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Ndiswrapper the easy Debian way...

Share your HowTo, Documentation, Tips and Tricks. Not for support questions!.
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uBaLd
Posts: 58
Joined: 2008-02-25 23:13

#31 Post by uBaLd »

Where is the howto ??

By the way is it normal that beafor installing my 2 drivers ther was nothing ??

Oh if I delete the driver alternative how i do that and where i find it ??
I tried

Code: Select all

ndiswrapper -e ipw2200
Sory too not enderstand your help !

Other quertion ? Wath is the
loop
sbp2
in the /etc/modules file ???
It says above that you might ave too edit the file !!??? How ??

hkoster1
Posts: 1264
Joined: 2006-12-18 10:10

#32 Post by hkoster1 »

Where are the moderators, now that they're needed... :evil:
Real Debian users don't do chat...

ouwe_man
Posts: 13
Joined: 2008-05-10 18:10

#33 Post by ouwe_man »

Dear mr. Koster,

I understand your frustrations but I myself am a newbee and very often pulling out my hair. Since 1980 I have used all types of DOS, Pascal and others but getting older also seems to make you hesitate more.

At the very beginning of your excellent HowTo you mention that it works for kernel 2.6.24-1 but I have net installed and updated to version 2.6.18-6-686. Logic tells me that my kernel is older then the one you are talking about.

I have lost a lot of time in UBUNTU 8.04 and decided this afternoon to go to DEBIAN, mostly because of your HowTo....

My broadcom BCM4306 rev 3 is mounted on a Linksys WPC54BS pcmcia card and even the latest update for this driver seems to be the 3.100.64 (07/28/2005) and in the file they mention only 2K and less.

It is simple to try it out, blindly and see wat happens but i'm kind of tired of that.

Question: do you think your instructions will go for my setup?

Thanks
John Stap
1565 Calixa-Lavallee
Trois-Rivieres, QC
G8Y3G1 CANADA

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hellfire[bg]
Posts: 499
Joined: 2006-06-21 19:15
Location: Sliven, Bulgaria

#34 Post by hellfire[bg] »

What about the issues with the ssb module? How can it be solved with kernel 2.6.25? On my laptop the ssb module is preventing ndiswrapper from working properly hoever i cannot just blacklist it because i need it for my b44 ethernet card.
...to boldly go where no one has gone before...

hkoster1
Posts: 1264
Joined: 2006-12-18 10:10

#35 Post by hkoster1 »

hellfire[bg] wrote:What about the issues with the ssb module? How can it be solved with kernel 2.6.25? On my laptop the ssb module is preventing ndiswrapper from working properly hoever i cannot just blacklist it because i need it for my b44 ethernet card.
It's a matter of the order in which these modules are loaded, item 5. in the Howto gives some hints on how to accomplish that. Don't know if it works with kernel 2.6.25, you're on your own here, but please report back here if you get it to work. Good luck!
Real Debian users don't do chat...

hkoster1
Posts: 1264
Joined: 2006-12-18 10:10

#36 Post by hkoster1 »

ouwe_man wrote:Dear mr. Koster,
No need to be that formal here, old man...
...you mention that it works for kernel 2.6.24-1 but I have net installed and updated to version 2.6.18-6-686... My broadcom BCM4306 rev 3 is mounted on a Linksys WPC54BS pcmcia card and even the latest update for this driver seems to be the 3.100.64 (07/28/2005) and in the file they mention only 2K and less.
Question: do you think your instructions will go for my setup?
Wireless support is improving rapidly with each kernel version, and both b43 and b43legacy drivers are included in the 2.6.24 kernel, one of which will probably work in your case (you also need to install firmware). There have been several threads on that in these forums, the search function is your friend here.

Now, how to get the 2.6.24 kernel on your system? Easiest is to upgrade your stable version of Debian (Etch) to the testing version (Lenny), it is sufficiently stable in my opinion for newcomers to Debian like yourself. The current kernel in Lenny is indeed the 2.6.24 version. Another possibility is to check backports for the 2.6.24 kernel, or even download the 2.6.24 kernel sources from kernel.org and try and compile them yourself -- I don't actually recommend the latter to a newcomer.

When none of the above works you might consider installing the Windows driver in Ndiswrapper, as described in the Howto. The Win2K driver you mention should be OK for that purpose.

Please post in System Configuration if you have any further questions; post here if you find some new angle or omission not yet mentioned in the Howto. Good luck!
Real Debian users don't do chat...

