Ravi's Gadgets

Compaq (recently acquired by HP) is a brand that makes Made for Windows PCs and Laptops. All the hardware that come with them are completely closed, and are not available for the Open Source community to make drivers for them. The Broadcom Wireless Adapter is one such device that came with my new laptop. And I prefer no other OS than ubuntu on any of my computers.

A few months ago, I bought a Compaq laptop. Tried installing ubuntu and everything got detected except the wireless. The laptop has a Broadcom wireless adapter built in, and ubuntu will not readily detect or install driver for it. So how did I install that? The info will follow.

I had to install Windows (pirated, craked, nulled and completely abused by a hacker, and its boot screen says its Windows 2098. Nobody really does that to ubuntu or any other Linux though), to get the driver file for the wireless driver. Once the installation was done, the laptop booted and the screen resolution was not crossing 640/480. The display driver was not detected. I was not given a CD with the laptop containing the drivers. Here is the list of things that didn’t work when I installed windows.

1. Display Adpater.
2. Wifi Adapter.
3. Network Adapter.
4. Horizondal and Vertical Scroll functions of the touchpad.
5. Sound Adapter
6. USB and Expansion Slot
7. PCMCIA

which means, the only communication that the laptop has when Windows is installed in it for the first time is it CD/DVD drive. Wow, what a way to communicate. This means that you need to download software and driver from another PC, put it on a cd/dvd, n install it on this Laptop. Cool.

I called Compaq customer support and they said that the drivers need to be downloaded from hp.com/in and that they do not provide cds anymore to save the company from bankrupsy.

I plugged in the network cable, and found out that the network card isnt detected either. What the Fuck? Isnt that one of the basic things that need to work when an OS is installed on a computer system? So I just had to switch to a PC, and when I entered the product number on HPs website, all I found was a HP wireless management software, and a few other useless junk. No display driver, no network driver, no wireless driver, and no sound driver. The computer is personal again?

So I had to call these people again, and they told me to search for V6000. I got 2 page list of drivers from which I didnt know what all I need to download and install for my particular model, and what all I dont have to. anyways, I downloaded the wifi driver, installed it, and switched to Linux. I am sure I would never have found the network card driver in that huge list.

Now don’t anybody tell me that the drivers were not detected because I installed a Pirated version of Windows on it. Im sure that even on a fully licensed Windows, it would not have worked either. Windows is just a waste of money. 90% of Windows PCs in India use the Pirated version and about 10% use genuine just to show off. and thats what makes India the largest user of Windows. Thats how India is. As a matter of fact, till 2001, I didnt know that Windows was a paid software and requires a License Key that needs to be paid for. All I knew was that there would be a file named CD-KEY.TXT in the cd, and you just need to copy n paste that when the installer asks you to, and that makes me feel proud as I was born with the thought that software shouldnt have to be paid for. I was born an Open Source guy.

Back to the Point.

Compaq laptop seems to be made for Windows. No other linux except ubuntu and Fedora are likely to install on it and autoconfugure most of the hardware.

For those of you who dont know, in Windows, once the OS is installed, you need to spend hours more to install the basic software and drivers to make your system working fine. Linux autoconfigures all hardware that it detects. It also comes with a bunch of restricted drivers for several hardware components. And Linux never crashes, and has no virus.

And, like I always say, Windows is an OS which is completely unstable, with INTENTIONALLY placed bugs, and is prone to viruses. It was an OS developed with no research done on their own, but followed other people’s works without any decipline, and not they have branded it and are selling it. Nerdy Bill is behind all these. He should be hanged for that.

Drivers were not available for my Broadcom wireless adapter cos Bill made it so. However, the users at ubuntuforums.com had come up with a way to install the wireless on the lappy.

You will need the bcmwl5.inf file from windows. Which means you will have to install windows first, download the windows driver, look for the bcmwl5.inf, copy it somewhere, install linux, and follow the procedure below. If you use dualboot, you will be able to access the windows filesystem from your linux, and you wont need to copy the file anywhere. I hate people using dualboot by the way.

From: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php%3Ft%3D201902%26highlight%3D02%253A00.0%2BNetwork%2Bcontroller%253A%2BBroadcom%2BCorporation%2BDell%2BWireless%2B1390%2BWLAN%2BMini-PCI%2BCard%2B(rev%2B02)&ei=aGQkR-zcHaTmqgOkq5SADg&sig2=qPsgfS-gdVWniNx42K4wUg&zx=0SxLcv-h_4M&ct=b

HOWTO: Broadcom 4306 With Ndiswrapper 54 Mbps

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This is the easiest way to get your Broadcom 4306 wireless card working in the shortest amount of time. I wouldn’t use the firmware cutter because it only allows you to run at 11 Mbps with it. With ndiswrapper you will get 54 Mbps if your router will allow it.

*This guide now works with Gutsy Gibbon. If you find any problems or know anything that can make the guide better just tell me because I always appreciate the feed back I get. 10/22/07

Do everything in the order as it is listed.

The Drivers listed below work for most broadcom 4306 wireless cards but not all of them. If you use the drivers below and your card doesn’tshow up under network then you should try using the driver that came with your card or go to the manufacturer’s website.

Get the 32 bit drivers from here or the website of the manufacturer of your wireless card.

