Can't get ndiswrapper to work with Network Manager

[Ralph L]

I have a Compaq Presario 2100 on which I have installed several OS's. A year of so ago I installed lucid, and got my wireless working using ndiswrapper, bcmwl5, and wicd. However, this combination would work only on an unencrypted wireless network. (As an aside I noticed that wpa_supplicant never ran as a process under wicd, and this may have had something to do with why I couldn't get WEP, or WPA2 running.) The reason I used ndiswrapper and the bcmwl5 driver is that the standard linux b43legacy driver works only occasionally on my Broadcom 4306 Rev 2 chip. After many tries, it may sync up, but it drops sync almost immediately and tries again. I know my router works fine, because I can easily sync up to it with my other computer (unencrypted or encrypted), as well as with the Presario running ndiswrapper/bcmwl5 (unencrypted) as described above. Moreover, Windows runs fine on the Presario 2100 (unencrypted or encrypted) using the bcmwl5 driver. I know that the linux compatibility sites say that b43legacy supports the 4306 chip, but I think they are talking about 4306 Rev 3, not 4306 Rev 2, that I have.

But I don't like leaving my network unencrypted. So I tried again to get encryption to work.

First, I installed a copy of 12.04.1, the latest version of Precise. Just to make sure I did a standard install with b43legacy, and got the same results that I got a year ago with lucid. The wireless may sync up, but it immediately drops out again. So I proceeded to install ndiswrapper using the instructions at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Wi...er/Ndiswrapper . However, when I tried to use ndisgtk (the ndiswrapper gui) to install bcmwl5, it said it couldn't find ndiswrapper. So I went to http://askubuntu.com/questions/13289...pper-not-found and followed the directions for downloading ndiswrapper source and installing it. This seemed to work as ndisgtk no longer complained that it couldn't find ndiswrapper. I continued the installation according to the first web site above. However, I noticed that as soon as I tried to do a configure with ndisgtk, the wireless network capability left the Network Manager icon pull down menu. No longer was the checkbox for Wireless there, nor were any of the available wireless networks--my own or that of my neighbors. It was if I had just disabled the wireless capability.

So my guess is that I somehow have a configuration parameter wrong and I shut off wireless, but I don't know where. Any help would be appreciated.

[Ralph L]

COME ON PEOPLE!!! How about a reply!! Somebody must have installed ndiswrapper with Network Manager!!! There is a Community Help Wiki site (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Wi...er/Ndiswrapper ) with very detailed instructions for doing this installation, and it is very current having been updated for Precise (12.04) and even for 12.10 Quantal Quetza. So somebody had to write it.

My problem is that, when I follow the instructions, it still doesn't work as I stated in my first post above. I can give a step by step description of what I have done if that would help anybody. However, as far as I know I have done just what is specified in the web site.

HELP!!!

[chili555]

I love a mystery.

I won't be surprised at all that older Broadcom devices may not do WPA and especially WPA2. There is a reason it's called 'legacy.' I will be quite surprised if bcmwlhigh5 is the correct inf for the device. I strongly suspect it's a hardware vs. driver problem and not an ndiswrapper vs. Network Manager problem. Please run and post:

lspci -nn | grep 0280
sudo modprobe ndiswrapper
ndiswrapper -l
dmesg | grep ndis

There are many versions of bcmwhigh5.inf floating around. I even have a few myself. Where did you find yours?

[flash63]

Hello,
i think this device works direct with b43/b43-legacy, but requires the right Firmware-file.

Same problem here:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...3#post12359653

[Ralph L]

Flash63
Thank you very much for responding.

Edited in latter: Flash63: I am afraid I might have misled you. What I have listed below is from my lucid system that uses bcmwl5, ndiswrapper, and wicd. It run unencrypted wireless very well, but won't run encrypted. I also have a Precise Pangolin system on which I have installed bcmwl5, ndiswrapper, but not wicd. On that system I am trying to use Network Manager that came pre-installed. I have messed up that system by trying many things, so I am going to do a fresh install and get you the results from a fresh system into which I have just installed ndiswrapper and bcmwl5.

I apparently have the ucode4.fw loaded. See below:

ralph@presario-lucid:/lib/firmware/b43legacy$ ls -l
total 132
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 18 2011-09-25 12:58 a0g0bsinitvals2.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 158 2011-09-25 12:58 a0g0bsinitvals5.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2520 2011-09-25 12:58 a0g0initvals2.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1818 2011-09-25 12:58 a0g0initvals5.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 158 2011-09-25 12:58 a0g1bsinitvals5.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1818 2011-09-25 12:58 a0g1initvals5.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 18 2011-09-25 12:58 b0g0bsinitvals2.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 158 2011-09-25 12:58 b0g0bsinitvals5.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2520 2011-09-25 12:58 b0g0initvals2.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1818 2011-09-25 12:58 b0g0initvals5.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1320 2011-09-25 12:58 pcm4.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1320 2011-09-25 12:58 pcm5.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 21680 2011-09-25 12:58 ucode11.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 16360 2011-09-25 12:58 ucode2.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 20096 2011-09-25 12:58 ucode4.fw
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 22280 2011-09-25 12:58 ucode5.fw
ralph@presario-lucid:/lib/firmware/b43legacy$


Maybe it is not in the correct folder; I don't know.

