Windows drivers for WIFI connection

I have a Dell E1405 and I had about the same problem. So what I did was connect with the ethernet cable to do my research, I think I tried three different methods and niether worked. So, finally what I did was at the top right up by the speaker symbol along with the date and time is a symbol of the computer>right on the computer and make sure you have enable wifi checked>then once that is done left click on the computer and select your wireless network.

If that doesn't work respond through the forum and I'll research the info and see if can further help you out or maybe the answer may be in the forum you just need to reword your question when you ask, because the forum will give you a couple of similar questions that may help you out, cause this is only my third day but I get on the forum everyday so I can try to get a better grasp of my new os.

I hope I was of help.

Thank you very much for volunteering to help. I am wired connected. WIFI light on notebook is lit. Right clicked on symbol and both enable networking and enable wireless are checked. Left click on symbol and 'Wireless Networks" is grayed out.

You are very kind to help, .. until UBUNTU sees some hardware, I don't think it is going to detect a wireless network.

I might have found the solution .. System, Administration, Hardware Drivers .... showed something about proprietary drivers .. 2 for Broadcom and another for my Graphics adapter ... I did not fully understand what it was telling me, but I activated all three, .. and one requires a reboot. Will reboot and see what works. If WIFI works, will come back and close this question. Thanks again.

I don't know if I improved things or made them worse. After installing some proprietary drivers, I now get an icon on the panel, .. can't make out what it is, but mousing over says New Restricted Drivers In Use. These are the ones that installed. So, .. OK, . they are proprietary and UBUNTU cannot support them. Whatever. They are certainly not the 'windows drivers' from XP. They got downloaded from somewhere.

Also, the 'computer' icon on the panel now DOES show my home network (did not before restricted drivers). I am asked for the nework password and I enter it (it is a 12-digit HEX number followed by 14 digits). Fails to authenticate. I'm gettin closer.

Hopin for some more help, ... thank you.

This is the driver file from Windows that Ubuntu needs:
bcmwl5.inf in C:\program files\dell\dell wireless WLAN Card\driver

If you install the restricted wl driver, it should recognize the broadcom chipset and work. The light will not change, but it will function.

Thank you. As I mentioned, I copied that .inf file and BCMWL5.SYS from that windows folder to a memory stick. When I click System, Administration, Windows Wireless Drivers, .. a window opens titled Wirless Network Drivers and it shows none installed. I click Install New Driver, point to bcmwl5.inf on the memory stick and click INSTALL. Back to Currently Installed drivers, lists bcmwl5 with a red x and a notation Invalid Driver.

Then, to recover, I Removel the invalid driver. So, I must be doing something wrong, but I do not know what it is. I cannot point to the C:\program files\dell\dell wirless WLAN Card\driver, which is why the .inf and .sys files are on the memory stick.

jfbooth wrote:
> Question #62313 on Ubuntu changed:
> https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/62313
>
> Status: Answered => Open
>
> jfbooth is still having a problem:
> Thank you. As I mentioned, I copied that .inf file and BCMWL5.SYS from
> that windows folder to a memory stick. When I click System,
> Administration, Windows Wireless Drivers, .. a window opens titled
> Wirless Network Drivers and it shows none installed. I click Install
> New Driver, point to bcmwl5.inf on the memory stick and click INSTALL.
> Back to Currently Installed drivers, lists bcmwl5 with a red x and a
> notation Invalid Driver.
>
> Then, to recover, I Removel the invalid driver. So, I must be doing
> something wrong, but I do not know what it is. I cannot point to the
> C:\program files\dell\dell wirless WLAN Card\driver, which is why the
> .inf and .sys files are on the memory stick.
>
>
Have you tried just the wl driver without the windows driver?

I am not sure what fixed it, but it works. Pointing to the Windows .inf file never worked. Kept getting 'invalid driver'.

What did work, I think was System/Administration/hardware drivers which revealed a window that says "Proprietary drivers are being used to make this computer work properly" and there are 3 listed, . Broadcom B43 wireless driver, Broadcom STA wirless driver, and ATI/AMD proprietary FGLRX graphics driver. Green dot by B43 wireless driver and another by ATI graphics driver. Broadcom STA is blue (not activated).

With that, network manager shows my home network. Edit that connection change Wireless Security to WEP 40/128-bit key and AUTHENTICATION to Shared Key ... and it works. I am not sure what the problem was, .. might have been STA driver was active (can't be both B43 and STA), and/or WEP was wrong, or did not have it on SHARED KEY. But with all this, it now works.
thank everyone for your help.

"might have been STA driver was active (can't be both B43 and STA), "

This was probably the problem. I had a similar issue with the Broadcom 1450 where I enabled the b43legacy driver through the Hardware Drivers menu but until I blacklisted the other wireless drivers it would not work properly.

Hello I am Using Ubuntu10.04 on Dell Inspiron 1564. Initially I installed windows wireless driver but it did not work. Then I installed the Proprietary Driver i.e The package that contains Broadcom 802.11 Linux STA wireless driverfor use with Broadcom's BCM4311-, BCM4312-, BCM4321-, andBCM4322-based hardware.

The Wifi started working but here comes a new trouble, Every time I restart my system it does not work then I go to the hardware drivers and it says The driver is active but not currently in use, So every time I restart I have to remove the driver from this Hardware drivers Panel and then Re-activate it to make it function and thats quite a headache.

If I try to remove the Windows Wifi driver to avoid any conflict it does not work, I keep on removing and it stays there. Nothing makes a difference to it. I even removed the application that supports windows driver yet the driver does not go away. I dont know how to remove it. And I do not know how to get rid of this issue that on every restart I have to remove and then activate the driver of wireless from Hardware drivers menu to make it work.

I am sorry but I dont know I have a feeling as if Microsoft has started to work on Ubuntu as such issues are an inheritance of microsoft not linux :) or probably Ubuntu has to work hard on wifi issues and automatic system clock manipulation of the system it is installed on.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thank you All for not Responding :) The Problem is resolved At my end.

Regards