Wireless problems! No ndiswrapper or b43-fwcutter!

[jkasai]

Hello!

I'm refurbishing a Dell Inspiron 1501, and have just changed the orginial harddrive to a Hitachi Travelstar 500GB, and installed Ubuntu 12.04 LTS onto it.

Unfortunately though, I'm not getting any Network Connections...
Networking is enabled, "Connection information" is unavailable and no connections are given in "Edit Connections".

Thinking it might be a problem with the PCI card (Card/Model: BCM4311 and PCI-ID: [14e4:4311] ) I connected a USB Wireless Adapter (which is a Netgear one... Terminal says: "ID0846:9020 Netgear, Inc. WNA 3100 (v1) Wireless-N300 [BroadcomBCM43241])...Seems that's not doing anything at all either... :"(

I've looked at the following links for some help:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=889395
http://invaleed.wordpress.com/2007/1...ci-ubuntu-710/
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Wi...Driver/bcm43xx
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Wi...er/Ndiswrapper
but to no avail.
Mind you, I might just be doing it all wrong...Still quite the rookie. :S Sorry.

But the laptop is telling me that both ndiswrapper and b43-fwcutter doesn't exist...

So I'm totally stuck on what to do...

I'm very sorry for jabbering on but I would really really truly love it if you could please please please help me!!

Thank you very much in advance!

M

[chili555]

Set that USB aside and let's see if we can get the Broadcom built-in to come to life. Walk over to the router, hook up the ethernet and get a connection. Open a terminal and type:

sudo apt-get install linux-firmware-nonfree

Detach the ethernet, reboot and post back to tell us how the wireless is working.

[jkasai]

Set that USB aside and let's see if we can get the Broadcom built-in to come to life. Walk over to the router, hook up the ethernet and get a connection. Open a terminal and type:

sudo apt-get install linux-firmware-nonfree

Detach the ethernet, reboot and post back to tell us how the wireless is working.

Hello chili555!!

Thank you for your reply!!
I really really appreciate it!

I connected the ethernet cable to the laptop but it seems that the laptop still isn't connecting to the internet... :"(
"Wired network disconnected - you are now offline" keeps popping up too...

[chili555]

Let's get the wireless going first, then we'll fix the ethernet. Download the file I've attached and transfer it to the desktop of the Ubuntu machine on a USB key or similar. Right-click it and select Extract Here. Now open the terminal and do:

sudo mkdir /lib/firmware/b43
sudo cp Desktop/b43/*  /lib/firmware/b43
sudo modprobe -r b43
sudo modprobe b43

Your wireless should now be working.

[jkasai]

Hi chili555,

Thank you for your help and support again!
Unfortunately, after

sudo cp Desktop/b43/* /lib/firmware/b43

I get:

cp: cannot stat 'Desktop/b43/*' : No such file or directory

[jkasai]

Put the extracted file onto desktop!
Worked!
Worked!!!

WOOHOOOO!!!
THANK YOU SO SO MUCH CHILI555

You're THE Saint!

Thank you so so much again!

Do I need to save anything, etc. to make sure this is permanent?

[chili555]

Do I need to save anything, etc. to make sure this is permanent?

Nope. You are all set. As long as the wireless is working, do we need to work on ethernet or is it not needed?

Please use thread tools at the top to mark Solved.

[jkasai]

Sorry for bugging you again!
Just a few more questions!

Do I need to keep the b43 extracted file in a specific location?
Will ethernet connection work now too?

Thank you so so very much again!

[chili555]

Do I need to keep the b43 extracted file in a specific location?

Trash it and the zip, too.

Will ethernet connection work now too?

Not until we troubleshoot it. If you'd like to proceed, please post:

lspci -nn | grep 0280
dmesg | grep eth0

The pipe symbol | is on the right side of my US keyboard on the same key with \.

Just to be sure you always get the latest and greatest firmware, you should do:

sudo apt-get install linux-firmware-nonfree

[jkasai]

Chili555,

Terminal says
"Setting up linux-firmware-nonfree (1.11ubuntu1)...
~$ "

Do I need to type or do anything more to complete set up?

Thank you!