Hey folks. I just installed 64 Studio on my laptop, and I'm having a bit of trouble with the wireless. lspci shows that I have a wireless card installed, but it wont use it. I used ubuntu before, and I'm remembering that it had this 'restricted drivers manager', but I caint find anything like that on this. I tried installing madwifi, but it says I'm missing ath_pci.ko, but I caint find that online either.

lspci:

00:00.0 Host bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RS300 Host Bridge (rev 02)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon 9100 IGP AGP Bridge
00:13.0 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc OHCI USB Controller #1 (rev 01)
00:13.1 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc OHCI USB Controller #2 (rev 01)
00:13.2 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc EHCI USB Controller (rev 01)
00:14.0 SMBus: ATI Technologies Inc ATI SMBus (rev 18)
00:14.1 IDE interface: ATI Technologies Inc ATI Dual Channel Bus Master PCI IDE Controller
00:14.3 ISA bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 434c
00:14.4 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc Unknown device 4342
00:14.5 Multimedia audio controller: ATI Technologies Inc IXP150 AC'97 Audio Controller
00:14.6 Modem: ATI Technologies Inc IXP AC'97 Modem (rev 01)
01:05.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc RS300M AGP [Radeon Mobility 9100IGP]
02:02.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications, Inc. AR5212 802.11abg NIC (rev 01)
02:03.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)
02:04.0 CardBus bridge: ENE Technology Inc CB1410 Cardbus Controller (rev 01)

Oddly enough, it found video drivers with no issue. I crashed ubuntu 7.10 3 times before giving up on loading that. Being a linux baby, I figured debian is debian. I think I'm wrong.

lsmod | grep ath:

multipath 10112 0
md_mod 75028 7 raid10,raid456,raid1,raid0,multipath,linear

Nothing there about the wireless card. I know the info I'm giving here is rather vauge, but I'm not sure exactly what I need to do to get what I need. If you need something else to make this understandable, let me know.

Heres what I get when I attempt to install madwifi:
sh scripts/find-madwifi-modules.sh 2.6.21-1-multimedia-486
for i in ath/ ath_hal/ ath_rate/ net80211/; do \
make -C $i install || exit 1; \
done
make[1]: Entering directory `/home/kip/Desktop/madwifi-0.9.4/ath'
test -d //lib/modules/2.6.21-1-multimedia-486/net || mkdir -p //lib/modules/2.6.21-1-multimedia-486/net
install ath_pci.ko //lib/modules/2.6.21-1-multimedia-486/net
install: cannot stat `ath_pci.ko': No such file or directory
make[1]: *** [install] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/kip/Desktop/madwifi-0.9.4/ath'
make: *** [install-modules] Error 1


The mouse problem is nowhere near as much of a bother, it just is VERY slow. Its like the touchpad is a life-sized representation of the screen, so my finger is getting one heck of a workout. If anyone knows of how to fix that, it'd make working on this thing much easier.

I've tried ndiswrapper, though I don't even know if its on the lappy, much less working. It shows as installed in my package manager, but theres no difference from before.

I should mention a few things. I *THINK* this is an A75, not to sure though. Matches all the specs, along with the other ones in the shop, but as for sure... well, the words on the sticker melted off. Or something.

Also, is there a possibility I'm having all sorts of issues because of my distro? 64 studio is based on the x64 port of Debian, which they then ported back to x32 *the one I'm using* So there are both 64 and 32 bit versions availible... but something says I ought not be hopping about like that...

seach in your add software for windows wireless drivers, also dowload the newest windows version of your wireless driver.
open the windows wireless drive utility, then browse the location you just saved the drivers in and select the[U].inf[U] file and select install.
this should hopefully give you youre wireless. or atleast it did for me on my A200

I believe the wireless problem is a conflict between madwifi and the realtime kernel. I had a laptop with an atheros card last year, and I had no wireless on a realtime kernel. (My solution was to replace the atheros card with an intel one), A quick search of "madwifi and rt kernel" turns up lots of posts like this. Have you tried using a standard debian 'etch' (stable) kernel? If that works, you may need to live without wireless while doing music/media work and boot into a 'regular' kernel for wireless browsing.