Wireless HP Pavilion dv9000 issue

[Snat]

Edit: Sat 5th of Dec, 2009

 

Well, I have finally found my answer at the end. Mandriva Linux was working all this time (only tested in Mandriva 2009.1 but I am guessing Mandriva 2010 will work as well but if you see no questions from me on here after this, then you know it does ;)), there wasn't actually anything wrong with it. The drivers was installed (which is why it worked when I tried it first time). I found out why it wasn't working after I was using Windows 7 after some time. Windows 7 suddenly stopped working with the wireless and only worked randomly when it was heated up (this was also the case with running it with Mandriva). I learnt that the actual motherboard of the HP Pavilion dv9000 had very major problem in which the graphic card would stop working after a certain amount of use. This also caused the wireless/bluetooth module to "disconnect" from the motherboard. If you wireless isn't picked up and your bluetooth don't connect <- You are affected by this issue.

 

This motherboard issue is actually an easy fix and I ain't sure if I can post it on here, so PM me if you would like to know how to do it (involves soldering). I can confirm that Mandriva DOES work with HP Pavilion dv9000 and it works very well. The other webcam issue I had was also an easy fix and once I find that topic again, I will post on how I did it.

 

For those people whom has this model, if you bug HP CEO enough times, he will actually give in (well some people had success) but I will post a guide somewhere on how to fix the motherboard issue. Sadly, this fix won't be to helpful for long without installing another fan inside (this will cause less battery life and be a bit louder) as the issue could happen again.

 

-- Original post below

Well, I have another problem but sadly this problem isn't one I can just ignore :(

 

I have a HP Pavilion dv9000 (dv9206eu) that I used to connect to the internet with by using a external USB. That USB sadly broke this morning and I am out of luck with connecting to the internet wirelessly. I am currently connected via an connecting to the router via cable but sadly I am unable to run this all the way upstairs where I wish to use the laptop.

 

I have tried using ndiswrapper with the Window version of the driver (XP, Vista both 32 & 64) which I downloaded from HP site. The command I used was. (For notice, I couldn't add it using MCC as it said it wasn't supported).

 

ndiswrapper -i '/home/snat/.wine/drive_c/SWSetup/Vista Drivers/bcmwl6.inf'

 

I then got it said it has installed it and it has been added. I then did the following:

 

[root@localhost snat]# ndiswrapper -l
bcmwl6 : driver installed

 

Then, I done the following

 

[root@localhost snat]# ndiswrapper -ma 
module configuration information is stored in /etc/modprobe.d/ndiswrapper

 

After that, I ran the following command

 

modprobe ndiswrapper

 

Naturally, it didn't work (not sure if it should do at this point) so I decided to check to see if it was picking it up. So I ran the following command,

 

[root@localhost snat]# iwconfig
lo		no wireless extensions.

eth0 no wireless extensions.

pan0 no wireless extensions.

 

So, it found nothing and after this, I have no clue what to do. I have "tried" to install the "bcmxx" or whatever they are called drivers but sadly no luck. If anyone has a hint on what to do next, please do let me know (and please do not let that answer be get a new wireless card etc as I don't want to get one if I can use it internally first).

 

Many thanks for reading.

Edited December 5, 2009 by Snat

[Snat]

I have looked into this a bit more, but sadly it seems that it might be possible that my wireless card isn't detected at all. I say this as when I ran the same command that someone else did on Ubuntuforums, I couldn't see any of my wireless on there.

 