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hellfire[bg]
Posts: 499
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Location: Sliven, Bulgaria

#37 Post by hellfire[bg] »

It's a matter of the order in which these modules are loaded, item 5. in the Howto gives some hints on how to accomplish that. Don't know if it works with kernel 2.6.25, you're on your own here, but please report back here if you get it to work. Good luck!
I finally managed to get my wlan card working with kernel 2.6.25 (it worked fine until 2.6.23 but i could not get it work with 2.6.24). What i did: i blacklisted b43 and b43legacy, uninstalled b43-fwcutter, completely removed the previously installed ndiswrapper and rebooted into the 2.6.25 kernel, then i installed ndiswrapper using module-assistant, crated the /usr/local/bin/wireless script and put a line pointing to it in /etc/rc.local. After i rebooted my wireless worked just fine. I had to modify the wireless script to my needs though:
#!/bin/sh
rmmod b44 ssb ndiswrapper
modprobe ndiswrapper
modprobe b44
I did this beacuse i have a broadcom ethernet card which actually causes the problems - it needs the ssb module and it conflicts with ndiswrapper. After that change my wlan card works. I have one question though - i read that kernel 2.6.25 was actually patched to solve the problem with ndiswrapper. Shouldn`t it work out of the box without hte need for such scripts? Also here is what network devices i have:
debian:/home/hellfire# lspci | grep Broadcom
06:01.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4401-B0 100Base-TX (rev 02)
06:02.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless LAN Controller (rev 02)
...to boldly go where no one has gone before...

ouwe_man
Posts: 13
Joined: 2008-05-10 18:10

#38 Post by ouwe_man »

Mr. Koster,

Finally I seem to have everything in order, thanks to your HowTo.

One thing that I would ask you to consider: for some one who just installed Lenny, it was not clear why the command m-a was not recognized.... A lot of research brought me to the apt-get install module-assistant....... I know, everyone should look around but when you write "ndiswrapper the easy Debian way" it could be even easier by mentionning this little oversight...

For the rest nothing but thanks.

John

hkoster1
Posts: 1264
Joined: 2006-12-18 10:10

#39 Post by hkoster1 »

ouwe_man wrote:Mr. Koster,

Finally I seem to have everything in order, thanks to your HowTo.
Great, but please stop with the formality. My favourite internet joke is about a dog sitting behind a terminal saying: "On the internet nobody knows you're a dog". Let's keep it that way.
One thing that I would ask you to consider: for some one who just installed Lenny, it was not clear why the command m-a was not recognized.... A lot of research brought me to the apt-get install module-assistant....... I know, everyone should look around but when you write "ndiswrapper the easy Debian way" it could be even easier by mentionning this little oversight...
You're right, I added module-assistant to be installed. And I changed apt-get to aptitude, as real Debian users should.
For the rest nothing but thanks.

John
Thank you.
Real Debian users don't do chat...

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hellfire[bg]
Posts: 499
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Location: Sliven, Bulgaria

#40 Post by hellfire[bg] »

BTW, it appears that ndiswrapper works with kernel 2.6.25-1 without the need for the wireless script described in the first page.
...to boldly go where no one has gone before...

hkoster1
Posts: 1264
Joined: 2006-12-18 10:10

#41 Post by hkoster1 »

hellfire[bg] wrote:BTW, it appears that ndiswrapper works with kernel 2.6.25-1 without the need for the wireless script described in the first page.
Yes, I gathered that; will adapt the Howto accordingly once 2.6.25 goes official in Lenny. Thanks for the heads-up.
Real Debian users don't do chat...

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hellfire[bg]
Posts: 499
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Location: Sliven, Bulgaria

#42 Post by hellfire[bg] »

