How I fixed the broadcom STA wireless driver problem in 9.10

[lexpenrose]

Ok, there's about 1 million people with the same problem : Broadcom STA Wireless driver problems since 9.10 ( worked for everyone in 9.04 )
Here's how to "FIX" it , more like a triple bypass :

First of all , set your router to use WEP 40 bit, because WPA is seriously bugged still with Ubuntu

- Just after installing Ubuntu 9.10, make sure you use a WIRED internet connection ( using your onboard NIC , not wireless obviously since it doesn't work )
- Issue a "sudo apt-get update" on the terminal to update all the drivers etc.
- Then go to System -> Administration -> Hardware Drivers
And select the Broadcom Wireless STA Driver and click Activate.

That's the only way I got this working , I'm sure there's 100 other ways but at least this is a guaranteed way for people to fix their problems ( provided they have access to wired internet )

[pulakka]

I went the same way, but i would like to be albe to connect to my accesspoint using WPA.

Did anyone find a solution for this?

[linthusiast]

I am now posting from Ubuntu 9.10 via my Wifi STA (lspci - "Broadcom 4306") using WPA and getting full speed. For the record this did not work for me out of the box in 9.10, unlike 9.04 where it just worked.

I followed the following tutorial: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Wi...Driver/bcm43xx

However connecting the machine to a wired network or having a 9.04 machine at hand was not an option for me so considering I am dual booting with Windows 7, I accessed the web and downloaded the necessary files (3 in all) using that. Then I had the 3 files need on my NTFS partition which I could then mount and access when I rebooted in to Ubuntu.

In the above tutorial they suggest you jump through hoops to get b43-fwcutter, but you can directly download it from here instead: http://bu3sch.de/b43/fwcutter/b43-fwcutter-011.tar.bz2

Then extract and build it in Ubuntu using the following
tar xjf b43-fwcutter-011.tar.bz2
cd b43-fwcutter-011
make

With the above tutorial, once I got to the stage where I rebooted my machine it automatically connected to my Wireless Profile (which uses WPA) that I had previously configured.

Hope this helps

[bhishan]

Isn't this a big problem for people who have access to wireless internet only?

[x2wdtoyotax]

YES! I have an HP Mini 1030nr that uses a Broadcom BCM4312 802.11b/g (rev 01) wireless card. I do not have the option of connecting via a wired connection due to the fact that netbooks do not usually have an ethernet jack due their small form factor. I have had to download the packages manually on a seperate system and transfer them to the netbook via usb. I am to the point of activating the driver and I get stuck. I click activate... the machine goes through the motions without any errors and returns back to the same window, with the driver still not activated. I am quickly losing patience! Any suggestions?

BTW here is my original posts... following the steps I have taken to get this far.

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...28#post8197228

Any help will be greatly appreciated!

[Haythayt]

Same problem here (Dell Inspiron 1525,). None of the many solutions (reinstalling bcmwl-kernel-source etc...) so far helped me. And still Jockey did not install the Broadcom STA driver. Seems the bug was known prior to the release and its fix did not help in my case, e.g.:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...ey/+bug/443185

So I did lose my patience.

And I downloaded the broadcom driver myself and "installed" them.

First download the drivers here:

http://www.broadcom.com/support/802.11/linux_sta.php

Then follow this instructions:

http://www.broadcom.com/docs/linux_sta/README.txt

Afterwards I could connect to my wireless network. Unfortunately this was not the case anymore after rebooting. lsmod shows neither "wl" or "lib80211" anymore.
Does anybody know how to add these modules permanently? (Adding to /etc/modules? And where do I have to put the wl.ko file then? Somewhere in /lib/modules/2.6.../.?)
And how may this interfere with Ubuntu's Jockey if it by any chance works again? For after loading the modules manually Jockey still does not show the driver activated...)

Thanks for your help...

[superticky]

YES! I have an HP Mini 1030nr that uses a Broadcom BCM4312 802.11b/g (rev 01) wireless card. I do not have the option of connecting via a wired connection due to the fact that netbooks do not usually have an ethernet jack due their small form factor. I have had to download the packages manually on a seperate system and transfer them to the netbook via usb. I am to the point of activating the driver and I get stuck. I click activate... the machine goes through the motions without any errors and returns back to the same window, with the driver still not activated. I am quickly losing patience! Any suggestions?

BTW here is my original posts... following the steps I have taken to get this far.

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...28#post8197228

Any help will be greatly appreciated!

I have the same problem, I also have a HP Mini 1030nr.

By the way, the HP Mini 1030nr DO HAVE a wired NIC, its just hidden, under a plastic cover on one of the side corners, look carefully, need to remove the plastic cover.

[Sly_tom_cat]

Same problem here (Dell Inspiron 1525,).
Does anybody know how to add these modules permanently?

I've added wl.ko also in /lib/modules/<kernel version>/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/
and got the wl.ko loaded after reboot. But it didn't help me - still have this issue unsolved on my Compaq 7620s laptop

[superticky]

I have solved the issue for me.

Steps:

- load the ubuntu 9.10 live with pen drive.
- after ubuntu loaded completely, go to hardware drivers
- select STA proprietary (the second one on the list)
- activate and it will work.
- now install the ubuntu into hard drive.
- after ubuntu is installed, go to hardware drivers
- only one will appear, which is the one we need.
- activate buy it wont work (its okey for now)
- now Go to pool/restricted/b/bcmwl on Ubuntu Live USB pen drive. Double click into the .deb file in there, and REINSTALL that package.
- go now again to hardware drivers.
- Now you can activate Broadcom STA driver, most cases you will see its already activated.
- now Wifi should work.

it worked for me on a hp mini.

please note: i founded another bug, after you have internet, if you do update/upgrade all, the new version of firefox wont work, it will say "bus error".

Thanks.

[stevenw66]

I have an HP 1000. I have manually installed the drivers from broadcom (4312 chipset) and have activated after much work. Rebooted, still no wireless access. Everything looks fine but cannot discover wireless network SSID. Tried to configure manually, still no luck. Device Manager shows the device and drivers loaded and active with no issues. Is there something I need to do to get network manager to search for available open infrastructure SSID's? I've tried many other wireless tools and none of them can detect any wireless network SSID's. This worked well in 9.04 so what happened.

If anybody expects Ubuntu to overtake windows they better figure out how not to regress each release relative to network access and video!