these commands.... iwlist scan lo - interface doesn't support scanning eth0 - interface doesn't...... eth1 - interface ........ iwconfig lo -no wireless extensions eth0 - no wireless..... eth1 - no ....... when i use lspci -nn , I find two possibles out of the displayed info, however I do not know exactly what I am looking for or what the numbers shown represent but here are the two that look close. Ethernet controller -14e4:4328 >it seems these numbers are too short am I correct in this assumption? Network controller - 14e4:4328 >it seems............... I am not familiar with ndiswrapper but would like to know step by step how to use this on the command line.

07-28-2008	#4 (permalink)
waterhead Trusted Penguin Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Franklin, Wisconsin Posts: 3,958	Go ahead and post the entire output of the lspci -nn command. Let us decide what is useful. __________________ Paul Please do not PM me with requests for help. I will not reply.

07-29-2008

#5 (permalink)

waterhead

Trusted Penguin

Join Date: Jul 2004

Location: Franklin, Wisconsin

Posts: 3,958

The device ID 14e4:4328 tells me that this is a Broadcom 4328 chip. I know of no Linux driver for this chip. It looks as if NDISwrapper is your only way.

I found three reports of NDISwrapper working with this card, in the NDISwrapper Supported Card List:

Quote:

Card: Dell Wireless 1500 (802.11draft-n/a/g) WLAN MiniCard

Chipset: Broadcom BCM4321(?) (rev 01)
pciid: 14e4:4328
Driver: http://ftp.us.dell.com/network/R129083.EXE
Other: ndiswrapper v1.22-rc1, Ubuntu kernel 2.6.15-26-386

Card: Dell Wireless 1505 (802.11draft-n/a/g) WLAN MiniCard

Chipset: Broadcom BCM4321 (rev 03)
pciid: 14e4:4328.5
Driver: ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/network/R151517.EXE
Other: ndiswrapper v1.46-1, Fedora 7 kernel 2.6.22.9_91

Laptop: Lenovo 3000 N100 (0768-A2U)
Card: Broadcom Wireless N 802.11n BCM94321MC (BCM4328)
pciid: 14E4:4328
Driver: http://ftp.us.dell.com/network/R140746.EXE (50MB+)
Other: Tested with ndiswrapper 1.37 on openSUSE 10.2 x86_64 kernel v2.6.18.2.
Tested with WPA2 and open wireless. Works Great!
NOTE: If you use a 64bits Linux use a 64bits driver, otherwise it won’t work!

For NDISwrapper, you will need a working WinXP driver for your card. First try one from your computer or wireless card manufacturer. If that is not available, then trying drivers that others report as working is the next best thing.

To get a list of all commands used by NDISwrapper, enter this command in a terminal:

Code:

ndiswrapper --help

First, place your WinXP driver in an easily accessible folder. Your home folder is good. You will give NDISwrapper the location of that driver when you install it. The driver needs to be uncompressed or unpacked. A zip or .exe file won't work. If this is the case, let us know. We can give instructions on how to unpack it.

It needs the drivers .inf and .sys files. It uses the .inf file for the installation.

To install the driver, use the -i option:

Code:

ndiswrapper -i /home/arbak/<driver>.inf

If there were no errors, check that it installed with this command;

Code:

ndiswrapper -l

If that looks good, then finish the module configuration with these commands, one at a time:

Code:

ndiswrapper -m
ndiswrapper -ma
ndiswrapper -mi

At this point, it is a good idea to reboot. Then configure the wireless as a network card. Then I recommend using the NetworkManager connection manager for handling all wireless and wired network connections.

__________________
Paul

Please do not PM me with requests for help. I will not reply.

07-29-2008	#6 (permalink)
ArbaK Just Joined! Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 9	Thank you for answering my post so quickly. So since I am running a Live CD I did not know any other way to get the driver files into the linux filesystem as I am not familiar enough with it yet. However I have put them onto a usb device and can see them fine on sdb1. I download the driver files you suggested from the dell site, so those are the ones I am working with. I moved them to my /home/knoppix directory. I used ndiswrapper as follows.. ndiswrapper -i /home/knoppix/bcmw15.inf , which displayed the following installing <file> ......... couldn't open /home/knoppix/bcmw15.inf : no such file or directory at /usr/sbin/ndiswrapper line 172 These are the three files in the device folder bcm43xx.cat \| bcmw15.inf \| bcmw15.sys type-unknown \| type Plaintext Document \| type windows executable size 10.1 KB \| size 496.0 KB \| 550.8 KB Are these all the files I should have? So you said I might have to unpack these as they have windows extensions or are windows exec. Please instruct on how to go about doing this. Your info so far has been very helpful and I appreciate you taking time for this beginner. -Eli

07-29-2008	#7 (permalink)
deltaflyer Linux Enthusiast Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 577	just a quickie, using a livecd may not work with wireless,as you can't really install anything, as any re-boots will lose the settings. I think something like simply mepis & ubuntu are about the best for this __________________ SLOMO: Samsung p10 lappy,suse 11.0,512mb ram 1.7ghz cpu.20gb hdd(my test machine)using wireless SPEEDY: homebrew desktop,sempron 3300,2gb ram,200gb +1tb( 2x500gb) hdd suse 11.0,8mb adsl registered linux user #401845

07-29-2008	#8 (permalink)
waterhead Trusted Penguin Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Franklin, Wisconsin Posts: 3,958	You can modify a system booted from a live CD, but any changes are lost when you shut the system down. I did forget one important piece of advice. You need to install NDISwrapper first! If it is installed, it seems that you are not accessing the USB drive correctly. I don't know about Knoppix, but the USB drives are usually mounted in the /media folder. __________________ Paul Please do not PM me with requests for help. I will not reply.

07-29-2008	#9 (permalink)
ArbaK Just Joined! Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 9	I am aware that I will lose any changes but everything you have told me should work right? Also I can access the USB drive fine from the command line or Konqueror. I see the files it just seems I need to unpack them or convert them to different extensions so linux can run them, as you previously said I might have to do. I don't mind going through this process even though it's not a permanent change it's good learning and since my printer is down and I have no linux reference materials I have to keep going on the internet for research. Which obviously is very tedious as I have to reboot into win os to do so. You said I might have to install NDISwrapper first, why when it seems to function correctly? Anyway if you can instruct on how to unpack or convert files it might help. Thanks for the advice!

07-29-2008	#10 (permalink)
ArbaK Just Joined! Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 9	Thanks I am getting ready to try Kubuntu today.

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