Wireless networking not working

Hi,

A generally helpful info is the name of the wireless card ( typing:

lspci | grep Wireless

in a terminal generally does the job)

There is still a chance for an easy fix: some drivers are not included in the default CD, but they exist. You can just try to plug your computer in a network cable and activate the wireless at the same time. Ubuntu should propose you to install something to make the wireless work.

Another possibility is that the wireless may be physically shut down (it is common to have such a switch on modern laptops). Are you sure the wireless LED is on?

Hope this helps!

Thanks for your reply

when i typed lspci | grep Wireless the output was this:

03:03.0 Network Controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless LAN Contoller (rev 02)

The wired port on the computer does not work, wireless is my only option. This computer does not have an external switch. I had shut the device off in windows before replacing windows with Ubuntu.

Hi,

Please follow this procedure:

http://www.sampbar.com/2008/11/broadcom-bcm4318-ubuntu-intrepid.html

Regards,

Mark

Thanks for your help, think this got me closer but...

at step 5 after the the second line I get an "Invalid Driver" message.

also, when I try to move the wifi.sh file to /etc/init.d folder I get an error message Error moving file: Permission denied
(you can probably tell I am really new at all this.)

Also, in case it is relevant, when I go to System>Administration>Hardware Drivers there are no wireless drivers listed.

On the other hand, when I boot with linux Puppy from a CD my wireless is working fine, so all the necessary stuff must be there.

Hi,

Step 4 explains where to put the .inf file that is stored in http://fluzzed.com/index/BCM4318-Ubuntu-Intrepid.zip

To make it easier, extract the contents of http://fluzzed.com/index/BCM4318-Ubuntu-Intrepid.zip to your homedirectory instead (something like /home/<your username>)

Then use the command

cd

to go directly to your homedirectory where you extracted the bcmwl5a.inf file.

Now the command

sudo ndiswrapper -i bcmwl5a.inf

should work.

/etc/init.d is a system folder. So the sudo command is needed to be able to copy wifi.sh with root privileges.

So you need to use something like this:

cd <directory where wifi.sh is stored, to make it easy, put wifi.sh in your homedirectory first>
sudo cp wifi.sh /etc/init.d

Hope this clarifies the instructions,

Regards,

Mark

Thanks so much for your help. I was able to move wifi.sh into /etc/init.d. Back at step 5, however, my problem is actually at line 3:

sudo ndiswrapper -l returns
bcmwl5a : invalid driver! (the ! is in the message not my editorial comment.)

Thanks again,

Matthew

Hi Matthew,

First make sure you extract all the contents of http://fluzzed.com/index/BCM4318-Ubuntu-Intrepid.zip to the same directory on your pc. Only extracting the .inf file is not enough, I think.

After that, try running the following commands in the directory where you extracted all the contents of the .zip file:

sudo ndiswrapper -e bcmwl5a
sudo ndiswrapper -i bcmwl5a
sudo ndiswrapper -i bcmwl5a.inf
sudo ndiswrapper -l

Regards,

Mark