[root@localhost snat]# lspci
00:00.0 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation C51 Host Bridge (rev a2)
00:00.1 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation C51 Memory Controller 0 (rev a2)
00:00.2 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation C51 Memory Controller 1 (rev a2)
00:00.3 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation C51 Memory Controller 5 (rev a2)
00:00.4 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation C51 Memory Controller 4 (rev a2)
00:00.5 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation C51 Host Bridge (rev a2)
00:00.6 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation C51 Memory Controller 3 (rev a2)
00:00.7 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation C51 Memory Controller 2 (rev a2)
00:02.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation C51 PCI Express Bridge (rev a1)
00:03.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation C51 PCI Express Bridge (rev a1)
00:04.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation C51 PCI Express Bridge (rev a1)
00:09.0 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation MCP51 Host Bridge (rev a2)
00:0a.0 ISA bridge: nVidia Corporation MCP51 LPC Bridge (rev a3)
00:0a.1 SMBus: nVidia Corporation MCP51 SMBus (rev a3)
00:0a.3 Co-processor: nVidia Corporation MCP51 PMU (rev a3)
00:0b.0 USB Controller: nVidia Corporation MCP51 USB Controller (rev a3)
00:0b.1 USB Controller: nVidia Corporation MCP51 USB Controller (rev a3)
00:0d.0 IDE interface: nVidia Corporation MCP51 IDE (rev f1)
00:0e.0 IDE interface: nVidia Corporation MCP51 Serial ATA Controller (rev f1)
00:10.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation MCP51 PCI Bridge (rev a2)
00:10.1 Audio device: nVidia Corporation MCP51 High Definition Audio (rev a2)
00:14.0 Bridge: nVidia Corporation MCP51 Ethernet Controller (rev a3)
00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] HyperTransport Technology Configuration
00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Address Map
00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] DRAM Controller
00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Miscellaneous Control
05:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation G70 [GeForce Go 7600] (rev a1)
07:05.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller
07:05.1 SD Host controller: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C822 SD/SDIO/MMC/MS/MSPro Host Adapter (rev 19)
07:05.2 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C843 MMC Host Controller (rev 0a)
07:05.3 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C592 Memory Stick Bus Host Adapter (rev 05)
07:05.4 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd xD-Picture Card Controller (rev ff)

 

Sorry if I have bumped this too early, I am just adding what I have found out as I go along incase anyone was about to do the same. The other person post can be seen here - http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=598...amp;postcount=3

Edited May 4, 2009 by Snat

[Greg2]

It would help us to know what version of Mandriva you're using, and if it's 32 or 64-bit? If you're using 2009.1, you should be able to install and use the dkms-broadcom-wl package from the non-free repo.

ndiswrapper -i '/home/snat/.wine/drive_c/SWSetup/Vista Drivers/bcmwl6.inf'

I don't believe that you can use ndiswrapper with NDIS 6 (Vista driver version) yet. Here's the driver I would try to use: hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareDownloadIndex

Then extract (using cabextract) the bcmwl5.inf and bcmwl5.sys for ndiswrapper to use.

[Snat]

I am using Mandriva 2009.1. I will try again with the other driver you linked me too. I will try "dkms-broadcom-w" afterwards. It is in the standard repo ?

 

I have tried the driver and it came up with

 

No device supporting the bcmwl5 ndiswrapper driver is present

 

Okay, I installed dkms-broadcom-w via urpmi, do I need to do anything else ?

Edited May 4, 2009 by Snat

[Greg2]

Go to 'Configure your computer' > 'Network and Internet' > 'Remove a connection', then select and remove all of your wireless connections. Remove ndiswrapper and edit your /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-mdv file by adding the lines:

blacklist ndiswrapper
blacklist b43

then reboot your system. If your laptop has a wireless switch, is it turned on? Then go to 'Configure your computer' > 'Network and Internet' > 'Set up a new network interface', and configure your wireless card using the wl module.

 

Let us know if that works?

[Snat]

Okay, some good news for people that is reading this. Update your BIOS first and then try it and you will see you get further :)

 

I will keep you updated.

 

UPDATE

 

Okay, good news at last. Right, when I tried in Windows XP, Vista and 7, it worked when I first installed it however it stopped. This was the same with Ubuntu after a while playing however, it stopped. However, I have noticed something in common. That once I run it on battery and when it goes to stand by etc, when I boot it back up with the plug it stopped working. So, after some playing around, I learnt that Windows stopped the wireless from working as a part of it power saving and that my laptop didn't know once it was back on plug (known issue according to HP).

 

So I ask this final question about my wireless. Is there a hidden power saving in Mandriva, that I do not know off ?

Edited May 7, 2009 by Snat