Ndiswrapper question...


Forum: Networking
Topic: Ndiswrapper question...
started by: maxwas

Posted by maxwas on Sep. 25 2005,01:00
Hi all,

When i run DSL from CD (on my laptop) ndiswrapper detects my wireless nic, and it runs fine.

I copied Knoppix over to a spare fat32 partition and booted from floppy, however, now, ndiswrapper cannot find the .inf file

i have the .inf on my C:\ drive mounted as hda1. I also tried copying the .inf file to the knoppix/ramdisk folder, it still cannot find it.

Any suggestions?

Thx

Dave

Posted by kenspank on Sep. 30 2005,15:40
I have my own ndiswrapper question to add.

I would like to use the NETGEAR MA111 wireless adapter on my computer.  When my friend originally wiped my harddrive clean and put Damn Small Linux on my laptop, his MA111 adapter card worked fine.

Its been a few months and I've acquired my own MA111 card, but its not working.

Using Ndiswrapper, i installed the following drivers: autorun.inf, netma111.inf, ma111nd5.sys, and layout.bin.

When i do ndiswrapper -l, i get "hardware not present" next to each file.

The adapter is plugged in and the green light is solid.  If i take the adapter out and do iwconfig, i just get
lo no wireless extensions
eth0 no wireless extensions

If i put the card back in and do iwconfig, i get
lo no wireless extensions
eth0 no wireless extensions
wlan0 no wireless extensions

Is my ndiswrapper not working or is there some step i'm missing in this process?

Posted by tempestuous on Oct. 01 2005,03:24
maxwas,
M$ Window$ has indoctrinated us into relying on automatic stuff.  I suggest you take control and set up things manually -
ndiswrapper -i /path/to/my/drivers/myinffile.inf

Now to backup: open /home/dsl/filetool.lst in a text editor, list all files in /etc/ndiswrapper (don't include the leading /), and save.
In the DSLpanel, press Backup/Restore, and Backup the files to your chosen device (probably hda2).
When you boot from floppy, add the boot parameter "restore=hda2"

I could help you automate this by modifying /etc/lilo.conf, and then boot DSL from the Windows bootloader ... but I don't know how you have LILO set up at the moment and it could overwrite your MasterBootRecord ... so I won't go there.


Kenspank,
DSL is probably detecting your MA111 and loading the native Linux driver for it - prism2_usb.  Run "lsmod" to confirm.

Why would you want to use ndiswrapper when this better driver is ready to use?

The prism2 driver family (linux-wlan-ng) does not support the Linux wireless extensions interface, that's why iwconfig can't see the wlan0 interface.
Configuration is achieved from the DSLpanel > Prism2.

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