ndiswrapper / modprobe / wireless networking help
 

Alright, I got a Compaq Presario 2200 laptop, with a built-in Broadcom Wireless NIC, and have a dual boot WinXP / Fedora Core 3 setup.

I've managed to install ndiswrapper, downloaded an XP driver, and installed it using ndiswrapper. When I list the installed drivers, it lists it saying Driver Present, indicating there is no error.

Then I type 'ndiswrapper -m' and got an alias and all that. But when I move onto the next step and type 'modprobe ndiswrapper' I get an error, saying "ndiswrapper module not found". Or something like that.

Now, I've been reading just about every post on this web site that even has the word "Wireless" in it, trying to figure this problem out, and I see that when I type 'ndiswrapper -l' and it lists my driver, it's also supposed to say "Hardware Detected" -- Which mine does not. Well, I figure it's probably because my NIC isn't enabled (the LED is not lit). I'm sure all this is related somehow or another. Well, on my laptop, I've got a little button underneath the LED that I can push to enable / disable my wireless NIC, which works great in Windoz, but does nothing but flash my hard drive LED in Linux.

Anywayz, if anyone has any suggestions they would be greatly greatly appreciated.

First off, welcome to LQ. Now on to the troubles. The modprobe error is somewhat disturbing because if it is true, something went horribly wrong. Use lsmod to list the modules and see if the error is true or if it is throwing an error just to be a pain. If you don't see the module, you may as well take another crack at compiling ndiswrapper because you won't get any farther any other way. If the module isn't there, that might also explain the lack of the Hardware Detected message.

I don't know if it will help, but I had a similar issue (and am still having other issues with ndiswrapper) but modprobe gave me issues with locating it because windows had tainted the source with CR+LF's (during one of my many poking arounds) . When I extracted the tar in linux and did make install, it detected it fine.

ok what version of ndiswrapper? did u make sure the /lib/modules/<kernel version>/modules/build points to the kernel source you are compiling module for? (it says can't find/locate module)

about the button to disable/enable wireless check if anything in dmesg pops up after turning on and off (just a suggestion)