Ubuntu – How to install Netgear N-300 UAB adapter WNA3100 on Ubuntu 12.04

ndiswrappernetgearnetworkingusbwireless

After a fresh install of Ubuntu 12.04, the first thing I'm trying to do, is to setup my wireless adapter. I can see it using lsusb:

 beer@beer-linux:~$ lsusb
 ...
 Bus 002 Device 006: ID 0846:9020 NetGear, Inc. WNA3100(v1) Wireless-N 300 [Broadcom BCM43231] 
 ...

I have found a lot of dated instructions on the net and just wanted to know what the right way is to set it up on 12.04. I don't want to mess up a brand new install by tweaking things that don't need tweaking.

According to most posts, you have to install the Windows drivers using the ndiswrapper package. Is this still the right way to go? If so, it would be great if someone could write down the steps to do this under 12.04

Best Answer

Thanks for the tips and advice. I spent 3 hours on the problem and finally gave up with the Netgear USB Wifi adapter. I'm done struggling with Netgear hardware on Linux.

I drove to the closest PC shop and bought an Edimax EW-77IIUAn 150 Mbps Wireless USB adapter. It worked out of the box - No installation whatsoever :-) I plugged it in, and Ubuntu immediately detected it and connected to my wireless network.

Sometimes it's just not worth the trouble to get around driver issues.

UPDATE

For compatible hardware it's a good idea to look at these sites:

Ubuntu Friendly (though it's by system rather than part)
Ubuntu hardware support page

For wireless cards you can go directly to the wireless support page.

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Ubuntu – Attempting to install netgear N300 Wireless USB Adapter on Ubuntu without a present internet connection

OP Posted:

I FIGURED IT OUT! I installed the driver: bcmwlhigh5.inf, using ndiswrapper (don't ask me what version, I don't know) to check stats and window wireless drivers to install I was able to get the device working and communicating! That is awesome.

Ubuntu – (re) mount usb device

Figure out its uuid:

(At least once, under whatever circumstances, if nothing helps, by mounting it on a friends machine). First, let's get the current id. (that can change again, on another time)

mount | grep ^/dev

You should somewhere should recognize its actual name here,

/dev/sda4...
/dev/sda5 on /boot ...
/dev/sdc1 on /media/frank/iPhoneWhatsoever...
/dev/sdc2 on /media/frank/my BackupDrive...

Now, say, it's sdb1. Let's figure out its truly unique uuid:

$> ll /dev/disk/by-uuid/ | grep sdc1

Should get you a fairly long string (often hex, sometimes with dashes)

lrwxrwxrwx [...]  366A2F886A2F003A -> ../../sdc1

manual mount

directory must pre-exist, not taken care of. so generate it (only once, ever):

sudo mkdir /media/myFx

And here we go

mount /dev/disk/by-uuid/366A2F886A2F003A /media/myFX

manual unmount

sudo umount /dev/disk/by-uuid/366A2F886A2F003A

Additionally if not done yet, add it to /etc/fstab. For that or for mount command (see man pages) you might want to use additional parameters, if there are problems with your preferred user rights, a ‘rare’ drive format etc... Just as a sketch:

sudo mount -t ntfs -o umask=007,gid=046,uid=0,nls=utf8 /dev/disk/by-uuid/366A2F886A2F003A /media/myFX

Best Answer

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Ubuntu – Attempting to install netgear N300 Wireless USB Adapter on Ubuntu without a present internet connection

Ubuntu – (re) mount usb device

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