Ndiswrapper blocking program installation

[rvs314]

I've been having trouble installing the 'ndiswrapper' program on my debian machine for quite a while now. I tried to install it and the install never stopped. I had to manually exit the installation process, and now I'm unable to install any new software onto my machine. Whenever I try to run apt upgrade the I'm given the error:

E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run 'sudo dpkg --configure -a' to correct the problem.

This will then try to restart the installation, which then never finishes. I've run the program for over 24 hours and nothing has happened, so I'm pretty sure that nothing is going to happen.

System information:
Linux Version 4.18.0-1-amd4
Debian 4.18.6-1 (2018-09-06)

Hardware information:
Ryzen 5 2600 CPU
Radeon 580 GPU
Aorus B450M Motherboard

I have an AC1300 Wireless PCI-E adapter inside the PC, but I don't think debian came with the drivers for it (which is why I'm installing ndiswrapper), so it's not working yet. I'm using an Athereos AR9271 external wifi adapter in the meantime. I'm semi-new to the Linux community, so don't expect me to know everything about my system just yet.

Thanks for any possible help!

[bw123]

How did you install the ndiswrapper, what command? Did you try to purge it? What clues do you get from running the dpkg --configure -a command?

What debian ver did you install? You should probably use stable+backports

[stevepusser]

Debian does not include non-free firmware in its standard install. This is a conscious decision. 99% of wi-fi hardware requires non-free firmware, so 99% of standard Debian installs will not have working w-fi. So the odds are that your particular hardware just needs the correct firmware package, and you can kick ndiswrapper out the door.

If you have a TP-Link AC1300 Wireless PCI-E, it says there's "Unix" drivers for it, so what you need to do next is let us know what chipset it has. If you have a wired connection, install inxi, update your hardware ID database as sysadmin with

Code: Select all

update-pciids
update-usbids

then as a regular user, run

Code: Select all

inxi -N

and copypaste the results here.

[rvs314]

How did you install the ndiswrapper, what command? Did you try to purge it? What clues do you get from running the dpkg --configure -a command?

What debian ver did you install? You should probably use stable+backports

I attempted to install ndiswrapper through the apt package manager, but that wasn't working. I think the package name was 'ndiswapper-dkms'. When I run 'dpkg --configure -a', I get the following output:

Code: Select all

Setting up ndiswrapper-dkms (1.60-6) ...
Removing old ndiswrapper-1.60 DKMS files...

-------- Uninstall Beginning --------
Module:  ndiswrapper
Version: 1.60
Kernel:  4.18.0-1-amd64 (x86_64)
-------------------------------------

Status: Before uninstall, this module version was ACTIVE on this kernel.

ndiswrapper.ko:
 - Uninstallation
   - Deleting from: /lib/modules/4.18.0-1-amd64/updates/dkms/
 - Original module
   - No original module was found for this module on this kernel.
   - Use the dkms install command to reinstall any previous module version.

depmod...

DKMS: uninstall completed.

------------------------------
Deleting module version: 1.60
completely from the DKMS tree.
------------------------------
Done.
Loading new ndiswrapper-1.60 DKMS files...
Building for 4.18.0-1-amd64
Building initial module for 4.18.0-1-amd64
Done.

ndiswrapper.ko:
Running module version sanity check.
 - Original module
   - No original module exists within this kernel
 - Installation
   - Installing to /lib/modules/4.18.0-1-amd64/updates/dkms/

depmod...

It then proceeds to hang on that message for the foreseeable future. Trying to run purge only gives a similar solution:

Code: Select all

Reading package lists...
Building dependency tree...
Reading state information...
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  ndiswrapper*
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 to remove and 276 not upgraded.
1 not fully installed or removed.
After this operation, 0 B of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] Setting up ndiswrapper-dkms (1.60-6) ...
Removing old ndiswrapper-1.60 DKMS files...

-------- Uninstall Beginning --------
Module:  ndiswrapper
Version: 1.60
Kernel:  4.18.0-1-amd64 (x86_64)
-------------------------------------

Status: Before uninstall, this module version was ACTIVE on this kernel.

ndiswrapper.ko:
 - Uninstallation
   - Deleting from: /lib/modules/4.18.0-1-amd64/updates/dkms/
 - Original module
   - No original module was found for this module on this kernel.
   - Use the dkms install command to reinstall any previous module version.

depmod...

DKMS: uninstall completed.

------------------------------
Deleting module version: 1.60
completely from the DKMS tree.
------------------------------
Done.
Loading new ndiswrapper-1.60 DKMS files...
Building for 4.18.0-1-amd64
Building initial module for 4.18.0-1-amd64
Done.

ndiswrapper.ko:
Running module version sanity check.
 - Original module
   - No original module exists within this kernel
 - Installation
   - Installing to /lib/modules/4.18.0-1-amd64/updates/dkms/

depmod...

As I was writing this, I figured out a workaround for the stalling problem. The 'ndiswapper-dkms' package automatically installs the package 'ndiswapper' along with it. I tried purging the 'ndiswrapper' package first, then the 'ndiswrapper-dkms' packge and everything went swimmingly enough. I'm now free to download new software.

[rvs314]

Debian does not include non-free firmware in its standard install. This is a conscious decision. 99% of wi-fi hardware requires non-free firmware, so 99% of standard Debian installs will not have working w-fi. So the odds are that your particular hardware just needs the correct firmware package, and you can kick ndiswrapper out the door.

If you have a TP-Link AC1300 Wireless PCI-E, it says there's "Unix" drivers for it, so what you need to do next is let us know what chipset it has. If you have a wired connection, install inxi, update your hardware ID database as sysadmin with

Code: Select all

update-pciids
update-usbids

then as a regular user, run

Code: Select all

inxi -N

and copypaste the results here.

The result of that command was:

Code: Select all

Network:   Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet driver: r8169 
           Device-2: Broadcom and subsidiaries BCM4360 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter 
           driver: bcma-pci-bridge 
           Device-3: Qualcomm Atheros AR9271 802.11n type: USB driver: ath9k_htc

If I'm not wrong, the first device is my PC's built-in Ethernet driver, the second is the PCI-e card that is directly connected, and the last device is an external card (the Athereos AR9271 I posted about earlier). The manual also lists the model number as 'Archer T6E' if that's at all useful.

[debiman]

i thought ndiswrapper was a thing of the past.
are you sure that you need it? see stevepussers comment about that.

[stevepusser]

OK, so you might need to get the firmware for the Broadcom 4360 for a driver that's in the kernel, or you might need instead to build the "wl" kernel module by installing the broadcom-sta-dkms package from the non-free section...some Broadcom hardware needs one or the other, other can use either driver. This'll need some research.

Are you running Debian testing, or Stretch plus backports?

[stevepusser]

It looks like one sort of 4360 might not be supported at all, and the other needs you to build the "wl" driver: https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/use ... ed_devices

If "lspci" shows the supported version, and you're using the stretch-backports kernel, you'll need to use the version of broadcom-sta-dkms in the backports repo to build on the 4.18 kernel: https://wiki.debian.org/wl