Arch Linux

sharkw

Member

Registered: 2008-02-22

Posts: 2

new install, wireless and kernel problem

Hi, I'm new to Archlinux and ran into a couple of problems on install.  Summary: the package for my wireless card (RTL8180 chipset) works for the kernel installed on default, but does not work with the latest kernel.

Long version: My install (2007.08-2) went fine, however my computer only has a wireless card so I had to get wireless working to connect to the internet and get the system updated.  The driver for my wireless card was not included on the install CD.  I managed to find this package:

http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?ID=3631

which I managed to compile and install(1).  I got my wireless connection working with WEP enabled (modprobe r8180, added module to rc.conf, configured wlan0 etc.), everything worked on reboot as well.  I then updated my system with pacman -Syu, and upon rebooting my system could not load the r8180 module.  The rtl8187 module included with the 2.6.24 kernel does not appear to work for my card(2).  Actually, I even tried recompiling the module from source but it threw an error(3).  I confirmed that this was related to my kernel by rolling back from the 2.6.24 to the original 2.6.22 kernel in the pacman cache, and wireless worked again.  This would constitute a fix, but continuing the install the proprietary driver for my video card nvidia-96xx (onboard GeForce4 video) requires the later kernel(4).

My question: does the packagebuild for my wireless driver need to be updated in some way to work with the latest kernel, or is there some other workaround?

Thanks for any help!

Other questions/comments:

(1) I had a bit of a chicken and egg problem, since I obviously couldn't connect to the internet without my wireless connection.  I ended up just downloading the sources from another system onto a USB drive, and installed the sources with "make" and "make install", I assume that's acceptable?

(2) modprobe rtl8187 loads and registers the module according to dmesg, but I can't bring up any wireless interface.  It appears that there is an rtl-wifi module which is a work in progress.

(3) I'd cut and paste the error here but I forget how to pipe/stdout the console errors upon "make" to a text file, and I'm too lazy to type them all out.

(4) I used the nv driver but it was a bit too unstable in Gnome.  Actually, after installing the proprietary driver I couldn't even get an xterm up but I'm not done troubleshooting that, I might ask another question later.

jacko

Member

Registered: 2007-11-23

Posts: 838

Re: new install, wireless and kernel problem

edit: I take all that back, go here and checkout version 1.10 it should be for kernel 2.6.22 U need d/l the PKGBUILD
http://cvs.archlinux.org/cgi-bin/viewcv … ogsort=rev

then go here and d/l the *.install file, again this is revision 1.3that u want

http://cvs.archlinux.org/cgi-bin/viewcv … ogsort=rev

after u do that, save those two files to a folder in your '~/' home directory and then cd into that folder and issue the command

makepkg -c

and then install the generated package with pacman

pacman -U nvidia-96xx.pkg.tar.gz

installing anything the old fashion way from source will work ok, but there is no easy way to track it and update the program without recompiling from source again. That's why they have package managers, like pacman.

as for your wireless, I don't have a clue, u may find a few tips on kerneltrap.org since it seems the problem is specific to the kernel.

Last edited by jacko (2008-02-22 04:29:29)