Wireless Network Card Problems

Hello,

I have spent several hours trying to configure a wireless card on my new laptop (compaq presario with a AR5006EG card). I tried using madwifi, but then went to ndiswrapper after googling the card and seeing that it was sometimes mislabeled and could be a AR5007EG.

Anyway, the same Windows driver works for both apparently, but I can't get the card to work with the ndiswrapper tutorials that I've found. I have Suse 10.3 with gnome. Here's what I've done:

I have downloaded the driver I think I need from the website of the company that makes the card (Atheros). They have options for XP and Vista, and I arbitrarily chose XP. I put the zip file in my /tmp directory, unzip, and end up with seemingly two drivers: two .inf files, two .sys files, and two .cat files.

I run (as root):

ndiswrapper -l

and make sure that no drivers are installed.

then

ndiswrapper -i file.inf
ndiswrapper -m (not sure what this does)
modprobe ndiswrapper (this either)

At this point I run:

dmesg

and it spits out a bunch of information. Near the end of the log are some errors saying that my wireless device is not set up correctly. However, I don't know if this is being updated because when I run ndiswrapper -m it says that it's already done. So I'm wondering if the first driver was wrong, but now I can't remove it completely to try new ones.

Can anyone please help?? I currently have an expensive paper weight until I fix this!

Thanks.

-John

have a scan through my personal mini how-to on using ndiswrapper http://stuntmanandy.no-ip.biz/Howto%27s.html it's helped a few people & may help you. or, you could follow andrew18's very good how-to found here http://www.andrewd18.com/ndiswrapper/ any other problems, just post

Andy

have a scan through my personal mini how-to on using ndiswrapper http://stuntmanandy.no-ip.biz/Howto%27s.html it's helped a few people & may help you. or, you could follow andrew18's very good how-to found here http://www.andrewd18.com/ndiswrapper/ any other problems, just post

Andy
[/b]

Alright, I tried those tutorials and still no luck. When I type iwconfig I get

lo no wireless extensions

eth0 no wireless extensions

when you unzip it you may want to save it to somewhere in /home, since /tmp gets cleared on most systems, depending on your setup. also, are the .sys files etc stored in the same folder?

when you unzip it you may want to save it to somewhere in /home, since /tmp gets cleared on most systems, depending on your setup. also, are the .sys files etc stored in the same folder?
[/b]

I have verified that they are not deleted from /tmp - at least for as long as I need them. I do have the .sys files in the same directory.

I tried using madwifi and the process is much simpler, but it still didn't work. I need to find out if I have the wireless card Suse is telling me I have. Apparently linux can become confused because it does not look at all of the information supplied with the card and can report the incorrect model. If anyone has any experience with madwifi, I would appreciate some help.

After running madwifi, I get the report that symbols or characters are not understood or expected. Not sure what that means yet...

a few questions i still have which i can't find on the thread, is your card usb or pcmcia? if usb enter on a console (su to root first)

lsusb -v

or if pcmcia try

lspci -v

that will tell you the card.

now, to ensure you have the exact same driver as what you have in windows you could re-download them on windows and install them to see if they work there; or, what i did on my pc with a belkin wireless card i plugged in, i went to C:/program files/belkin.... and found the folder which found the right drivers. because if the drivers are the same which work in windows chances are they should work under ndiswrapper. i have no experience with madwifi so can't advise on that, but used ndiswrapper a little a while ago. just double check the drivers are the exact same as what you have for windows and you are installing the same .inf file. follow the exact steps from deltaflyers howto and you should be ok. i'm far from a wireless guru, but i know a small bit. but for those who know more please post the output of one of the above commands (depending which it is), and then we may be able to check that drivers we might try and use for it are the same as yours.

Ross.

edit: also check your yast set up is correct. with module name entered correctly (ndiswrapper) if my memory serves me correctly, but you may want to double check.

edit again: what does 'ndiswrapper -l' (without quotation marks) give you after installing the driver? is it correct?

Alright, I tried those tutorials and still no luck. When I type iwconfig I get

lo no wireless extensions

eth0 no wireless extensions
[/b]

looks from here you haven't set the card up in yast...? :blink:

looks from here you haven't set the card up in yast...? :blink:
[/b]

I thought it was neither USB or PCMCIA. Here's a link to the one I think I have (I'm not on my laptop right now so I can't run the commands you recommended). I'm pretty sure it is the one described in the link though.

http://www.atheros.com/pt/AR5007EG.htm

Do I set it up in Yast before running ndiswrapper?

Thanks for your help btw.

One more thing that I found interesting. I tried using www.linuxant.com to get my wireless working also with no success. The website allows you to upload your Windows drivers, detects your cards, and installs drivers. I tried several drivers and for each one it couldn't detect the correct device.

As far as I know wireless capabilities are always off on my laptop since linux doesn't yet recognize the button that turns it on. Could this be causing a problem? Yast seems to at least have a good guess as to what kind of card it is though. So confusing.

it's a pci card, same type as what i had in my desktop. the device should have come with a cd with the drivers on? do you have dual boot with windows, your posts above suggest this is the case? if so is there a folder in program files called atheros or something like that? as my belkin card has /program files/belkin/driver and behold, in there were the correct drivers i needed. what you could do is, if you still have the disc, reinstall the drivers and take a note of where they are being saved to? this way you can just copy them from windows drive to somewhere in /home (personally i would advise against storing in /tmp, but that's just my opinion) once you have them drivers you could then follow the tutorial that andy (deltaflyer) gave you and all should be well. you do all the ndiswrapper commands THEN add a wireless card in yast. if stuck i suggest follow the howto on his site, then after the ndiswrapper then come back and either i or someone else can try to guide you through the next steps. but the most important bit is (obviously) getting the right drivers. then ndiswrapper -l will tell you if the correct drivers are installed and the hardware is present. if that fails, you may need to check if your card is compatible with suse under ndiswrapper. i suspect it should be. i have no knowledge of using atheros cards so i can only go by what i experienced with my belkin card.

no need to post the lsusb or lspci outputs now, as i know its a pci card.

good luck, and please come back with any more questions if you get stuck.

Ross.