Inspiron 5100 and Truemobile 1300

jeffman12 · 06-06-2004, 12:40 AM

Hey,
I have just been working on getting linux installed on my Dell Inspiron 5100 laptop. Everything is working, but I have some questions about using the TrueMobile 1300 internal mini-pci card and the ndiswrapper program. I followed the instructions and I am able to get it working. However, I am now trying to make it stay on after a reboot, but I can't edit the modprobe.conf file or make a new folder in the lib directory. I know it has something to do with me being able to use the root account, but I'm not sure how to create and edit text files in the terminal.

Also, does someone have a sample code of their modprobe.conf that i could look at?

I also have a question about speeding up boot times when the ethernet cable is unplugged. Right now if the ethernet cable is unplugged, it hangs on "initiating eth0" or whatever the command is, and then fails. If there away to skip this during the boot up, if you know the cable is unplugged?

Thanks for the help!

Hangdog42 · 06-06-2004, 07:59 AM

I'm typing this on the same rig you've got........

I swiped some code I saw elsewhere and created a file in my /etc/rc.d that I call from rc.inet1. I do it before eth0 is set up and I don't have a delay waiting for the system to boot. Using this, the card comes up on boot every time.

Here is the code I use

Code:

#!/bin/sh
   #
   # rc.wlan0
   #

   #CHANNEL=_
   ESSID="DomainNameHere"
   INTERFACE="wlan0"
   KEY="WEPKeyHere"
   MODE="Managed"
   NETMASK="255.255.255.0"

   #Load the module
   echo "Loading NDISWRAPPER"
   /sbin/modprobe ndiswrapper

   # Set up the WiFi card

   echo "Configuring ${INTERFACE}:"
   /usr/sbin/iwconfig ${INTERFACE} essid ${ESSID}
   #/usr/sbin/iwconfig ${INTERFACE} channel ${CHANNEL}
   /usr/sbin/iwconfig ${INTERFACE} mode ${MODE}
   /usr/sbin/iwconfig ${INTERFACE} key ${KEY}

   # Get IP address from dhcp

   /sbin/dhcpcd -t 10 -d wlan0

   # Bring up interface - I'm not sure if this is necessary, 
   # but it doesn't hurt

   ifconfig wlan0 up

jeffman12 · 06-06-2004, 02:06 PM

Thanks.

Before you replied I had found a website showing how to make a program that you can call to start the wifi card.

A little off topic though, what are the commands for releasing and renewing ip's for network devices and how do you disable enable the network devices. ie. Turn eth0 off while using wlan0.

Thanks

Hangdog42 · 06-06-2004, 02:51 PM

You can turn off network devices with the ifconfig command:

ifconfig eth0 down (or up if you want to turn it on)

Some distros have a shorthand version, ifdown (and ifup)

ifdown eth0

I don't think either of them actually power down the device, but they do make them unavailable to other programs.

As far as renewing the IP address, I think (emphasis on think) that Mandrake uses the dhclient command. Slackware uses dhcpcd, which is why I'm not sure about Mandrake.

jeffman12 · 06-06-2004, 02:59 PM

Thanks, those commands worked for Mandrake.