Overview
Dell Latitude C400 Notebook
866 MHz Pentium III (M)
512MB Sodimm PC133
100GB Hard Drive
Dell TrueMobile 1350 mini-pci card
Ethernet LAN used during install
Dual Boot:
Windows XP Professional (Dell's Default)
Fedora Core 6
Install
Looking for a Fedora 7 tutorial? Go HERE
I installed Windows first on 25GB of the drive. I'll use grub to
choose which os to use at boot time.
Insert the FC6 DVD and boot.
At the prompt don't just hit enter but type
linux i686 and then enter.
Here's why
Partitioning:
- 25GB - Windows NTFS
- 30GB - Shared Storage FAT
- 1GB SWAP
- Extended EXT3 with 250MB /boot and the remainder / The installer will automatically build the home and system directories under the root/.
I left everything default in the installer except I added the default development packages (required!) and the default kde packages to the install. I wanted to get it working first then I'll customize my applications later.
It installed fine, and now to tweak
things.
Updates are done through yum. By default, yum-updatesd service
runs yum as root and auto-updates your software.
I choose to disable it so I control my updates and because when
it's running in the background it prevents me
from running yum. I also want to prevent too many background
processes running when I'm trying to use this
extremely low resource computer.
To disable it use System/Administration/Services.
Disable it for Runlevel 3 and 5
Wireless!!!
Open a terminal
su need root access (enter root password here)
yum install kernel-devel Needed to compile and
install ndiswrapper.
After install, close terminal.
If yum is busy because yum-updatesd is running in the
background,
you can wait or reboot and then continue with this step.
Install ndiswrapper and add it to the
path
Download the
latest version of ndiswrapper from sourceforge
open a terminal
su need root access (enter root password here)
cd [directory where you downloaded ndiswrapper
to]
tar xzvf ndiswrapper-x.xx.tar.gz Replace x.xx with
version you have
cd ndiswrapper-x.xx Enter the directory created by
untarring the archive
make install install ndiswrapper
echo "PATH=\$PATH:/usr/sbin:/sbin" >> ~/.bashrc su
inherits user's path
Remove Fedora's failed install of the wireless
card
You need to edit the file /etc/modprobe.conf
Add to the end the line:blacklist
bcm43xx
and comment out the line: # alias eth1
bcm43xx
exit terminal
Open System/Administation/Network and delete the entry for your
wireless
card. (eth1)
Now REBOOT but bookmark this page first :)
Get the drivers from Dell
Open terminal
su
cd /usr/local/src location where we'll work with the
drivers
wget http://ftp.dell.com/network/R74092us.EXEGet the
drivers from Dell
mkdir R74092us
cd R74092us
unzip ../R74092us.EXEunzip the drivers
mv IR/* .move required files from IR folder to this
folder
ls List of files should be something like:
Make sure you see the files highlighted in yellow.
Install the drivers
ndiswrapper -i bcmwl5.inf install the driver. That's
a lower-case L not a 1!
Output should be several lines of "forcing some doodad bla bla
bla" and then it will say
it's installed.
Trouble?
Errors? Invalid driver? you don't have the right driver from
Dell.
Uninstall the driver with ndiswrapper -r
bcmwl5
I used this driver because it was the one that worked in Windows
XP. I recommend you do the same.
That is, get it working in Windows and just replace R74092us in
all code above with the driver
you used for Windows. Note, other drivers may not hide the .sys
and .inf files in the IR folder.
They may be in DRIVERS or some other named folder or they might
already be in the main folder. Just
be sure that the bcmwl5.inf and bcmwl5.sys files are in the main
folder with the rest of the files.
And if they were in another folder, go ahead and move all files
from that folder into the main folder.
Verify the driver is installed.
ndiswrapper -l If errors, uninstall (see above)
Installed drivers:
bcmwl5 driver installed, hardware
(14e4:4324) present (alternate driver: bcm43xx)
Bring up wireless at boot time
edit /etc/modprobe.conf again
Add the line alias wlan0
ndiswrapper
Now's a good time again to REBOOT
Confirm it is working
open a terminal
su
iwconfig
lo no wireless extensions.
eth0 no wireless extensions.
etc.
iwlist wlan0 scan should list the nearby access
points
exit terminal
Go online
System/Administraton/Network
click New
click Wireless connection Forward
select ndiswrapper Forward
configure settings for your access point
go ahead now and disconnect your ethernet line
Now's another good time to REBOOT You don't want to get it
working, assume all is well
and then next time you boot up have it not work.
It should work now with only the usual hassles such as you get with wired ethernet
Edit After doing a complete update
since there was a new kernel installed, the wireless adapter failed after
boot. ndiswrapper is compiled against the kernel so it needs to be
recompiled with every new kernel update. That's what I did and it worked
this time anyways. Let me know if I'm wrong about that.
Open a terminal
su
cd [directory containing your extracted ndiswrapper files]
make uninstall
make install
REBOOT
It should now work again. You may have to enable it in the
System/Administration/Network gui.