Ubuntu 7.04 on a Dell Inspiron 710m

Well I got sometime today to reinstall my campus issued laptop with Feisty. Originally I had it dual booting with Windows XP and Ubuntu 6.10 (Beryl Desktop / Pain in the @$$ wi-fi setup). I have to admit, I really was dreading the thought of having problems setting up my on-board Wi-fi card like last time.

So I booted off the Ubuntu Desktop CD-Rom and started installing Ubuntu using the manual partition option and selecting the already existing linux partition which I wanted formated and had to set it as the root / (Note – this was in my case since I already had an linux install I wanted to overwrite). Once that was done the rest was fairly straight forward. Now the tricky part was the wi-fi adapter which seem be detected but failed to work. So after checking out a few posts from the Ubuntu Forum, I came up with the following solution.

Download and install Automatix

Use Automatix to load Ndisdriver support – I know it’s not listed on the picture but if you haven’t installed it – It will be listed here.

Use the Tutorial from the link –

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=285809&highlight=BCM4318

Here is what basically written on the forum post – I’ve changed a few things such as the driver link. Great Thanks and props to nbound for the How-To.

Blacklist native bcm43xx drivers

* Edit Blacklist file
sudo gedit /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist

* Add the line to the file blacklist:
blacklist bcm43xx

* After saving type at the terminal:

sudo rmmod bcm43xx

Get windows drivers and install them

* A) Download and extract windows drivers to a folder of your choice.

For Dell Inspiron 710m – Patched Drivers for Broadcom Wi-fi Vulnerability – Dell Wireless 1470 Dual-Band WLAN miniPCI Card Driver

I know it’s a different card – this driver covers the one for the 710m.

Updated 6/12/07 A list of supported Wifi devices with the driver mentioned above.

Dell Wireless 1470 Dual-Band WLAN miniPCI Card Driver

Network: Dell _Wireless (US) WLAN Card, Wireless 1350 WLAN MiniPCI Card, Wireless 1350 WLAN PC Card, Wireless 1370 WLAN MiniPCI Card, Wireless 1390 WLAN ExpressCard, Wireless 1390 WLAN MiniCard, Wireless 1450 WLAN miniPCI Card, Wireless 1470 Dual-Band WLAN miniPCI Card, Wireless 1490 Dual-Band WLAN MiniCard, Wireless 1500 Draft 802.11n WLAN mini Card, Driver

* Install the driver in ndiswrapper:
sudo ndiswrapper -i /location_of_your_wireless_driver/bcmwl5.inf

* Check to see if hardware found
sudo ndiswrapper -l

* If hardware not found and you are sure you followed the howto you have a different card and this howto will not work.

Setup ndiswrapper to load driver (and itself) at startup

* Edit the following file:

sudo gedit /etc/modules

* Add a line which says:

ndiswrapper

* Restart your laptop

During restart the “Wireless On” light for your laptop should turn on or flash depending on your setup ( Results may vary)

* If light does not show try pressing wireless button (incase left in off mode)

Setup Wireless Card in Networking (Manual setup is also fine)

* System -> Administration -> Networking
* Enable wireless connection and configure all the settings
* Disable wired connection (wireless and wired connections may not work simultaneously – your mileage may vary in this regard, if it doesnt work, it should after extra tinkering that isnt covered here)
* Use the internet/LAN!

Well my wi-fi is up and running now. Next I gotta get my Beryl desktop online and video player setup. Guess I’ll be covering that in a future post.

Edit Update 6/10/07: I forgot that we needed to use the synaptic packager manager to install the 915resolution fix for our screen resolution. It’s there in the list of packages without having to search for it – 915resolution – it will give you 1280 x 800 widescreen resolution without having all the fonts look so big. If you prefer the larger font – I guess you can hold off on installing this package.

We’ll need it for the Beryl install later.

-dhashi