Three months ago I posted about getting my Netgear WG511 802.11 b/g wireless card to work in Linux. Well, this weekend I figured out a much, much simpler way, and wanted to update my documentation.
In my previous post I discussed that I had tried the Prism54 method without luck and resorted to the ndiswrapper. Then I proceeded to give lengthy instructions on what I had to do to get the ndiswrapper to work. The last thing I wrote was that you had to put the firmware in the /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware directory to get ndiswrapper to work.
What I didn’t realize is that ndiswrapper wasn’t working at all, and that putting that firmware into /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware was actually enabling Prism54 to work, and therefore was the only step necessary!!
So without further ado, if you want to get your WG511 card working, plug the isl3890 file into the /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware directory and reboot your computer.
There are 2 ways to do this, you can download the PCI driver from Prism54 or you can find the WG511DCB.arm file from Netgear and rename it isl3890. I would offer it for download here, but I don’t want to run into the same problems that Prism54.org have had with making these files publicly available. I actually found it by installing the old driver (I think v1.1) from the CD-ROM that came with the card and looking in C:Program FilesNETGEARWG511Driver, so you might try that first. Once you have this file, simply mkdir /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware if it doesn’t already exist and drop it in there (that’s it!).
Note: One word of caution. My wg511 card says on the BACK in small print on the right side above the MAC address that it is “v2.0″ but my co-worker’s wg511 says on the back that it is “v3.0″ and we cannot get it to work! If you have a v3.0 card and have it working please let me know
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It is indeed! I just updated the blog to reflect that. Thanks Vladimir.
So thanks to you too!
this did not work for me
just if i can get the fucking file
Like Jason said, go to netgear’s site and download the v1.1 for the WG511v1 card. the .arm file is in the driver folder after you run Netgear’s installer program.
I was reading this in order to gain a more complete understanding on where to put my file. As i read it i realised something that i already knew. The firmware folder for the isl3890 (remember to rename it isl3890 not isl3890.arm) is different. For your distro it is the mentioned folder for me it is :/lib/firmware/ (i’m using my custom distro ) but it is still a point i would like to raise
Just posting this for the information of anyone who has the WG511 v2. This card does not use the Prism54 chipset. It uses the Marvell chipset and thus the method described here will NOT work with the WG511 v2 (made in China).
To use the WG511 v2 you need to use the Windows driver found on the netgear website and ndiswrapper – find more info on installing ndiswrapper for your distro here.
hope this helps
Crimperman
i got a WG511 v3.0 (i assume you are talking about the version number written in tiny letters on the back above the MAC and just below th PCC and Canada IDs) using the windows drivers, and ndiswrapper on ubuntu and kubuntu.
I wanted to post the procedure here, but i think it isnt letting me put a comment that big. so i put it up on my blog – you can see it at
http://devilsadvocate-chs.blogspot.com/2006/08/netgear-wg511-wireless-adapter-on.html