Wireless went flaky !

[Ken Nordquist]

Kim Lux wrote:
> I've been using wireless on my laptop for 2 years.  I used to use
> ndiswrapper.  For the last few months I've been using bcm43xx.  
>
> The other night I was working away, listening to an Internet radio
> broadcast when my wireless connection quit.  I can't remember if I
> installed any updates that day or not.  
>
> Ever since then my wireless connection has been flaky.  Sometimes it
> works, sometimes it doesn't.  
>
> Did something change software wise recently ?
>
> Is it time to install ndiswrapper again ?
>   
I had the same problem until recently.  As a general rule, I download 
the latest and greatest version of ndiswrapper and create rpm's 
(rpmbuild -ta ndiswrapper-VERSION.tar.gz) instead of using someone 
else's rpm's.  My system is an HP Pavilion laptop with a Broadcom 
AirForce One NIC.

ndiswrapper: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=93482
I downloaded this driver: 
ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp33001-33500/sp33008.exe ***note: extract 
using cabextract

'ndiswrapper -l' to see the driver you are using
'ndiswrapper -r DRIVERNAME' to remove the driver
'ndiswrapper -i /PATH/TO/DRIVER/bcmwl5.inf' to install the driver

'service wpa_supplicant restart' to restart the wpa_supplicant service
'service NetworkManager restart' to restart the NetworkManager service 
(if you use it)

...or reboot.

The next time you reboot, you should see something like this in 'dmesg'
ndiswrapper version 1.37 loaded (preempt=no,smp=yes)
ndiswrapper (link_pe_images:577): fixing KI_USER_SHARED_DATA address in 
the driver
ndiswrapper: driver bcmwl5 (Broadcom,03/23/2006, 4.40.19.0) loaded

I have had *NO* problems with my wireless since I changed my wireless 
driver.

-- 
Ken Nordquist
"Did I Do That?!"