NDISWRAPPER causing login to freeze with popup error

After repeat trial and error, I have determined that ndiswrapper is causing my system to freeze on login with the error of the following...

There was an error starting the GNOME Settings Daemon.

Some things, such as themes, sounds, or background settings may not work correctly.

The last error message was:

Did not receive a reply. Possible causes include: the remote application did not send a reply, the message bus security policy blocked the reply, the reply timeout expired, or the network connection was broken.

GNOME will still try to restart the Settings Daemon next time you log in.

After hours of googling, this apparently has something to do with ndiswrapper and the mrv8k51.inf file for installing the Dlink DWL-G510 Rev.A1 wireless card...which apparently is a big issue that nobody has really come up with a die hard solution. I did find something about my situation causing the eth lo file getting corrupt when you install this stuff but I can't figure out how to alter the file afterwards cause, like I said...I can't log in cause it freezes and gives me the above error so being a Linux newbie I don't know how to do that kind of stuff via text commands and Konsole and recover my system.

So anyway...when I install the Ndiswrapper via the Synaptics Package Manager and install the windows driver .inf file which I downloaded from Dlink, then voila...I've got wireless, and everything works fine. But then when I reboot to make sure everything is set...then I get this problem that I am explaining, so I think It has to do with ndiswrapper and the wireless adapter trying to start automatically when I boot the machine. So then I have to reinstall Ubuntu and start from scratch.

So to make a long question short...how can I make it where I have to manually start the wireless when the machine boots up. I know I can disable the wireless adapter before I shut down but that isn't going to work because what happens if the machine restarts automatically after an update, or the power goes out, or whatever kind of restart that wouldn't allow me to disable the wireless and then I'm back to square one!!

By the way...this is Ubuntu Desktop Edition 8.04 which is the latest...just downloaded and started this business the other day.

Sorry for the rambling, but I just wanted to make myself clear and throw out as much info as possible in case somebody sees something I am missing!!

Thanks...any pointers is appreciated!!

Roger

 

I have exactly the same problem, and its with the same card. Haven't figured it out yet, but I do know that if you pull out your wireless card you can login just fine. Thats how I figured out it was ndiswrapper. If I figure out how to fix it with a manual enable of the network card or another solution I'll post.

 

I've figured out this much....it is indeed caused from ndiswrapper attempting to startup automatically on boot. After much troubleshooting I figured out that as long as I manually start ndiswrapper after boot/login, then everything is fine. But if you either put ndiswrapper in the /etc/modules file...or install the ndiswrapper GUI (ndisgtk)...then you get the login error/freeze

Either install ndiswrapper utils 1.9 and ndiswrapper common either via command line or Synaptics (which will require you to use the Ubuntu OS disk to retrieve the package) but don't install ndisgtk which is the GUI for ndiswrapper. I think it is also part of the problem cause I think it automatically makes ndiswrapper to start at boot, which you don't want since that is what is causing the log in error on boot. Then install your wireless .inf driver file via the terminal interface.

if you are using the DWL-G510 Rev.A1 and only Rev.A1, wireless card (marvell chipset) then this is the steps I do to install it.

Go to the following link and do steps 2.3, 3.1, 3.2, 3.2.1, 3.3, 3.4.2, 3.4.2.1, & 3.5, and that does it for me.

Then you can manually start your wireless after login/boot via the following steps...

Open Terminal and type the following commands in order once it returns to the prompt.

sudo depmod -a
sudo modprobe ndiswrapper

I ended up having to turn off WPA on my network unfortunately cause it kept dropping my connection, so hopefully that might be resolved soon.

I did try doing a startup script but that took me right back to square one!!

Hope that helps you.