Dell Wireless 1370 WLAN MiniPCI Card with Ubuntu
 

I am having a bit of a problem getting my wireless network card working, it is a Dell Wireless 1370 WLAN MiniPCI Card and I am running Ubuntu. I have downloaded ndiswrapper and the windows driver but I am a complete newbie when it comes to Linux (in other words I don't know where to go from here) so if someone could break down exactly what I have to do step by step it would be greatly appreciated.

Welcome to LQ!

Probably the best place to start is the ndiswrapper wiki (see my sig for the link). They have excellent installation instructions and a good series of distro-specific instructions.

The other thing to worry about is the chipset that card uses. You might want to have a look at the output of lspci and see if it lists it. The reason you need to worry about it is that Dell cards frequently use Broadcom chipsets, and there is a native Linux driver for those that Ubuntu almost certainly has and it can conflict with ndiswrapper.

correction
 

I can see that my wireless card is active (because it lets me check or uncheck it in the network connection menu),but it does not allow me to connect. I am thinking that maybe it is using the wrong driver? I switched to Suse 10.2 now because of different issues with Ubuntu. Anyway for what ever reason I can not set up my wireless. If you think that using ndiswrapper would work then let me know. If it is something really simple that I am just missing I am sorry, I am completely clueless right now as far as what to do. Again any help would be appreciated.

There are actually quite a variety of things that could be going wrong at this point, so until we have an idea of what is (or is not) happening, making any recommendations would be pointless.

So lets start from the top. If you post the output of lspci and lsmod, we hopefully will be able get you heading in the right direction.

Roth:/home/bradleyaroth # lspci
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile 915GM/PM/GMS/910GML Express Processor to DRAM Controller (rev 03)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 915GM/GMS/910GML Express Graphics Controller (rev 03)
00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 915GM/GMS/910GML Express Graphics Controller (rev 03)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) High Definition Audio Controller (rev 03)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 03)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) PCI Express Port 4 (rev 03)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #1 (rev 03)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #2 (rev 03)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #3 (rev 03)
00:1d.3 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #4 (rev 03)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller (rev 03)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev d3)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801FBM (ICH6M) LPC Interface Bridge (rev 03)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) IDE Controller (rev 03)
02:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4401-B0 100Base-TX (rev 02)
02:03.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless LAN Controller (rev 02)


and the other is

Roth:/home/bradleyaroth # lsmod
Module Size Used by
af_packet 29320 2
i915 22656 2
drm 71316 3 i915
xt_tcpudp 7296 4
xt_pkttype 6016 3
ipt_LOG 10624 9
xt_limit 6912 9
snd_pcm_oss 53376 0
snd_mixer_oss 21248 1 snd_pcm_oss
snd_seq 60272 0
snd_seq_device 12812 1 snd_seq
cpufreq_conservative 11912 0
cpufreq_ondemand 10892 1
cpufreq_userspace 9088 0
cpufreq_powersave 5888 0
speedstep_centrino 12832 1
freq_table 8832 1 speedstep_centrino
button 10896 0
battery 14340 0
ac 9476 0
ipt_REJECT 9472 3
xt_state 6272 12
iptable_mangle 7040 0
iptable_nat 11524 0
ip_nat 21804 1 iptable_nat
iptable_filter 7168 1
ip6table_mangle 6528 0
ip6table_filter 7040 0
ip_conntrack 52960 3 xt_state,iptable_nat,ip_nat
nfnetlink 11032 2 ip_nat,ip_conntrack
ip_tables 17604 3 iptable_mangle,iptable_nat,iptable_filter
ip6_tables 18756 2 ip6table_mangle,ip6table_filter
x_tables 18180 9 xt_tcpudp,xt_pkttype,ipt_LOG,xt_limit,ipt_REJECT,xt_state,iptable_nat,ip_tables,ip6_tables
apparmor 55572 0
aamatch_pcre 18304 1 apparmor
loop 20488 0
sg 38044 0
sr_mod 20132 0
dm_mod 60184 0
usbhid 52192 0
usb_storage 82112 0
scsi_mod 136712 3 sg,sr_mod,usb_storage
ide_cd 42272 1
cdrom 38432 2 sr_mod,ide_cd
bcm43xx 423168 0
firmware_class 14080 1 bcm43xx
ieee80211softmac 36736 1 bcm43xx
b44 30604 0
mii 9600 1 b44
ieee80211 34632 2 bcm43xx,ieee80211softmac
ieee80211_crypt 10112 1 ieee80211
ehci_hcd 34696 0
intel_agp 26652 1
agpgart 35528 3 drm,intel_agp
uhci_hcd 26892 0
usbcore 114896 4 usbhid,usb_storage,ehci_hcd,uhci_hcd
snd_hda_intel 23060 2
snd_hda_codec 164352 1 snd_hda_intel
snd_pcm 86788 3 snd_pcm_oss,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec
snd_timer 27908 2 snd_seq,snd_pcm
snd 61188 12 snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_seq,snd_seq_device,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec,snd_pcm,snd_timer
soundcore 13792 1 snd
snd_page_alloc 14472 2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm
ext3 141192 1
mbcache 12804 1 ext3
jbd 70324 1 ext3
edd 13892 0
fan 8964 0
piix 13700 0 [permanent]
thermal 18568 0
processor 34664 2 speedstep_centrino,thermal
ide_disk 20480 3
ide_core 129992 4 usb_storage,ide_cd,piix,ide_disk

