Wireless question Fedora - ndiswrapper

neutron001 · 01-27-2009, 10:30 PM

I sure hope someone can help me... I'm thinking about putting windows back on this machine (and you know how much we all love windows):
Acer Aspire 5000.
Wireless Card: Broadcom BCM4318 [Air Force One 54g]
Fedora Core 7

Steps I took (as root)

Code:

added "blacklist bcm43xx" to /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist
ndiswrapper -i bcmwl5.inf
ndiswrapper -l shows:
bcmwl5 : driver installed
        device (14E4:4318) present (alternate driver: ssb)

Not sure if the above is normal, but proceeding on...

Code:

ndiswrapper -m

http://floppyjoes.homeip.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=5 ... says to add ndiswrapper to the end of -> /etc/modules, but this file doesn't exist on my system. Shouldn't skip, but I don't know what to do.

Code:

depmod -a
modprobe ndiswrapper

----

Now, I tried setting up wpa_supplicant.
I set up the conf file as:

Code:

ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=wheel

network={
        ssid="chupacabra"
        psk="blahblahpass"
        pairwise=TKIP
        group=TKIP
        key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
        proto=WPA
}

---
From the command line...

Code:

/usr/sbin/wpa_supplicant -c /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf -D ndiswrapper -dd -i wlan0 -B

ps output shows it to be running.

----
Then I wrote a dummy script which I thought might work, but apparently I was wrong:

Code:

#!/bin/bash
    iwconfig wlan0 mode Managed
    killall wpa_supplicant
    sleep 2
    iwconfig wlan0 essid chupacabra
    sleep 2
    /usr/sbin/wpa_supplicant -c /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf -D ndisw
rapper -dd -i wlan0 -B
    sleep 2
    dhclient wlan0

So none of this works and I'm pulling my hair out.
Just in case anyone asks I will add iwconfig & ifconfig...
Note, I can not use iwconfig to change essid when in Managed mode. I do iwconfig wlan0 essid "chupacabra" and it doesn't complain, but if I 'iwconfig', the changes don't update.

Here is iwconfig:

Code:

wlan0     IEEE 802.11g  ESSID:off/any  Nickname:"localhost.localdomain"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.437 GHz  Access Point: Not-Associated   
          Bit Rate=54 Mb/s   Tx-Power:25 dBm   
          RTS thr=2347 B   Fragment thr=2346 B   
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality:0  Signal level:0  Noise level:0
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

Here is ifconfig:

Code:

wlan0     Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:14:A4:2C:96:D2  
          UP BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 
          RX bytes:0 (0.0 b)  TX bytes:0 (0.0 b)
          Interrupt:22 Memory:e2000000-e2002000

lepht · 01-28-2009, 04:17 AM

can i suggest that before you try anything else, you back up what you got and upgrade to Core 10? there's probably new drivers out, but they won't get to you if you're still using 7.

JBauza · 03-03-2009, 10:51 PM

I have been reading all of these threads for a few days. This is my 4th Linux Distribution. Mandravia, SUSE, OpenSuse, now Fedora 10. All have the same problem No Wireless connection. I have spent all night and all day. 23 hours straight. I can't understand a word of what I am reading. I have also read the Help tabs. I opened the terminal windwow it shows this [Joe@LinuxCompaq -]$ What is This? I don't see any windows that look like what you guys are showing. I went to applications, then sytem tools, then Terminal and that is what I see. Now I understand why Windows from DOS 6.0 through Vista is the way to go. Just pop in a CD and in 40 minutes your off!!. I just thought an alternative is worth the effort. Maybe I'll give it another day or so. I am going to sleep for a little while and hope someone has an easy answer. I'll be back around 3:am.

Thank You
Joe

lepht · 03-08-2009, 02:48 PM

Joe - don't get disheartened, bro, we're here to help. in case you're not already, you can run Windows and Linux at the same time - you don't have to move directly to Linux before you're ready to move away from Vista or whatever. the terminal is like this:

username@computername - currentlocation

then it waits for you to type commands.

so in your case it's showing that the terminal is open for user Joe on the computer LinuxCompaq; the location is a dash thing that represents your home directory (think of the symbol as a shortcut for /home/joe/.)

so start me off with the basics. open up a terminal and type:

su -

then enter your root password, and type:

lspcmcia

and post what it tells you. then we can get cracking. Broadcomm wireless can work under Fedora Core, i promise you, and i'll do my level best to get it to - i've had enough wireless heartache that i don't want it to put another user off Linux altogether.

L