Arghhhh it is not working again. I just don`t know what i did to make ndiswrapper stop working. The module is loaded but there is no wireless device (at least ifconfig and iwconfig do not show any). I haven`t done anything related to ndiswrapper - there haven`t been any kernel or ndiswrapper updates, i haven`t changed my modules or blacklist files, i haven`t done anything. The problem appeared for the first time after i had played with usplash - i installed and later removed usplash. After i rebooted i noticed that my wlan0 device nolonger appeared. I just don`t know how usplash is related to ndiswrapper. I tried to use the wirelessfix script proposed in the first page of the howto but it didn`t help. This is what dmesg sayas about ndiswrapper:
debian:/home/hellfire# dmesg | grep ndiswrapper
[ 13.691459] ndiswrapper version 1.52 loaded (smp=yes, preempt=no)
[ 13.746304] usbcore: registered new interface driver ndiswrapper
[ 71.770067] usbcore: deregistering interface driver ndiswrapper
[ 71.811379] ndiswrapper version 1.52 loaded (smp=yes, preempt=no)
[ 71.900945] ndiswrapper: driver bcmwl5a (Broadcom,12/22/2004, 3.100.46.0) loaded
[ 71.908298] ndiswrapper (NdisWriteErrorLogEntry:191): log: C000138D, count: 1, return_address: f8cabd1a
[ 71.908304] ndiswrapper (NdisWriteErrorLogEntry:194): code: 0x10e
[ 71.908369] ndiswrapper (mp_init:216): couldn't initialize device: C0000001
[ 71.908377] ndiswrapper (pnp_start_device:439): Windows driver couldn't initialize the device (C0000001)
[ 71.908395] ndiswrapper (mp_halt:259): device f781a3e0 is not initialized - not halting
[ 71.908399] ndiswrapper: device eth%d removed
[ 71.908432] ndiswrapper: probe of 0000:06:02.0 failed with error -22
[ 71.934633] usbcore: registered new interface driver ndiswrapper
Apparently there is some error but i can`t make anything out of it. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
...to boldly go where no one has gone before...

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mzilikazi
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#43 Post by mzilikazi »

hellfire[bg] wrote:Arghhhh it is not working again. I just don`t know what i did to make ndiswrapper stop working. The module is loaded but there is no wireless device (at least ifconfig and iwconfig do not show any).
Using 2.6.25.4 I tried not to call anything from /etc/init.d/bootmisc.sh also. Sometimes the wireless device would come up and sometimes not (mostly not). I was able to get it working by rmmod ndiswrapper, modprobe ndiswrapper and reconfigure the interface from there but it didn't always work. So I'm still using the script although it is no longer necessary to rmmod ssb. I realize that you may still need it. All I'm doing at the moment is calling modprobe ndiswrapper from /etc/init.d/bootmisc.sh which works. The script is no more than this:

Code: Select all

modprobe ndiswrapper
echo "* Configuring ndiswrapper...."
A grep from my kernel .config

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grep SSB .config
CONFIG_SSB_POSSIBLE=y
CONFIG_SSB=y
CONFIG_SSB_PCIHOST_POSSIBLE=y
CONFIG_SSB_PCIHOST=y
# CONFIG_SSB_B43_PCI_BRIDGE is not set
# CONFIG_SSB_DEBUG is not set
CONFIG_SSB_DRIVER_PCICORE_POSSIBLE=y
CONFIG_SSB_DRIVER_PCICORE=y
CONFIG_USB_OHCI_HCD_SSB=y
Module b43 is still blacklisted in

Code: Select all

/etc/modprobe.d/blacklist
ndiswrapper is still aliased in /etc/modprobe.d/ndiswrapper

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alias wlan0 ndiswrapper
Debian Sid Laptops:
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual-Core Processor TK-55 / 1.5G
Intel(R) Pentium(R) Dual CPU T2390 @ 1.86GHz / 3G

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hellfire[bg]
Posts: 499
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Location: Sliven, Bulgaria

#44 Post by hellfire[bg] »

I solved my problem by downloading and compiling kernel 2.6.23.17 from kernel.org (because it is no longer in the debian repositories). I couldn`t get ndiswrapper to work with with neither kernel 2.6.24* nor kernel 2.6.25* from the debian repositories. I`ve tried with and without the wireless script, i`ve tried blacklisting and rmmoding various modules, i`ve tried everything i could come up with and i have most certainly tried everything i have found on the debian, ubuntu and gentoo forums, on google and on various mailing lists and sites. For me ndiswrapper works only with kernels <= 2.6.23 (and 2.6.23 is the only choice for me because the ENE technology card reader i have on my laptop works only with kernels >= 2.6.23 :D ). The b43 driver on the other hand still causes me a lot of troubles and is not usable. Although the b43 driver supports my wireless card - Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless LAN Controller (rev 02) (at least according to the drier`s documentation) my wlan card can only scan for networks but cannot neither create (i need to be able to create an Ad-Hoc network) nor associate with networks. I`ve tried the b43 driver with various distributions - Debian. Ubuntu, Fedora, Gentoo - i got the same error and the same problem with all of them. I tried to post on the b43 mailing lists (https://lists.berlios.de/pipermail/bcm4 ... 07385.html and to seek help on the b43 irc channel but noone could help me. Right now the situation is pretty fucked up for me (i am sorry for the bad language but i am really angry seeing how something that worked perfectly until kernel 2.6.23 was broken in the newer version of the kernel) - my only viable option is to use kernel 2.6.23 and to get one i must compile it myself (usually i do not have problems with compiling and i even prefer to compile some packages by myself but i just think that the debian developers are better qualified to configure a kernel than me).
...to boldly go where no one has gone before...

ouwe_man
Posts: 13
Joined: 2008-05-10 18:10

ndiswrapper

#45 Post by ouwe_man »

Although I'm sure that this is not a support section of the forum, it seems that we can just the same continue to ask our questions....

