New to Linux - can't get my wireless to work

English Hardware
1

I just got a Dell Latitude E6500. I was able to install OpenSUSE 11 as part of a dual-boot system by following a tutorial on this site, but have been unable to get my wireless card to be recognized, and have minor problems with my graphics card.

After some research, it seemed as though I needed to update my kernel from 2.6.25 to 2.6.27 to get proper driver support for my Intel 5100 wireless card. This was not easy, I had to get my cousin to perform the patch update and it took him a few hours. Even though he got it updated, my wireless is still not recognized and my cousin keeps saying things about repositories not working and ndiswrapper “not being there”.

i have little experience with linux, but i am trying to make the shift from windows. this is quite a learning curve. what should i do? i don’t know any code.

2

The way ahead depends a bit on which wireless card you have. Which one (look at the literature in the pdf(?) that came with the laptop). And also, what is the response that you get in a console window to these two commands:

sudo /sbin/lspci | grep thernet

and

sudo /sbin/lspci -n

Use copy/paste to return the results here.

PS: first post I notice. Welcome to the Forums

3

hey, thank you for your response. well, it isnt so easy copy/pasting into a command prompt, since i can’t use my wireless. i will migrate to a LAN connection in a moment and try, though.

i talked to my cousin again. he thinks that i shouldnt rely on the kernel patch to fix my problem because, well, it obviously didnt work. he thinks that i should reinstall opensuse from a DVD (i used a CD). he says that since ndiswrapper isnt present on my system, that it makes it hard to just use the windows drivers for my hardware on linux. does this sound about right?

i will try that code that you gave me, and i will post what the computer spits back out. but all these codes and such make me uneasy, as i dont understand them, and ive already watched my cousin sit at the command terminal for a few hours. there must surely be an easier way, right? do you think the idea of reinstalling suse from DVD and using ndiswrapper to get my drivers working is good?

btw, the hardware in question is…

Dell Wireless 1397 802.11b/g Mini Card

and some slight issues with my…

NVIDIA Quadro NVS 160M

4

in response to the first line of code:

00:19.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82567LM Gigabit Network Connection (rev 03)

response to second line of code:

00:00.0 0600: 8086:2a40 (rev 07)
00:01.0 0604: 8086:2a41 (rev 07)
00:19.0 0200: 8086:10f5 (rev 03)
00:1a.0 0c03: 8086:2937 (rev 03)
00:1a.1 0c03: 8086:2938 (rev 03)
00:1a.2 0c03: 8086:2939 (rev 03)
00:1a.7 0c03: 8086:293c (rev 03)
00:1b.0 0403: 8086:293e (rev 03)
00:1c.0 0604: 8086:2940 (rev 03)
00:1c.1 0604: 8086:2942 (rev 03)
00:1c.2 0604: 8086:2944 (rev 03)
00:1c.3 0604: 8086:2946 (rev 03)
00:1d.0 0c03: 8086:2934 (rev 03)
00:1d.1 0c03: 8086:2935 (rev 03)
00:1d.2 0c03: 8086:2936 (rev 03)
00:1d.7 0c03: 8086:293a (rev 03)
00:1e.0 0604: 8086:2448 (rev 93)
00:1f.0 0601: 8086:2917 (rev 03)
00:1f.2 0104: 8086:282a (rev 03)
00:1f.3 0c05: 8086:2930 (rev 03)
01:00.0 0300: 10de:06eb (rev a1)
03:01.0 0607: 1180:0476 (rev ba)
03:01.1 0c00: 1180:0832 (rev 04)
03:01.2 0805: 1180:0822 (rev 21)
03:01.3 0880: 1180:0843 (rev ff)
0c:00.0 0280: 14e4:4315 (rev 01)

5

what does -n do? i looked up the other commands.

6

Hi
Have a look at the man page :slight_smile:


man lspci

Options to control resolving ID's to names

-n     Show  PCI  vendor and device codes as numbers instead of
looking them up in the PCI ID list.

-nn    Show PCI vendor and device codes as both numbers and
names.

–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
openSUSE 11.0 x86 Kernel 2.6.25.18-0.1-default
up 9:21, 2 users, load average: 0.00, 0.03, 0.11
GPU GeForce 6600 TE/6200 TE - Driver Version: 177.80

7

I have made a mistake. This command: “sudo /sbin/lspci | grep therenet” is for wired ethernet devices and some wireless devices. It has missed your device. Please instead paste here the response to the full command which is:

sudo /sbin/lspci

I hope to get from it the chip for the wireless card. From “lspci -n” I can match that to the PCI ID for the card. From both of these pieces of information I can see whether ndiswrapper or madwifi or native drivers is the way to proceed (I hope).

So please supply the missing info from lspci as above.