Get the 64 bit drivers from here. I’ve heard that you don’t change the name .inf file to bcmwl5.inf just keep it the way it is.

run the following command to make sure you have a broadcom chipset wireless card.
1.

 

Code:

lspci | grep Broadcom Corporation

2.

 

Code:

sudo rmmod bcm43xx

3.

 

Code:

echo 'blacklist bcm43xx' | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist

5. You will need the Ubuntu 7.10 CD to get these packages.

 

Code:

sudo aptitude install build-essential

6.

 

Code:

uname -r

Insert the output of the uname -r command into the following 2 commands where the numbers are at

7. Gutsy Gibbon comes with this already installed so if you have Gutsy you can move to step 8.

 

Code:

sudo aptitude install linux-headers-2.6.22-14-generic

8.

 

Code:

sudo ln -s /usr/src/linux-2.6.22-14-generic /lib/modules/2.6.22-14-generic/build

Download ndiswrapper
9.

 

Code:

wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/ndiswrapper/ndiswrapper-1.48.tar.gz

Make a folder for ndiswrapper and place it in there
10.

 

Code:

mkdir ~/ndiswrapper
mv ndiswrapper-1.48.tar.gz ~/ndiswrapper

Install ndiswrapper
11.

 

Code:

cd ~/ndiswrapper
sudo tar -xvzf ndiswrapper-1.48.tar.gz
cd ~/ndiswrapper/ndiswrapper-1.48
make distclean
sudo make
sudo make install

12 If you are running Dapper or Edgy run this command. Some people say that compiling it works for them and some people say getting it with synaptic so I thought if you just installed both then you’ll have some form of ndiswrapper working.

 

Code:

sudo apt-get install ndiswrapper-utils-1.8

If you are running Feisty or Gutsy run this command. You’ll need the Ubuntu 7.10 CD to get these packages.

 

Code:

sudo apt-get install ndiswrapper-utils-1.9

If you can’t get ndiswrapper from any of the sources above you can get it from the Ubuntu CD.

13.

 

Code:

sudo ndiswrapper -i ~/folder where driver is/bcmwl5.inf

If you are using the 64 bit drivers run this command

 

Code:

sudo ndiswrapper -i ~/folder where driver is/bcmwl564.inf

Make sure the .sys file is in there also, without it, it won’t work

 

14.
Code:

ndiswrapper -l

To make sure the hardware is present

15.

 

Code:

sudo ndiswrapper -m

To load ndiswrapper automatically when the wlan0 interface is used

16.

 

Code:

modprobe ndiswrapper

Modprobe ndiswrapper didn’t put ndiswrapper in the /etc/modules folder for me on Gutsy and I tried it twice. This was the one of the reasons why after reboot a lot of people lose their wireless connection. Make sure you run the following command just to make sure. The following command manually puts ndiswrapper in the /etc/modules folder.

17.

 

Code:

echo 'ndiswrapper' | sudo tee -a /etc/modules

To load the module

If you are running Gutsy or Feisty you can skip to step 26.
Enable the Connection

18. Go to System -> Administration -> Networking

19. If you don’t see any wlan0 connections in Networking then you should restart your computer.

20. Go to your eth0 connection and disable the connection.

21. Now go to your wlan0 connection and enable it.

Network Manager

If you need WPA or WEP encryption do the following:

Note: If you are running Feisty you can skip steps 22 and 25.

22.

 

Code:

sudo apt-get install network-manager-gnome

23.

 

Code:

sudo gedit /etc/network/interfaces

24. Comment out anything in there at the bottom that has to do with your wireless essid. You need to also comment out anything that says eth1, eth2, or atho. When I say comment out that means put a # in from of it. You can leave all of the eth0, wlan0, lo, inet, and auto stuff.

25.

 

Code:

nm-applet

26. Now click on the applet that is in the top right corner and you should see all of the available connections. Click on yours and set it up.

SOLUIONS TO PROBLEMS

Problem 1
Totoro found a fix for the eth1 problem. Thank You Totoro!
add ndiswrapper to /etc/modules
change eth1 -> wlan0 in the files below:

 

Code:

sudo gedit /etc/modeprobe.d/ndiswrapper
sudo gedit /etc/network/interfaces
sudo gedit /etc/iftab

Problem 2
Shaton found a fix for the FATAL: Error inserting ndiswrapper problem. Thank You Shaton!
If you get an error saying

FATAL: Error inserting ndiswrapper (/lib/modules/2.6.17-10-generic/kernel/drivers/net/ndiswrapper/ndiswrapper .ko): Invalid argument

then try this.

 

Code:

sudo apt-get install ndiswrapper-utils-1.8
sudo rm /usr/sbin/ndiswrapper
sudo ln -s /usr/sbin/ndiswrapper-1.8 /usr/sbin/ndiswrapper

If you are using Feisty then you will need to put a 9 where the 8 is.

Problem 3
If you get a lot of error messages talking about the icon then run this command:

 

Code:

sudo gtk-update-icon-cache -f /usr/share/icons/hicolor/

Problem 4
If you have to run modprobe ndiswrapper every time you reboot your computer run this command.

 

Code:

echo 'ndiswrapper' | sudo tee -a /etc/modules

Thanks Phifer for the fix for problem 4

I hope this helps a lot of people!

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