Hello. I posted here earlier in the week, and was helped by the people in this forum. So, to return the favor, I'm posting the steps I took to get my Linksys WMP54G wireless adapter working.

Ndiswrapper did not work for me.... But, there is an alternative-- Ralink technology. It offers an open-source driver for the rt2500 chipset; MUCH easier to load than ndiswrapper. You can find it here.

http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/

This comes along with a great configuration gui.

I'm running Mandrake linux 10, but this link will show you how to configure with other flavors of linux.

http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/wiki/index.php/HOWTOS

The tutorials are for the 2400 chipset, but it's pretty much the same.

My 2500 tutorial for Mandrake:
---------------------------------------

****Before doing anything make sure you have all your firewalls disabled.
Wow, if only I remembered!

1.) make sure you have the kernel source installed on your system
It's located in /usr/src/linux (you might want to get up to date on your patches if you don't have a recent kernel)
# rpm -qa | grep kernel
kernel-2.6.3.7mdk-1-1mdk
kernel-source-2.6.3-7mdk

My system kept on freezing after a few minutes of being online. The solution: linuxant provides their own custom kernel to work around the
4k stack issue on their website.


2.) save the driver's source file to /usr/src

3.) get the latest qt packages:
#rpm -qa | grep qt
libqt3-3.2.3-19.2.100mdk
qt3-common-3.2.3-19.2.100mdk
qt3-example-3.2.3-19.2.100mdk
libqt3-devel-3.2.3-19.2.100mdk

4.)Make sure you have the following link:
#ls -l /lib/modules/2.6.3-7mdk


5.)compile the module:
#cd /usr/src/rt200-1.1.0/Module
#make
#make install

6.) now go back a directory to the Utilitys directory
#qmake -o Makefile raconfig2500.pro
#make

7.) Type in the ip address of your router into the address bar of your browser. This will give you all the info you will need to correctly fill in the variables to come.

8.) install the wireless-tools package to your computer.

9.) add the following to /etc/rc.local at the bottom before touch/var/lock/subsys/local:
#insmod /usr/src/rt2500-1.1.0/Module/rt2500.o
#iwconfig ra0 mode managed
#iwconfig ra0 channel 6
#iwconfig ra0 key off
#ifconfig ra0 up
#dhclient ra0

10.)/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-ra0 should look like this (create this
if it's not already there)

DEVICE=ra0
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
ONBOOT=yes
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
DHCP_HOSTNAME=
IPADDR=
DOMAIN=
HWADDR=xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx (this can be obtained from iwconfig)
USERCTL=yes
PEERDNS=yes
GATEWAY=192.168.1.1
TYPE=Wireless
IPV6INIT=no
ESSID="linksys" (in my case)
CHANNEL=6 or whatever your using
MODE=Managed or Ad-Hoc
RATE=Auto
KEY=xxxx-xxxx-xx (you don't have to use a key, but it's a good idea)


11.)reboot your computer
Everything should work when you start up.
But if all else fails, use /usr/src/rt2500-1.1.0/Utilitys/RaConfig2500.
Try pinging your router........use lspci.........ifconfig..............

Good luck
regards--
Patrick Chirdon

Just a couple things I noticed:

Anytime you add modules to the kernel you should run depmod, so Step #5 should be.

5.)compile the module:
#cd /usr/src/rt200-1.1.0/Module
#make
#make install
#depmod -a

9.) add the following to /etc/rc.local at the bottom before touch/var/lock/subsys/local:
#insmod /usr/src/rt2500-1.1.0/Module/rt2500.o
#iwconfig ra0 mode managed
#iwconfig ra0 channel 6
#iwconfig ra0 key off
#ifconfig ra0 up
#dhclient ra0

Modprobe is a better choice than insmod. Since you did make install in step #5, that would put the rt2500.ko module in the directory;
/lib/modules/<kernel-ver>/kernel/drivers/net/wireless
That also modifies the file /etc/modules.conf so you could replace the insmod command above with this:
modprobe ra0
or
modprobe rt2500

I am following the above instructions and am stuck at step 6. Whenever I type qmake in the utilitys directory, I get a return of command not found. I am running Mandrake 10.1 kernel 2.6.8.1-10mdksmp. Is it on one of the three disks or how should I go about getting and installing qmake?

I don't think the sourceforge driver works with a SMP kernel, at least I read that on their site. Don't know enough to tell you how to get qmake to work, unless your just not SU'ed. I installed Mandrake 10.2 RC2 and had to get some of the rpm's nessesary (qt3 stuff, kernel source) off a "Cooker" ftp.
ftp://mirrors.secsup.org/pub/linux/m...86/media/main/

hope this helps, AkBrian

Whenever I type qmake in the utilitys directory, I get a return of command not found.

You need to install qt3-dev-tools.

Hi, I've got a c54ri wireless card. Of course, Conceptronic did't give even a piece of advice which could help me to connect to the net. So I've been surfing on the web (thanks god google exist) in order to download a driver for my card. I've download one from railink.com (or something like that) called rt2500 v.1.4.4.0 (I think). (rt2500 is supposed to be the chip of my card). After lots of hours and efford I've installed it and an utility which is included to configure the net...
Well, it seems to work. My mandrake "knows" I've got an rt2500 wireless card and it detects the router should be connected to (it detects his MAC). And It also detects the lan net ...
I can connect my pc to the lan net...
BUT, when the system says to me that I'm connected using the wireless card, I'm not. I'm not able to connect to any web, I'm not able to make a "ping" to my router or even to other computers which "works" with Windows. I'm tired and I don't have any idea of what to do.
Sorry for my English. Greetings: DAVID

ok i was able to do everything until step 8, I am using suse and there is no file rc.local in /etc. Need some help here where do i put that info if there aint no file. I made the ifcfg-ra0 file in /etc/sysconfig/network

Any help would be appreciated.

davidmr

Make sure you turn off WEP and any other encription until you get everything working. Also turn off any firewall you may have running. Once you get everything working properly then you can turn on any firewall and WEP.

Also make sure you have your DNS IP numbers set correctly.

Post the results of these three commands:

lsmod

iwconfig

and

ifconfig

gfreire

I think the suse equivalent of rc.local is boot.local.

Eh Mom, with no wires! :P
Thanks man, it was the firewall.
I thougth I didn't have to configure the firewall because i think I didn't need it when I first used the non wireless card and I hadn't realised that it is another "conection", so, without your help I wouldn't have been able to manage it. Thanks a lot. bye