8

I didn’t know about “-nn”. Very nice. Thanks for the info. From now on I will use that instead of asking OPs to provide both “lspci” and “lspci -n”.

9

I’m about to try out that new line of code you sent me. One quick update though, it appears that even my LAN connection is not recognized when i boot with my patched kernel, ver 2.6.27. Luckily I saved the old one, 2.6.25. When I boot with my updated kernel, I get a big blob of “fatal” error messages. I’ll try to get a closer look next time I boot.

Ok, now for the code…

sudo /sbin/lspci

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Cantiga Memory Controller Hub (rev 07)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Cantiga PCI Express Graphics Port (rev 07)
00:19.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82567LM Gigabit Network Connection (rev 03)
00:1a.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 03)
00:1a.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #5 (rev 03)
00:1a.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #6 (rev 03)
00:1a.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #2 (rev 03)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 03)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 2 (rev 03)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 3 (rev 03)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 4 (rev 03)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 03)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 03)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 03)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #1 (rev 03)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev 93)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation ICH9M-E LPC Interface Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.2 RAID bus controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 82801 SATA RAID Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 03)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation Device 06eb (rev a1)
03:01.0 CardBus bridge: Ricoh Co Ltd RL5c476 II (rev ba)
03:01.1 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller (rev 04)
03:01.2 SD Host controller: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C822 SD/SDIO/MMC/MS/MSPro Host Adapter (rev 21)
03:01.3 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C843 MMC Host Controller (rev ff)
0c:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4310 USB Controller (rev 01)

10

I’m also interested in figuring out how to get the desktop cube feature to work. When I go to turn 3-D acceleration on, the option is greyed out so that I can’t change it. I guess that means SUSE isn’t recognizing my graphics card properly. If anyone knows about this, help would be greatly appreciated.

I’m enjoying this. Linux just FEELS better.

11

just bumping this, hoping for a response.

12

Looks like I fell off the distribution for this thread.

According to lwfinger, on this link, ndiswrapper drivers work for your card. I can’t check that ATM on the ndiswrapper compatibility lists because those lists have fallen off the Net. But lwfinger should know.

Here’s a tutorial for installing ndiswrapper:
Madwifi or Ndiswrapper Wireless Network Drivers - Suse/openSUSE 10, 11 - LAN & Internet access
Ignore the parts about madwifi.

After installation, go into Yast and configure the card as described in the tutorial.

13

wow, you linked me to a very informative thread. i will try the things suggested and post back.

14

ok, I’m the cuz that was trying to help work through this problem…

we had essentially gotten to the point where we knew we needed ndiswrapper, but ran into the following problems…

first: YaST2 software management did not turn up an ndiswrapper via simple query. at this point I was beginning to worry that we hadn’t the proper repositories, though I was unable to quickly find a list of the standard repositories anywhere without too much trouble…

second: it seemed the uname -a command was returning a 64-bit version, although there are some 32-bit softwares installed, and it would ask for a huge dependency change (900+) in order to switch architectures to 64 when attempting to install a version of ndiswrapper (that seemed more like an interface to the prog, but we were assuming ndiswrapper would be a dependency of such).

we had also pursued upgrading the kernel, which we accomplished by creating a new section in GRUB to boot to optionally whilst leaving the standard kernel in place. lo and behold we found no better luck with the .27 version of the kernel.

I should state that the other half of the problem was detecting the proper video card… I have terrible phone connection problems and have still been unable to get the exact specs on the card other than it having been an nvidia chipset. The nvidia one-click install failed as we have been having repository issues as well…

so here are the questions:

from which repository could ndiswrapper be obtained? we have been quite unsuccessful in compiling our own version from the ndiswrapper page… plenty of errors with make (although make needed installed before we could get to that point).
however, on my 11.0 at home I am easily able to find it in YaST (i believe the standard OSS repo).

if we use the ndiswrapper solution, assuming of course we could get ndiswrapper to work (sudo yast -i ndiswrapper FAILED because of repositories?), I am to understand that we needn’t change the kernel, and we could safely remove the option from grub and delete the kernel from /boot ??

secondly, I’m still a bit worried about our hybrid 32/64 bit installation… I didn’t think it was possible, honestly, but I’m quite sure it’s a 64-bit system, and have suggested doing a clean install using a 64-bit DVD instead of the LiveCD that was used. (There also seemed to be 2 swap partitions @ 2GB, where since he had 2 GB of RAM I wanted just 1 @ 4GB… but we cannot seem to consolidate them as they are positioned before the / and /home partitions…)

Additionally, would you have a basic list of repos (obviously we could include the nvidia repo) that should be included in a standard 11.0 install? I only use packman occasionally, so I tend to remove it again once I get what I need… but there isn’t a chance there’s a version of ndiswrapper there that would be viable?

lastly: am I missing something here:

I issued a su to root, and then accessed SaX using the “-r” parameter, though we’re still unable to get anything but the “Standard Framebuffer Driver” which unfortunately does not support 3d acceleration.

