Netgear wg311v2 Installation

[gnsivamail]

Hi,

I have been using Netgear wg311v2 with XP for one year. Now I want to use it on my fedora 11 which is installed along with XP.

I have no physical internet connection.

When I search here, I learnt that I have to install ndiswrapper. When I downloaded(in XP) and installed(fedora11) an rpm for ndiswrapper named fc11.i586(I forget complete name)
It failed.

Could anybody give me some installation notes so that i can install offline.

I have fedora11 32 bit
Pentium 4
945 chipset

Thanks in Advance
Siva

[bbfuller]

Hello gnsivamail

It looks like your wg311v2 uses the acx111 chipset and that seems to need ndiswrapper.

It is possible to install ndiswrapper from the fedora rpmfusion repositories without an internet connection. Here are the notes for doing it:

If you want to install the ndiswrapper rpm's from rpmfusion without an internet connection then you need to know which kernel you are running.

uname -a

from a terminal will tell you that. My machine reports:

2.6.29.4-167.fc11.i686.PAE

The important parts to note for the kernel on your machine are the equivalent to the parts I've marked in red.

Go to this site:

http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/...thing/i386/os/

You will need a file like:

kmod-ndiswrapper-2.6.29.4-167.fc11.i686.PAE-1.54-4.fc11.8.i686.rpm

but that matches your kernel number and architecture, the parts I have highlighted red, and a file like:

kmod-ndiswrapper-PAE-1.54-4.fc11.8.i686.rpm

note how the parts of this file name match the previous file, and finally like:

ndiswrapper-1.54-4.fc11.i586.rpm

that again matches the other two. Don't worry, the architecture for this one is the basic architecture.

Transfer them all to a folder on your linux machine where there are no other rpm files..

In a terminal, acquire full root rights by issuing the command:

su -

that's a space and a minus sign after the su.

Then use the cd command to change into the folder where you have the three rpm files.

Use the command:

rpm -ivh *.rpm

to install the three files. By using a wild card they should be able to sort out their interrelated dependencies for themselves.

That should get ndiswrapper installed.

If you are OK with that part, just one word of caution. ndiswrapper doesn't like Vista drivers, make sure you use your Windows XP one with it.

That assumes by the way, that you haven't had the opportunity to update fedora since you installed it. If you have then the ndiswrapper packages you require may be here:

http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/...dates/11/i386/

instead.

If you need help setting ndiswrapper up afterwards, post back. I have notes for that as well.

[gnsivamail]

Hi bbfuller,

I have installed netgear driver with ndiswrapper.
Could you guide me to configure netgear with WPA encryption?

Regards,
Siva

[bbfuller]

Hello gnsivamail

These are the general notes for setting up ndiswrapper after install. NetworkManager which I refer to below is an icon in the notification area of both Gnome and KDE just to the left of the clock. If wireless is working, clicking on it should produce a list of available wireless networks, clicking on one of those............

Then set up and configure ndiswrapper with:

ndiswrapper -i <path to your windows driver file>.inf

should install the driver,

ndiswrapper -l

if it is going to work should return "driver present" and "hardware present"

modprobe ndiswrapper

should load the driver into the kernel, but probably only until you reboot.

If you are lucky now and NetworkManager is running then after a short while it 'may' begin reporting wireless networks. NetworkManager is the preferred method of connecting to wireless networks with Fedora and should be located in the notification area of either KDE or Gnome just to the lefto of the clock.

If it works, or indeed if it doesn't you will also need to run:

ndiswrapper -mi

to ensure the ndiswrapper module loads each time of booting.

Please remember that ndiswrapper is only happy with Windows XP/98 drivers and doesn't get on with Windows Vista drivers. Of those it doesn't happily co-exist with all XP/98 drivers either. Be prepared to experiment if your original doesn't work.

[gnsivamail]

Hi bbfuller,

My netgear is working fine.

Thank you very much. I have no other words to appreciate your help.
Regards,
Siva

[bbfuller]

Hello Siva,

It's what the forum is here for. Actually, when something tuns out well, like this, it's almost as good as doing it on your own machine.

Enjoy the wireless.

Bernard.

[gnsivamail]

Hi bbfuller,

I have a problem now. After I update F11 up-to-date and restarted my system, Netgear doesn't get detected.
When I queried using the commands you posted here, it said wg311 is installed but in addition it said "some deprecation in future releases" and configuration files should have .conf extension.

After renaming using "cat" command I was able to rename it.

But "ndiswrapper -m" command creates another ndiswrapper file.

As you told me to configure wireless using network manager,I did so.

At that time a device named "Marvell Technology" displayed. Now its not.

I hope you can help me.

Thanks & Regards,
Siva

[bbfuller]

Hello gnsivamail

The reason for that can be found in the three ndiswrapper packages you downloaded. One of them is specific to the kernel that you are running at any time.

If you have the rpmfusion repositories enabled on your machine, the required kernel module will usually be pulled in as the kernel updates. If you haven't got rpm fusion enabled then the kernel moduke doesn't get pulled in and wireless fails for that kernel.

The short term fix is to download and install the new kmod package. Just the single package that is equivalent to this one:

kmod-ndiswrapper-2.6.29.4-167.fc11.i686.PAE-1.54-4.fc11.8.i686.rpm

but matches your new kernel.

The good news about that is that fedora keeps three kernels installed, and if you select your previous kernel from the Grub boot menu you should find that wireless resumes working and you will be able to do it in Linux without the need to get the file in windows and transfer it.

The longer term solution is to install the rpmfusion repositories. This command run as root will install them for you and prevent the situation arising gain.

rpm -Uvh htt://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-stable.noarch.rpm htt://download1.rpmfusion.org/nonfree/fedora/rpmfusion-nonfree-release-stable.noarch.rpm

Edit: Unfortunately, long url's don't seem to paste very well into the forum. To make that one appear at all correctly, I've had to edit it and in the two instances where it says 'htt' you will of course need to amend it to 'http'

[gnsivamail]

Hi Bernard,

Temporarily I switch to old kernel and I got wireless back now. I will inform you after I do changes.

Thank you,
Siva