Ndiswrapper Wireless Card Install
Guielines for How to Setup Wifi in Linux to Use the Windows Driver
Jun 9, 2008
Setting up wireless networking in Linux can be difficult, especially if the Linux user does not have a supported card. The more popular Linux distributions, such as Redhat, Slackware, Debian and Ubuntu, come with many native drivers, but not every networking card will work out of the box on a system running Linux.
Native wirless networking card drivers do not exist for every networking card. Many Linux distributions come with a program calledndiswrapper that allows a Linux user to set up a wireless network without too much differently. The steps for setting up any networking card or any other device driver that does not have native Linux support using ndiswrapper are the same.
1. Get and Install Ndiswrapper
The Ubuntu, Redhat, and SuSE installation CDs contain the ndiswrapper packages. The program can be installed from the command line by using apt-get. Gnome users can install the packages through Synaptic and KDE environment users install it through a program called Adept.
Debian users must find the source package and compile the program using module-assistant. The commands are
- module-assstant prepare
- module-assistant auto-install ndiswrapper
The process is then the same in most other Linux distributions. The steps are:
- sudo apt-get ndiswrapper-common-<version number>
- sudo apt-get ndiswrapper-utils-<versoin number>
2. Find the Windows Driver for the Wirleless Networking Card
The wireless networking card's manufacturer should have the Windows drivers available for download if the CD has been lost. Some manufacturers provide Linux drivers for wireless networking cards, but these are few and far between. Download the Windows drive to use with Ndiswrapper if there is no native Linux driver available. The driver files have .inf and .sys extensions. Copy the files from the CD or copy the files onto the Linux partition. When inside Linux, make a folder for these two files and copy the files to it.
3. Install the Wireless Network Card Driver as the Root User
The next step for installing a wireless networking card (or indeed any device with a Windows driver) for use on Linux is wrapping the driver and inserting it into the kernel. Although it is the same operating system, every distributon does not implement things in the same way. (The steps for Debian Etch, Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon and Hardy Heron are different.)
- Enter the command ndiswrapper -a <fileneame.>
- Run lspci -n to see the device driver for the wireless networking card
- Check to see if the lights for the card come on
- If so, good. Proceed to the next step. If not type lsci -n to get the device id number. The device dirver is an 8 digit hexadecimal number.
- If the lights did not come on, type ndiswrapper -a (or -d) <devid><driver filename.>
- If the distribution allows it, type in modprobe ndiswrapper. In some cases, ndiswrapper must be typed in as the last line as in the /etc/modules file.
- Issue the command ndiswrapper -m
- Edit the /etc/network/interfaces. with the line face wlan0 inet dhcp.
If the user is lucky, his wirless networking card should be working on Linux. The instructions work well for Ubuntu, but may not work well for all distrubtions. Getting help for the Linux operating system is easy and cheap.
Getting Technical Support to Set up a Wireless Networking Card in Linux
Windows and Apple suers can pay to obtain professional tech support. Professional tech support exists for the commercial Linux distributions, but it often is not necessary. Linux users are passionate about the operating system and can be helpful if a new or longterm Linux user takes his problem to the forums for his particular distribution.
Resources:
Ubuntu IRC Chat
