How to update a device driver?

How to move from a driverfile.tar.gz file to an installed or updated driver?

More specific: I'm a new 13.10 user. My wired network doesn't work. I found that the LAN driver could be obsolete.

I got from the INTEL website, the latest driver version in the tar.gz format. Now I don't know how to install it. Is there any standard procedure? I didn't find it on the on line documentation.

1 Answer

Please be sure the prerequisites are installed:

sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-generic

Then compile:

cd ~/Scaricati/e1000e-2.5.4/src
make
sudo make install
sudo modprobe -r e1000e && sudo modprobe e1000e

Verify that you are now using the updated driver:

modinfo e1000e | grep version

It ought to report 2.5.4-NAPI. Can you connect now?

You will have built the driver for your currently running kernel only. When Update Manager offers a newer kernel version, also knownn as linux-image, and asks you to reboot, you must re-compile:

cd ~/Scaricati/e1000e-2.5.4/src
make clean
make
sudo make install
sudo modprobe -r e1000e && sudo modprobe e1000e