How to install ndiswrapper for the IBM 11a/b/g WLAN adaptor

Usage of the IBM 11 a/b/g adapter with ndiswrapper:

Because I had massive problems getting the madwifi driver running on kernel 2.6.13 I gave ndiswrapper a try - with impressive success:

Reference system

• Thinkpad T41p 2373-GHG
• Kernel 2.6.13
• Ndiswrapper 1.2
• 802.11bg WLAN Mini PCI Express adapter software v 4.1.102.1095

Configuration of Ndiswrapper

I once had the problem that the wireless led status doesn't come up with loading the driver. After a while I figured out that the driver could be configured through a config file. When you load ndiswrapper it tells you through syslog which config file it uses.

dmesg:wlan0: ndiswrapper ethernet device XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX using driver net5211, configuration file XXX:XXX.X.conf

Changing 'gpioPinFunc1|1' to 'gpioPinFunc1|0' in the configuration file should enable the wireless status led.

Advantages of Ndiswrapper

• full power management support (madwifi has no powermanagement support)
• connection to access points establishes fast (madwifi has problems here / especially with dhcp)

There are also some drawbacks of Ndiswrapper against madwifi. Some features that madwifi allready provides are missing in ndiswrapper.

Installation instructions

Note: You can also install the driver from an existing windows system. Mount your windows partition and locate the *.INF file of the windows driver: find -name NET5211.INF