Thanks again,
Ralph

[Ralph L]

Chili555

Thank you very much for responding. Here is what you asked. This system runs with no encryption using bcmwl5, ndiswrapper, and wicd.

ralph@presario-lucid:~$ lspci -nn | grep 0280
00:09.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:4320] (rev 02)
ralph@presario-lucid:~$ sudo modprobe ndiswrapper
[sudo] password for ralph: 
WARNING: All config files need .conf: /etc/modprobe.d/ndiswrapper, it will be ignored in a future release.
ralph@presario-lucid:~$ ndiswrapper -l
WARNING: All config files need .conf: /etc/modprobe.d/ndiswrapper, it will be ignored in a future release.
bcmwl5 : driver installed
	device (14E4:4320) present (alternate driver: ssb)
ralph@presario-lucid:~$ dmesg | grep ndis
[   26.069664] ndiswrapper version 1.55 loaded (smp=yes, preempt=no)
[   27.246611] usbcore: registered new interface driver ndiswrapper
[   30.236000] usbcore: deregistering interface driver ndiswrapper
[   30.335117] ndiswrapper version 1.55 loaded (smp=yes, preempt=no)
[   30.414843] ndiswrapper: driver bcmwl5 (Linksys,02/12/2003, 3.10.39.7) loaded
[   30.415299] ndiswrapper 0000:00:09.0: PCI INT A -> Link[LNKD] -> GSI 10 (level, low) -> IRQ 10
[   30.537492] ndiswrapper: using IRQ 10
[   30.749203] ndiswrapper (set_ndis_auth_mode:619): setting auth mode to 3 failed (C0010015)
[   30.753273] usbcore: registered new interface driver ndiswrapper
ralph@presario-lucid:~$

Thanks again,
Ralph

[chili555]

Let's see if your hardware does WPA:

sudo iwlist wlan0 auth

I'm pretty sure this is a valuable clue:

ndiswrapper (set_ndis_auth_mode:619): setting auth mode to 3 failed (C0010015)

[Ralph L]

Chili55

Here is the information you requested from my lucid system that uses ndiswrapper, bcmwl55, and wicd and runs well unencrypted but won't run encrypted. One thing I noticed that may be relevant is that wpa supplicant did not show in the list of running processes.

ralph@presario-lucid:~$ sudo iwlist wlan0 auth
[sudo] password for ralph: 
wlan0     unknown authentication information.

Thanks for helping me.

[Ralph L]

Flash63

I installed, from the live cd, into a new disk partition 12.04.1,the latest version of Precise. I then installed, using synaptic, the b43legacy driver. The network manager icon showed it connected to my wireless, but then dropped out. It kept connecting and dropping out and I could not use it. I have had this experience many times before. b43legacy (nor b43) will work with this Broadcom 4306 rev2 chip.

So once again, using synaptic, I installed ndiswrapper from source, then ndisgtk, etc. Then I used ndisgtk to install bcmwl5 and followed the installation procedure in https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Wi...er/Ndiswrapper . I got no errors during the installation. Note that the installation procedure emptied /lib/firmware/b43legacy of all its contents. Then I rebooted and network manager icon no longer showed wireless networks.

So I followed your directions and performed

wget http://media.cdn.ubuntu-de.org/forum/attachments/04/32/2480236-Broadcom_Firmware.tar.gz 
sudo tar xvf 2480236-Broadcom_Firmware.tar.gz -C /lib/firmware/

This reinstalled the firmware into the /lib/firmware/b43legacy folder, and also installed the /lib/firmware/b43 folder with all its firmware. I rebooted, but still no wireless networks showed up. This is understandable, because I now had a mix of b43legacy and ndiswrapper.

So once again I proved that b43legacy and b43 won't work with a Broadcom 4306 REV 2 chip. And I am back to the same problem that I can't get Precise with Network Manager to work with ndiswrapper. As I said in my original post I do have (in another disk partition) Lucid Lynx running with ndiswrapper, bcmwl5, and wicd. However, this only works with unencrypted wireless, which I don't like to use. But with Precise and Network Manager, wireless is completely disabled. And I don't know how to re-enable it.

Thank you for your help. I appreciate it very much. I look forward to any other ideas you might have on the subject.

[Ralph L]

Chili555

As I mentioned above I did a complete install from live cd into a new disk partition Precise Pangolin 12.04.1. I then followed the instructions in https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Wi...er/Ndiswrapper to do the ndiswrapper installation. I had to install ndiswrapper itself from source, and I used ndisgtk to install bcmwl5. After a restart wireless was completely shut off and I couldn't get it to re-enable. Here is the output of the items you asked me to run again, but this time on Precise rather than Lucid with ndiswrapper working (but not with encryption).

ralph@ralph-Presario-2100-DM728A:/lib/firmware$ lspci -nn | grep 0280
00:09.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:4320] (rev 02)
ralph@ralph-Presario-2100-DM728A:/lib/firmware$ sudo modprobe ndiswrapper
ralph@ralph-Presario-2100-DM728A:/lib/firmware$ ndiswrapper -l
bcmwl5 : driver installed
	device (14E4:4320) present (alternate driver: ssb)
ralph@ralph-Presario-2100-DM728A:/lib/firmware$ dmesg | grep ndi
[    2.529592] powernow: This is indicative of a broken BIOS.
[    3.284358] ata2.00: WARNING: via pata_ali.atapi_dma modparam or corresponding sysfs node.
[ 2461.517470] ndiswrapper version 1.57 loaded (smp=yes, preempt=no)
[ 2461.564384] usbcore: registered new interface driver ndiswrapper
ralph@ralph-Presario-2100-DM728A:/lib/firmware$ sudo iwlist wlan0 auth
wlan0     no authentication information.

ralph@ralph-Presario-2100-DM728A:/lib/firmware$

You help is much appreciated.
Ralph