Comment 54 for bug 567016

I've been continuing to try to find a workaround for this problem, and I thought I would share what I've tried, what hasn't worked, and what seems now to be working.

First, I tried installing the lastest Linux driver from Realtek's site (v. 2.6.0018.1025.2010) following the readme included with the download. This involves manual installation using "sudo make" and "sudo make install" from the command line. This did not work, and using "make uninstall" broke my wireless completely. (Easy to see why if you look at the makefile: Both install and uninstall go all over the place "rm -rf"ing things, and I consider myself lucky that all I broke was the wireless.) Finally got it "working" again, with the Lucid driver, by uninstalling and reinstalling the kernel in Synaptic, and manually copying the firmware files from the download to /lib/firmware/RTL8192SE. Random freezes, however, persisted.

Second, I tried installing the WinXP driver (v. 1092.1.0802.2010) using ndisgtk. By blacklisting the Lucid kernel module (rtl8192se_pci) in /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf and including ndiswrapper in /etc/modules, I was able to get ndiswrapper to load and install the XP driver. But this didn't work at all, and "sudo lshw -C Network" showed that no driver was associated with the card. Searching /var/log/syslog for "ndiswrapper" showed that it was unable to load the XP driver because of a couple of "unknown symbol" errors. The Windows 7 driver produced a similar result. Basically, the Windows drivers appeared not to be compatible with ndiswrapper.

I subsequently discovered that the 32-bit XP drivers may in fact work with ndiswrapper, but the 64-bit drivers (which is what I use) are known not to work. So you 32-bitters may be able to go this route, if necessary.

Finally, I tried installing the Realtek Linux driver (version above) using the modified procedure of "sudo make" followed by "sudo checkinstall." (Checkinstall packages the installation such that it can be removed later using Synaptic, if needed.) This worked, in that it did indeed install the new driver and it does now connect. I would also note that the signal strength in my small apartment is now shown as three or four bars, instead of one or two before. What I don't yet know is whether it fixed the biggest problem, which was the random OS freezes. I will report back once I have enough connects under my belt to get a sense of that.

I still think, though, that this would benefit from a "real" solution. This card may be hated, but it is very common, and it is frequently installed on laptops (such as my Lenovo X201) with BIOS locks preventing the owner from installing other wireless cards. It is possible to hack the BIOS to get around this, but in doing so one runs the risk of bricking one's laptop, which I am not willing to do.