**so here our our goals… **

1.) wireless access to his internet (even if we HAVE to use ndiswrapper to grab his vista driver for his broadcom wireless card…)

2.) Hardware 3d acceleration (so we can see the CUBES when we switch desktops!) – even if we have to trick X11 into using a different driver…

I can clarify anything as stated here as I’m working side by side with DJChopin… honestly though, I wasn’t past just doing a fresh install to verify all the settings on the way in… We actually have about 9 partitions on the primary hdd currently… :’(

Thanks in advance…

  • polarysekt
    (Linux Counter #462144)
15

from which repository could ndiswrapper be obtained? we have been quite unsuccessful in compiling our own version from the ndiswrapper page… plenty of errors with make (although make needed installed before we could get to that point).
however, on my 11.0 at home I am easily able to find it in YaST (i believe the standard OSS repo).

These are the repositories you need:
openSUSE 11 oss
openSUSE 11 non-oss
Packman
Once you have those you can turn off the DVD as a “repository”

if we use the ndiswrapper solution, assuming of course we could get ndiswrapper to work (sudo yast -i ndiswrapper FAILED because of repositories?)

Use Yast –> Software –> Software Management to install the two RPMs for ndiswrapper. NB I said two RPMs. See the tutorial I linked in to see which RPMs.

I am to understand that we needn’t change the kernel, and we could safely remove the option from grub and delete the kernel from /boot ??

Lost me there.

secondly, I’m still a bit worried about our hybrid 32/64 bit installation… I didn’t think it was possible, honestly, but I’m quite sure it’s a 64-bit system, and have suggested doing a clean install using a 64-bit DVD instead of the LiveCD that was used. (There also seemed to be 2 swap partitions @ 2GB, where since he had 2 GB of RAM I wanted just 1 @ 4GB… but we cannot seem to consolidate them as they are positioned before the / and /home partitions…)

Good idea – rub out all partitions, start again. Is there any partition before windows or is windows the first?
List of repositories here:
Package Repositories - openSUSE
and here:
Additional YaST Package Repositories - openSUSE
IIRC you can turn the ones you want (or most of them) on in Yast –> Software –> Software Repositories –> Add –> Community Repositories

I issued a su to root, and then accessed SaX using the “-r” parameter, though we’re still unable to get anything but the “Standard Framebuffer Driver” which unfortunately does not support 3d acceleration.

Ask nvidia questions in hardware forum – better answers there. Maybe see what happens if you reinstall.

16

all good info, although now i think i have two distinct options that are being presented?

  1. get rid of linux and reinstall it

or

  1. try to download those repositories

which one should i do?

if this “hybrid installation” is going to be a problem in the future, i might as well just reinstall i think. in that case, im not exactly sure how to do it. i can download, burn and get into the install program, but im not sure what to do to manage all these partitions.

to answer your question, windows is the second to last option on the GRUB screen.

17

Reinstall Linux.
Don’t update the kernel for proper driver support. That’s not relevant for Ndiswrapper which is supported well.

To handle the partitions you need to get rid of the Linux partitions and start again. Boot into windows and go to Control Panel – Admin tools/Computer management –> storage/disk management. There you’ll see the partitions lined up as picture icons in the lower panel. The Linux partitions are labelled “Unknown”. You can delete them by a right-click –> delete

Then install and get the repositories correct as discussed earlier and install ndiswrapper (two RPMs) as per the tutorial I referenced earlier.

Luck

18

thanks again for the response swerdna. well, i went to download the DVD iso last night, some annoying fluke while clicking to check on the progress ended the download at about 83%. sigh

so tonight im going to try again. my cousin convinced me to go the 32-bit route (even though my comp is 64-bit) because he thinks that i may run into more compatibility issues than i would care for with a 64-bit. is this true? it sounds counterintuitive to install something that isnt tailored to my hardware, but at the same time, i definitely am running out of patience with all the tweakings ive had to do.

if i dont hear back from anyone, i will go ahead and start my 32-bit download, via bittorrent, a little later tonight.

thank you for the advice about dealing with the partitions, you were one step ahead of me again : )

19

btw, im going to be using bittorent to avoid the possibility of being unable to resume my download if it were to get interrupted, as it did last night. is this method as reliable as using a standard HTTP download?

i am going to be running my first md5checksum or whatever once the download is finished. not really too certain of what that is or does or whether or not i could get away with not doing it?

20

Always best to do an MD5 checksum, it ensures the download was successful & there are no errors,even though using torrents, some don’t do an MD5 on the download.Fortunately, Bittorrent does

Andy