Unable to add WLAN0 after plugging in wifi adapter

[LostSoul451]

Hello everyone,

I apologize for another wifi issue post I am sure you all see plenty of these. I have been reading forums, walk-throughs, and watching youtube videos and haven't had any luck as of yet. Here is the situation, I am running a Windows 10 laptop and using the free VMware player to host Kali as a guest OS. I did some reading before hand and discovered that I needed an additional USB wifi adapter and picked a cheap option from this website: https://www.wirelesshack.org/best-ka...r-dongles.html

I ended up with a 'Panda PAU05' which may or may not be my issue, but it was on the list of compatible adapters. I plugged my adapter in, disabled it on my host OS, started Kali and connected it to the guest OS. I checked settings and realized I don't have any wireless options so I opened up the terminal and looked at dmesg.

usb 1-1: new high-speed USB device number 4 using ehci-pci
usb 1-1: New USB device found, idVendor=148f, idProduct=5372, bcdDevice= 1.01
usb 1-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
usb 1-1: Product: 802.11 n WLAN
usb 1-1: Manufacturer: Ralink

Then I checked lsusb:
root@kali:~# lsusb
Bus 001 Device 004: ID 148f:5372 Ralink Technology, Corp. RT5372 Wireless Adapter

However if I run iwconfig or ifconfig it doesn't appear to have setup a wireless interface.

root@kali:~# iwconfig
eth0 no wireless extensions.

lo no wireless extensions.

I watched a youtube video which talks about installing 'compat wireless', but after going to their website it says that it shouldn't be used any more. I don't see any driver errors or other issues and I have disabled it from the host OS. I've also tried various network interface settings in VMware, currently all network interfaces are disabled. Everyone makes it look really simple but I can't get this working for the life of me. Any help you are willing to offer is greatly appreciated.

[Mister_X]

That's weird, this chipset should work just fine. By the way, iwconfig has been deprecated, use 'iw'. Anything else after that dmesg output?

Regarding compat-wireless, that's ancient. Basically, installing it would downgrade the drivers you have and you don't want to do that.

[LostSoul451]

That's weird, this chipset should work just fine. By the way, iwconfig has been deprecated, use 'iw'. Anything else after that dmesg output?

Regarding compat-wireless, that's ancient. Basically, installing it would downgrade the drivers you have and you don't want to do that.

Thanks for the info and confirming my sanity. I copied a few more lines but that is the bottom of the log. I can provide a dump of it if you or anyone is interested. As a test I also installed a new VM machine running Debian 10.1, and after installing the ralink firmware that same usb adapter works perfectly.

I attempted to run through the same steps in my kali install, but it said I'm already at the newest version.

[ 2577.469119] usb 2-2.2: new full-speed USB device number 5 using uhci_hcd
[ 2577.785244] usb 2-2.2: New USB device found, idVendor=1770, idProduct=ff00, bcdDevice= 1.10
[ 2577.785246] usb 2-2.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=1, SerialNumber=1
[ 2577.785247] usb 2-2.2: Product: MSI EPF USB
[ 2577.785247] usb 2-2.2: Manufacturer: MSI EPF USB
[ 2577.785248] usb 2-2.2: SerialNumber: MSI EPF USB
[ 2584.705937] usb 1-1: USB disconnect, device number 3
[ 2592.693020] usb 1-1: new high-speed USB device number 4 using ehci-pci
[ 2593.075365] usb 1-1: New USB device found, idVendor=148f, idProduct=5372, bcdDevice= 1.01
[ 2593.075366] usb 1-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
[ 2593.075367] usb 1-1: Product: 802.11 n WLAN
[ 2593.075368] usb 1-1: Manufacturer: Ralink
[ 2721.581061] e1000: eth0 NIC Link is Down
[ 2745.575750] usb 1-1: USB disconnect, device number 4
[ 2758.284591] usb 1-1: new high-speed USB device number 5 using ehci-pci
[ 2758.675399] usb 1-1: New USB device found, idVendor=148f, idProduct=5372, bcdDevice= 1.01
[ 2758.675400] usb 1-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
[ 2758.675401] usb 1-1: Product: 802.11 n WLAN
[ 2758.675402] usb 1-1: Manufacturer: Ralink


root@kali:/etc/apt# apt-get install firmware-ralink
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
firmware-ralink is already the newest version (20190717-2).
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
automater bdfproxy blindelephant keimpx leafpad libisl19 libjaxp1.3-java
liblirc-client0 libnfs12 libproj13 miranda pdgmail python-configargparse
python-configobj python-construct python-dns python-dnslib python-feedparser
python-gtkspellcheck python-h2 python-hpack python-html2text python-hyperframe
python-jsonpickle python-m2crypto python-pcapy python-pyperclip python-twisted-web
python-typing python-urwid ruby-librex sslcaudit sslstrip u3-pwn u3-tool ua-tester
wifitap wol-e
Use 'apt autoremove' to remove them.
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 25 not upgraded.

[Mister_X]

Still no idea. It should be supported and the PAU09 that has a 5572 chipset works.

Just FYI trying to install the firmware in this case is pointless. If firmware is missing, it would be mentioned in dmesg. And only a driver will load the firmware. The driver will still load if the firmware isn't present but will show errors (something along the lines "failed loading firmware").

Anything new gets printed in dmesg if you leave it plugged for a minute?

[LostSoul451]

I don't see anything new popping up in dmesg, I had a friend from work run a test with the same adapter and he was able to get it working by following these steps:

apt install dkms build-essentialgit
clone https://github.com/gnab/rtl8812au.git
cp -r rtl8812au /usr/src/8812au-4.2.2
dkms add -m 8812au -v 4.2.2
dkms build -m 8812au -v 4.2.2
dkms install -m 8812au -v 4.2.2
echo 8812au | tee -a /etc/modules
reboot now

He also had to set USB compatibility to USB 2.0

I followed his steps but I am still unable to get it working. It is quite possible I broke something while attempting to fix it, I am pretty new at this. My intention is to re-install Kali this weekend, update and follow the steps provided. I'll report back either way.

Thank you for following up!

[LostSoul451]

Ok so after reinstalling KALI in VMware, and following the steps listed above I was able to get the ralink adapter to connect and find available access points.

Thanks for your support Mister_X, and hopefully this can help someone else if they run into this problem.