Wireless w/Realtek 8185 chipset
 

Hi all,

First, My Hardware (pretty standard stuff):
Abit KV7-V (VIA KT-600 chipset), Athlon 2900, 1 GB PC-3200 RAM
20 GB Maxtor 5400 RPM, Mandriva 2006 Retail and Windows 98SE
Toshiba/Samsung TS-H552U burner
ATI All-In-Wonder 9200 (theater 200 TV capture chip not set up yet)
350W ATX PS (PC Power and Cooling)


I'm trying to get the PCI CompUSA 802.11 B/G wireless card to work (Realtek 8185 chip). Mandriva Linux Control Center (Network & Internet) flashed *_VERY_* fast messages. Going to a console screen, "mcc" (and modprobe and insmod) tell me that the module r8180 does not exist (probably because the card didn't exist at the time of the Mandriva install). Choosing depmod -a doesn't create the module either. So I thought I would have to use an ndiswrapper solution.

I installed ndiswrapper and pointed it to the XP driver on my CD (this chip not on sourceforge's list). When I boot, here are the relevant lines from dmesg, numbered for your convenience:

1) NET: Registered protocol family 17
2) ndiswrapper version 1.2 loaded (preempt=no,smp=no)
3) ndiswrapper: driver net 8185 (Realtek,05/05/2005,5.102.0504.2005) loaded
4) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKD] enabled at IRQ 12
5) PCI: setting IRQ 12 as level-triggered
6) ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:0b.0[A] -> Link [LNKD] -> GSI 12 (level,low) -> IRQ 12
7) ndiswrapper: using IRQ 12
8) wlan0: ndiswrapper ethernet device 00:0e:2e:71:35:ab using driver net8185, configuration file 10ec:8185.5.conf
9) wlan0: encryption modes supported: WEP, WPA with TKIP, WPA with AES/CCMP

After the message "Press 'I' to enter interactive startup", I see various things start up, including the following:

sit0: [OK]
wlan0: [OK]
wlandetect [OK]

I confirmed that the module ndiswrapper is loaded.
Also, /proc/net/wireless does in fact exist


My observations:

1) The output of lspci confirms device 00:0b.0 is the PCI card in question (line 6 above)
2) "lspci -n" gives the device code 10ec:8185, which we see in line 8 above.

When I start KDE, the symbol in the system tray that looks like a "plug" (one male and one female parallel port connectors) simply won't plug in, even when I right click and tell it to connect wlan0.

When I click on "configure the network", I think I've chosen correct settings. I'll try to come up with them in the next few days. When I go into "Mandriva Linux Control Center" and click on "Wireless", there is something there (it used to tell me "you don't have an interface, you need to set one up first" or something).


First, can anyone help me with depmod? I feel really stupid because it won't work.

Second, does line 9 mean that I *_MUST_* use encryption?

Third, can ndiswrapper work? I get the feeling I am so, very close to succeeding. On some level, the chips *_are_* detected. And yet I am so far away.

Thanks in advance for all your help.

Lots of mandriva users have had sucsess using the following how-to.
http://www.linuxfordummies.org/index.php?topic=96.0
Hope it works for you as well.

How to delete stuff w/out nuking partition?
 

Thank you for the suggestion, but I need help to make it work.

The tutorial tells me to remove Mandriva's ndiswrapper, and to make sure it is all gone (it wasn't).

Many files were left, and could not be removed, like these:

/sys/module/ndiswrapper/*
/sys/class/misc/ndiswrapper/*
/sys/bus/pci/drivers/ndiswrapper/*


This is *_MY_* system and I am root. Root means I can delete ANYTHING I WANT. and I'm really pissed when my system doesn't obey me.

I tried ls -la, thinking maybe root had to be part of bin group, wheel group, or adm group. Nope, these remnants are owner root and group root.

I cannot delete the files or copy them to *.bak files, even after I use "chmod a+x", "chmod a+r", and "chmod a+w. Most perplexing.

Can anybody help me delete these remnants? When Windows says a file is in use, and thus cannot be deleted (i.e. spyware), I reboot into safe mode or use Linux to mount my FAT32 partition, and delete at will. But AFAIK Linux has no such restriction. If a file is in RAM and on the hard drive, I can delete the one on the drive. This one has me stumped. I read somewhere that Linux has a "read-only" bit that is different from -drwxrwxrwx, but cannot find it.

Do I need to boot from a rescue CD or DVD to delete these files? I'll try that next.

This is no longer about getting wireless to work. Just like when I beat cancer last year, this is about getting control back, even if I have to nuke half my install.

Please help me figure this out.

Update
 

Okay, it looks like the /sys is similar to /proc or /dev.

I thought my router ($2.99 after rebates at CompUSA, 1/1/2006) was trash. But someone suggested releasing the lease, so I did so (then shutting Win98 down). I rebooted into Linux, and the wired portion works. I'll probably put the router on a UPS, so the lease isn't lost if the power dies unexpectedly.

Would have been nice if they would have told me to release the lease in the documentation, but they didn't. It has been a rough 24 hours, but at least the wired portion works once again.

I've got 2 or three boxes I'm working on for friends right now (A/V, new harddrive). I have to put the wireless project on the back burner for now, but I'll be back.