Newbie :: Need Help Installing iwlwifi-3945 driver

[hansonc]

I opened the readme file and it is all french to a newbie, really wish they would have wrote the install isntructions for a beginner, but no biggie. Could you please help me figure out how to install the driver so that i can hopefully resolve the wlan and eth01 issues at boot?

As for the section that doesn't make sense, it's the "2. Installation" section in it's entirety, i don't know where the device drivers files are held, let alone how to configure a kernel:



<font color=#0000FF">
The iwlwifi-3945 driver will look for the file iwlwifi-3945.ucode using the

kernel's firmware_loader infrastructure. In order to function

correctly, you need to have this support enabled in your kernel. When

you configure the kernel, you can find this option in the following

location:



Device Drivers ->

Generic Driver Options ->

Hotplug firmware loading support





You can determine if your kernel currently has firmware loader support

by looking for the CONFIG_FW_LOADER definition on your kernel's

.config.



In addition to having the firmware_loader support in your kernel, you

must also have a working hotplug and udev infrastructure configured.

The steps for installing and configuring hotplug and udev are very

distribution specific.



Once you have the firmware loader in place (or if you aren't sure and

you just want to try things to see if it works), you need to install

the microcode file into the appropriate location.



Where that appropriate location is depends (again) on your system

distribution. You can typically find this location by looking in the

hotplug configuration file for your distro:



% grep \"^FIRMWARE_DIR\" /etc/hotplug/firmware.agent



This should give you output like:



FIRMWARE_DIR=/lib/firmware



If it lists more than one directory, you only need to put the

microcode in one of them. In the above example, installation is

simply:



% cp iwlwifi-3945.ucode /lib/firmware



You can now load the driver (see the INSTALL and

README.iwlwifi-3945 provided with the iwlwifi-3945 package for

information on building and using that driver.)
</font>

[bbfuller]

Hello hansonc

If you are running Fedora 8 you don't need to do anything with the iwl driver for the 3945 card, it's included in the basic installation.

If you use the command:

su -

in a terminal to obtain full root rights. That is a space and a minus sign after the su. It gives you full root rights over your machine whereas su only gives you root rights within the areas accessible to your originating user.

Then use:

iwconfig

Then according to the output of that:

iwlist wlan0 scan

and we will see how far your card is being recognised.

Obviously in the unlikely event that your card is not identified as wlan0 in the first command, substitute what it is called in the second command.

Copy and paste back the results and we'll decide what next.

[hansonc]

Okay makes sense... I am using NetworkManager for the time being... not bad as it is the only app that seems to allow me to connect to any WiFi.

If I let wlan0 go from boot it never finds anything and eventually fails. I also get highly anoid w/ NetworkManager in the fact that it asks me for a keyring password everytime and asks me for my router password everytime... i guess alot of it is my own neglegence.. Hopefully you could help me resolve alot of these issues. Here is the info you asked for:

lo no wireless extensions.

eth0 no wireless extensions.

wmaster0 no wireless extensions.

wlan0 IEEE 802.11 ESSID:"Je Ne Sais Pas"
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.462 GHz Access Point: 00:0F:66:0D:1E:CA
Bit Rate=54 Mb/s Tx-Power=14 dBm
Retry min limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr=2352 B
Encryption key:910A-53BC-0E47-693B-0650-90B9-37E1-17C8-E4FD-0563-E6D0-0739-2E79-B477-DAA8-EEB2 [2]
Link Quality=97/100 Signal level=-58 dBm Noise level=-97 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0

AND

wlan0 Scan completed :
Cell 01 - Address: 00:15:05:ED:7A:10
ESSID:"A3QQ7"
Mode:Master
Frequency:2.427 GHz (Channel 4)
Channel:4
Quality=26/100 Signal level=-93 dBm Noise level=-127 dBm
Encryption key:on
Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s
9 Mb/s; 12 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s; 24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s
48 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s
Extra:tsf=00000159fa082407
Cell 02 - Address: 00:0F:66:0D:1E:CA
ESSID:"Je Ne Sais Pas"
Mode:Master
Frequency:2.462 GHz (Channel 11)
Channel:11
Quality=90/100 Signal level=-60 dBm Noise level=-96 dBm
Encryption key:on
IE: WPA Version 1
Group Cipher : TKIP
Pairwise Ciphers (1) : TKIP
Authentication Suites (1) : PSK
Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s
24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s; 9 Mb/s
12 Mb/s; 48 Mb/s
Extra:tsf=00000011338bb477
Cell 03 - Address: 00:11:50:F7:48:B9
ESSID:"J_B_Network"
Mode:Master
Frequency:2.437 GHz (Channel 6)
Channel:6
Quality=24/100 Signal level=-94 dBm Noise level=-127 dBm
Encryption key:off
Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s
9 Mb/s; 12 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s; 24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s
48 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s
Extra:tsf=000001599da36580


Cheers!

[bbfuller]

Hello hansonc

I assume you to mean that you are now connected to the internet and able to surf and e-mail OK?

The keyring thing can be a problem if you don't understand it the first time it appears.

If you are connecting to an encrypted network then unless you have some managing software you would expect to have to enter the full network key each time you connect.

My network key is fairly long and I wouldn't like that so the keyring thing should store your long wireless key and produce it for NetworkManager when needed after you have given the password that it will ask for and which you give first time.

Why doesn't it just store the key like windows and connect automatically? Well, that's part of the Linux security model. Don't log in without password, don't get root access without password, don't connect to an external network without some sort of authorisation. i.e. a password. I'm afraid you won't get round that.

If you need to restart with the keyring, its configuration is stored in:

<yourhomefolder>/.gnome2/keyrings/default.keyring

it can be deleted and will start again with a blank file asking for keys and passwords again