As far as NDISWRAPPER is concerned, it still works on my tiny little Thinkpad X22 but what I don't understand is: why can I not see any of the other wifi signals floating around, as I can on my wife's Toshiba working under windows?

The easy installation HowTo did not work for me as intended although it seemed to work but the moment I shut the machine down I had nothing on restart. Somehow I managed to do the right thing, somewhere but I'm very nervous at each restart and everytime I ask myself if it was worth the pain and suffering getting Debian to work....

John
John Stap
1565 Calixa-Lavallee
Trois-Rivieres, QC
G8Y3G1 CANADA

wificraig
Posts: 27
Joined: 2008-06-01 10:50

Hope this helps everyone...

#46 Post by wificraig »

For those who have ndiswrapper working with an earlier kernel (ie. with bcm43xx driver) that upgraded to a kernel with b43, try this:
If your ndiswrapper -l reads that the device is present, thenyou know the windows driver is correct, but the ssb module is still using the wireless device.
Make sure your blacklist includes b43, ssb, (and bcm43xx if you still load an earlier kernel from grub) some systems will also need b44, mac80211, cfg80211 blacklisted (mine did not).
In a terminal:
ifconfig
If the eth0 is NOT listed, then...
In a terminal:
rmmod ndiswrapper
rmmod ssb
depmod -a
modprobe ndiswrapper
Then check ifconfig to see if eth0 is now present.
If so, edit your /etc/rc.local file to read:
rmmod ndiswrapper
rmmod ssb
modprobe ndiswrapper
exit 0
Make sure that you have a wlan0 alias in terminal:
ndiswrapper -m
Disable your other scripts you used, and reboot.
Since ndiswrapper is starting before your scripts disable the ssb module, this will restart ndiswrapper after the ssb has been disabled.

RuralRob
Posts: 1
Joined: 2008-06-08 16:18

This bug might never get fixed

#47 Post by RuralRob »

From what I read in the Linux Kernel development forums, this bug might never get fixed. Linus Torvalds HATES ndiswrapper (because the Windows driver eats a lot of stack space, introduces various stability issues, and technically violates the GPL) and is basically resisting any kernel patches intended solely to fix ndiswrapper-related problems, instead insisting that efforts be focused on making the native drivers work.

cb474
Posts: 150
Joined: 2007-11-15 09:48

#48 Post by cb474 »

Thanks for the howto. If I want to try ndiswrapper, do I have to remove madwifi first (and how would I do that)? Or can I have the two side-by-side and switch between them, depending on which seems to work better with a particular access point?

hkoster1
Posts: 1264
Joined: 2006-12-18 10:10

#49 Post by hkoster1 »

cb474 wrote:Thanks for the howto. If I want to try ndiswrapper, do I have to remove madwifi first (and how would I do that)? Or can I have the two side-by-side and switch between them, depending on which seems to work better with a particular access point?
Only one driver can control your wireless device at any one time, either ndiswrapper (leading to a wlan0 interface) or madwifi (probably ath0). If they are both installed, then the one to load first will probably control the device. Reversing this will require unloading them first,

Code: Select all

rmmod ndiswrapper madwifi
(as root) to be followed by loading the required one, e.g.

Code: Select all

modprobe madwifi
and configuring the resulting interface. You could even make a script to do this.

That said, it would probably be less trouble to stick with madwifi (or ath5k or ath9k), since ndiswrapper is known to have problems with WPA/WPA2 Personal security.
Real Debian users don't do chat...

cb474
Posts: 150
Joined: 2007-11-15 09:48

#50 Post by cb474 »

Thanks. I have one particular access point that I need to use a lot, that madwifi seems unable to connect to. But I can connect in windows (on the same laptop), so that's why I thought ndiswrapper might be the solution. But I intend to try ath5k too (although I'm also having a little trouble figuring out how to use ath5k).

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