Installing Wireless Drivers [Fedora 8.0]

Sean^DCT4

Hi all,

I've been messing around with a couple of distro's of Linux on VM's (Ubuntu and Fedora).

I have a motherboard Asus P5E3 Deluxe/WIFI-AP which has linux drivers on the cd that came with it.

I am following the readme.txt that also came with the cd. It says:

Supporting Kernel: 
=================== 
linux kernel 2.4 and 2.6 series.  
Tested in Redhat 7.3 or later. 

....

Build Instructions:   
=================== 
1> $tar -xvzf RT2870_Linux_STA_Drv_x.x.x.x.tar.gz 
    go to "./RT2870_Linux_STA_Drv_x.x.x.x/" directory. 
 
[B]2> prepare the firmware (bin file) and the profile (dat file). 
    $cp common/rt2870.bin /etc/Wireless/RT2870STA/ 
    $cp RT2870STA.dat  /etc/Wireless/RT2870STA/  [/B]
 
3> compile the source code. 
    $make all 

....

When I try Step2 I get the following error:

[Sean@localhost ~]$ cd Desktop/
[Sean@localhost Desktop]$ ls
2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0
[Sean@localhost Desktop]$ cd 2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/
[Sean@localhost 2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0]$ ls
common  include  Makefile  os  README.txt  RT2870STA.dat  sta  tools
[Sean@localhost 2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0]$ cp common/rt2870.bin /etc/Wireless/RT2870STA/
[B]cp: cannot create regular file `/etc/Wireless/RT2870STA/': No such file or directory[/B]
[Sean@localhost 2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0]$ cp RT2870STA.dat  /etc/Wireless/RT2870STA/ 
[B]cp: cannot create regular file `/etc/Wireless/RT2870STA/': No such file or directory[/B]
[Sean@localhost 2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0]$ 

I have googled and googled and cannot seem to get an answer to this
Could someone please help me out here as I'm sure it's something trivial?

Many thanks in advance,

Seany

niallb

You need to be logged in as 'root' to write to the /etc/ directory.
Basically, you are changing the system, so you need to be an administrator.

Type in the command su and give the root password when prompted.
Your prompt will change to [root@localhost /home/Seano/Desktop]$# if succesful.

Then type cp common/rt2870.bin RT2870STA.dat /etc/Wireless/RT2870STA/

You may also need to create the Wireless directory before you can copy these files into it.
mkdir /etc/Wireless

Sean^DCT4

Thanks niallb, I already tried that and have now created the directory.

Unfortunately, when I try to run 'make all' I get the following errors, as:

Normal User:

[Sean@localhost 2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0]$ make all
make -C tools
make[1]: Entering directory `/home/Sean/Desktop/2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/tools'
gcc -g bin2h.c -o bin2h
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/Sean/Desktop/2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/tools'
/home/Sean/Desktop/2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/tools/bin2h
[B]Can't open write file /home/Sean/Desktop/2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/include/firmware.h [/B]
make: *** [build_tools] Error 255

Root User:

[Sean@localhost 2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0]$ su
Password: 
[root@localhost 2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0]# make all
make -C tools
make[1]: Entering directory `/home/Sean/Desktop/2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/tools'
gcc -g bin2h.c -o bin2h
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/Sean/Desktop/2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/tools'
/home/Sean/Desktop/2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/tools/bin2h
cp -f os/linux/Makefile.6 os/linux/Makefile
make  -C  /lib/modules/2.6.23.15-137.fc8/build SUBDIRS=/home/Sean/Desktop/2007_0508_RT2870_Linux_STA_v1.0.0.0/os/linux modules
make: *** /lib/modules/2.6.23.15-137.fc8/build: No such file or directory.  Stop.
make: *** [LINUX] Error 2

p.s. /lib/modules/2.6.23.15-137.fc8/build does exist. So I don't understand this error (as root user).

Any help would be greatly appreciated.


Seány

Sean^DCT4

It's no wonder Windows is a more popular OS than linux

Still can't get the most basic of things done with linux i.e. install wireless drivers.

Windows > DOS > Linux in my opinion after a week of messing around with Fedora and Ubuntu.

PogMoThoin

Not really an expert, but did you try ndiswrapper? It allows you to use the windows driver for the wireless device. There is also ndisgtk, which is a Gui for ndiswrapper.

Hotblack Desiato

RTFM. You will probably need to install the kernel sources and a few other prerequisites.

Or, just blame the OS :rolleyes:

Hotblack Desiato

PogMoThoin wrote: »

Not really an expert, but did you try ndiswrapper? It allows you to use the windows driver for the wireless device. There is also ndisgtk, which is a Gui for ndiswrapper.

I had to use ndiswrapper on my previous laptop (until the next distro release supported the card natively.) It's a hassle to install and configure, and you may be stuck with only WEP security (i.e. none). As a native driver seems to exist for the OP, it's less hassle in the long run to get it working. Also I would suggest trying Ubuntu or openSUSE rather than Fedora for a newbie (if Fedora is anything like as unfriendly to configure as RHEL )

niallb

Sean^DCT4 wrote: »

It's no wonder Windows is a more popular OS than linux

Still can't get the most basic of things done with linux i.e. install wireless drivers.

Thing is, installing wireless drivers for a brand new piece of 802.11n hardware
is far from being the "most basic" thing you'll ever do with a computer.
The drivers just aren't completely finished yet. Older hardware tends to work fine.
People will see this with Vista too as more old hardware will never have drivers written.

The drivers on the CD mention being tested in Redhat 7.3 or newer (7.3 came out in 2002),
but a lot of these wireless drivers are being worked more closely into the kernel now, so the
older ones can run into problems - the end result of this is that next year, it'll probably
just autodetect your wireless without any need for an extra driver.

p.s. /lib/modules/2.6.23.15-137.fc8/build does exist. So I don't understand this error (as root user).

Do an ls -l /lib/modules/2.6.23.15-137.fc8/build and I think you'll find the directory
it's pointing at doesn't exist. It's a 'symlink' like a windows 'shortcut'.
It's no use if the destination object doesn't exist.
As ninja900 metnioned, this can be solved buy installing the kernel source.

One thing, I may just be wrong, but I thought the drivers you're trying to build
were for a USB wireless adapter - are there any others on the CD?
Take a look at the company's home page RaLink for more up to date drivers.

This sounds like a great motherboard, and the top end version already has linux installed on it in the BIOS!
There should be far more support online than you've yet found.

You're trying to run before you can walk though. Find a copy of the driver someone else
has compiled and save yourself the woe. You'll need to add an 'apt repository' as those drivers simply aren't in the ones enabled by default.

Let me know what the wireless chipset is, and I'll have a go at building the driver for you
if you still have trouble.
Post up the output of the command 'lspci' , so that we can see exactly what it is.