I hope you know what all of this is because I have no idea. What is sad is that I just now realized that I had to be logged in as root to use "lspci". You can stamp newbie across my forehead any time you want. O I do have ndiswrapper-1.43 and bcm43xx-fwcutter-006 plus I have the drivers off of my disk. Everthing is on my desktop, I have tried building the ndiswrapper according to the install sheet but for some reason I keep running into this error

Roth:/home/bradleyaroth # tar zxvf ndiswrapper-1.43.tar.gz
tar: ndiswrapper-1.43.tar.gz: Cannot open: No such file or directory
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now
tar: Child returned status 2
tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors

Any idea as to why this is showing up? I am pretty sure I did ever step up to this point.... again any help would be appreciated.

This is from lspci. Since you've got a 4318 chipset, you probably want to use ndiswrapper. The bcm43xx doesn't work with this chipset very well.

In your lsmod output, bcm43xx is loaded and that will conflict with ndiswrapper unless you remove it prior to loading ndiswrapper (modprobe -r bcmr43xx). You should be able to block it from loading by adding bcm43xx to your /etc/modprobe.d blacklist file. Since you're using ndiswrapper, you really don't need fwcutter (that cuts out the firmware for bcm43xx) but you do need to be able to compile ndiswrapper:

Either the ndiswrapper tarball isn't in your /home/bradelyaroth directory or you've had a bad download. The good news is that your command is correct, so there must be some other problem.

Hey, if I had newbie stamped on my forehead for every time Linux tripped me up, there would be one VERY rich ink vendor out there somewhere..........

Welcome to the permanent newbie club.

Sorry about the dumb question but how exactly do I add it to my blacklist file? What is the command for that?

Thank You I actually think I am getting the hang (at least I think...) of Linux now, I owe that to you and all of your help. Thank you again.

You need to open up /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist in a text editor (you'll have to be root to save it) and add a line blacklist bcm43xx. You should already see a bunch of examples in that file, so follow those.

I have the same wireless card in my dell latitude d510. I was stuck after installing ndiswrapper, and it was not working. This was the answer! THANKS!

Thank you
 

Thank you for all of your help, I am now wireless. I really appreciate all of your help, especially with me being extremely new to Linux. You guys are great over here.

Congrats on getting it working! Believe it or not, you've solved one of the biggest problems most new users face.

Still need help.
 

hi. Could you (or someone) help me as well. After I modify the blacklist file and reboot the bcm43xx still seems to be loaded when I do the lsmod command.

Is this supposed to be the case? I also did the following command but it still seems loaded:
modprobe -r bcm43xx

Thank you in advance!

OK, a couple of questions:

- When you run modprobe -r bcm43xx, are you root? Are there any error messages?

-What distro are you using? It might be important.

- What exactly did you add to your blacklist file?


Welcome to LQ!

lost at lsmod!
 

Module Size Used by
nls_utf8 1069 1
isofs 30022 1
binfmt_misc 6599 1
parport_pc 26058 0
ppdev 5556 0
snd_intel8x0 25632 2
i915 291004 3
snd_ac97_codec 99227 1 snd_intel8x0
ac97_bus 1014 1 snd_ac97_codec
drm_kms_helper 30200 1 i915
snd_pcm 71475 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec
drm 168054 4 i915,drm_kms_helper
arc4 1165 2
snd_seq_midi 4588 0
snd_rawmidi 17783 1 snd_seq_midi
b43 168681 0
i2c_algo_bit 5168 1 i915
snd_seq_midi_event 6047 1 snd_seq_midi
video 18712 1 i915
snd_seq 47174 2 snd_seq_midi,snd_seq_midi_event
output 1883 1 video
joydev 8735 0
snd_timer 19067 2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
snd_seq_device 5744 3 snd_seq_midi,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq
pcmcia 35973 0
mac80211 231541 1 b43
cfg80211 144470 2 b43,mac80211
snd 49006 11 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq,snd_timer,snd_seq_device
intel_agp 26360 2 i915
soundcore 880 1 snd
dell_laptop 5730 0
yenta_socket 21518 0
psmouse 59033 0
pcmcia_rsrc 10566 1 yenta_socket
agpgart 32011 2 drm,intel_agp
snd_page_alloc 7120 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
dcdbas 5402 1 dell_laptop
serio_raw 4022 0
led_class 2633 1 b43
pcmcia_core 14657 3 pcmcia,yenta_socket,pcmcia_rsrc
lp 7342 0
parport 31492 3 parport_pc,ppdev,lp
e100 30356 0
ssb 39288 1 b43
mii 4425 1 e100



What now?

How about starting a new thread with a full description of the hardware and the problem your facing. In general LQ frowns upon digging up old threads.