Broadcom Wireless for 8.10

[Ayuthia]

Yeah, they tried to improve wireless with this release, but it seems that it did more harm. This is very disheartening and I might just go back to 8.04.1 because I also have an issue where my fan won't turn on in 8.10, which will eventually fry my laptop. Getting back to the wireless though, it would be helpful if other Broadcom users that have their wireless working, if they could post what worked for them.

It is looking like your card is not wanting to connect with the wl driver. Can you try the following again:

sudo modprobe -r b43 ssb wl
sudo modprobe ieee80211_crypt_tkip
sudo modprobe wl
lsmod|grep -e wl -e b43
dmesg|grep 'wl '

The lsmod portion is checking to see what modules are being loaded for the wireless card. The dmesg command is looking to see if any error messages are coming up for the wl driver.

You also have the other option of using the b43 driver. It will require you to have to download the firmware. I am going to post (in the next post) the instructions on what to download if you don't have a working connection in Ubuntu.

[Ayuthia]

For those of you who don't have a working connection in Ubuntu and cannot use the wl driver, here are some instructions on what to download so that you can install it in Ubuntu:

This will only work in Intrepid (and not the older versions of Ubuntu). This is a revised version of this thread(changed because the firmware is different in Intrepid):

Option 2
For those without a working internet connection

If you have a Intrepid install CD,
Insert your CD and do the following:

sudo apt-cdrom add
sudo aptitude update
sudo aptitude install b43-fwcutter

Make sure that you say no or cancel when the installer asks you to find/download the firmware for you. It will get stuck because it is thinking that there is an internet connection.
Now skip down to the Downloading Firmware section.

If you don't have a Intrepid install CD
You will have to find a place with a working internet connection. Go to this link:
http://packages.ubuntu.com/intrepid/utils/b43-fwcutter
Download the version that you need--amd64 for 64-bit and i386 for 32-bit. Copy the file to your home directory and do the following:
64-bit:

cd
sudo dpkg -i b43-fwcutter_011-4ubuntu1_amd64.deb

It is possible that the _011-4ubuntu1_ portion is another number.
Make sure that you say no or cancel when the installer asks you to find/download the firmware for you. It will get stuck because it is thinking that there is an internet connection.

32-bit:

cd
sudo dpkg -i b43-fwcutter_011-4ubuntu1_i386.deb

It is possible that the _011-4ubuntu1_ portion is another number.
Make sure that you say no or cancel when the installer asks you to find/download the firmware for you. It will get stuck because it is thinking that there is an internet connection.

Downloading Firmware
Both 32-bit and 64-bit:
You will still need to find someplace with a working internet connection and download the following files:

http://downloads.openwrt.org/sources/wl_apsta-3.130.20.0.o
http://mirror2.openwrt.org/sources/broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5.tar.bz2

Copy those files to your home directory. In the Terminal/Konsole/xterm window do the following:

cd
sudo b43-fwcutter -w /lib/firmware wl_apsta-3.130.20.0.o
tar xfvj broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5.tar.bz2
sudo b43-fwcutter --unsupported -w /lib/firmware broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5/driver/wl_apsta_mimo.o
sudo chmod o+rx /lib/firmware/b43 /lib/firmware/b43legacy
sudo ifconfig wlan0 up

For those of you who are configuring your /etc/network/interfaces, you might need to do:

sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

That will restarting your network and will read through the /etc/networking/interfaces to connect.

[billli]

Please try the following:

sudo modprobe -r b43 b44 ssb wl
sudo modprobe ieee80211_crypt_tkip
sudo modprobe wl
sudo modprobe b44
sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

it worked! thank you so much!

just wondering, what did those commands do? and why "sudo modprobe b44" instead of "sudo modprobe b43"?

and i should just use the wl driver instead of the broadcom b43 driver?

once again, thx

[malachi1990]

Am I missing something here?

All I had to do to enable wireless is turn on the wireless card, at least since the 2.6.24-21 kernel release. Then it works out of the box better than the windows driver ever did (I did go through the hoops to get wireless in hardy).

And I have the Broadcomm 4318 wireless card, before anyone asks.

[Ayuthia]

Am I missing something here?

All I had to do to enable wireless is turn on the wireless card, at least since the 2.6.24-21 kernel release. Then it works out of the box better than the windows driver ever did (I did go through the hoops to get wireless in hardy).

And I have the Broadcomm 4318 wireless card, before anyone asks.

The Broadcom STA (wl) driver does not support the 4318 card you will not be able to get your card to work without downloading something. Your card might work with the b43 driver (it appears that Intrepid is working better with them than Hardy), but the system needs to download the firmware. The other route is also ndiswrapper.

[malachi1990]

The Broadcom STA (wl) driver does not support the 4318 card you will not be able to get your card to work without downloading something. Your card might work with the b43 driver (it appears that Intrepid is working better with them than Hardy), but the system needs to download the firmware. The other route is also ndiswrapper.

Thanks for that info. It's just that since the 2.6.24-21 kernel release, the linux driver has flawlessly supported my wireless (out of the box, w/out downloading anything that I can tell), which has left me surprised. And a bit confused as to why these problems exist for others.

[el2king]

it worked! thank you so much!

just wondering, what did those commands do? and why "sudo modprobe b44" instead of "sudo modprobe b43"?

and i should just use the wl driver instead of the broadcom b43 driver?

once again, thx

OK, so I tried the exact same thing with the modprobe commands, and I noticed that this worked for me too! Is there like a script I can write to get this working correctly right on computer bootup? I would definitely want this to be done automatically without manually executing the commands/script. Thanks! This has been a huge help!

Update: Actually I found that script and I tested it! It does work. Earlier in the email thread, a person created a file /etc/modprobe.d/wl, and it does work! I'm glad to finally be rid of these annoying wireless problems. Yes!!!

[kolibri]

You will need to check and see if you have a Broadcom wired network card. If you go into the Terminal and type:

lshw -C network

If you see a Broadcom 44xx series card, then you have the b44 driver. That means you will have to remove that driver before you can remove the ssb:

sudo modprobe -r b43 b44 ssb ndiswrapper wl
sudo modprobe b43 
sudo modprobe b44
sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

I have a 4312 Broadcom card

My result for the above:

kolibri@Fruhling:~$ lshw -C network
WARNING: you should run this program as super-user.
*-network
description: Ethernet interface
product: 88E8040 PCI-E Fast Ethernet Controller
vendor: Marvell Technology Group Ltd.
physical id: 0
bus info: pci@0000:09:00.0
logical name: eth0
version: 12
serial: 00:1d:09:3d:21:c1
width: 64 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: bus_master cap_list ethernet physical
configuration: broadcast=yes driver=sky2 driverversion=1.22 firmware=N/A ip=192.168.1.45 latency=0 module=sky2 multicast=yes
*-network
description: Wireless interface
product: BCM4312 802.11b/g
vendor: Broadcom Corporation
physical id: 0
bus info: pci@0000:0b:00.0
logical name: eth1
version: 01
serial: 00:16:44:7b:e4:ab
width: 64 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless
configuration: broadcast=yes driver=wl latency=0 module=wl multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11
*-network DISABLED
description: Ethernet interface
physical id: 1
logical name: pan0
serial: ce:e4:83:5f:c5:13
capabilities: ethernet physical
configuration: broadcast=yes driver=bridge driverversion=2.3 firmware=N/A multicast=yes
kolibri@Fruhling:~$ sudo modprobe -r b43 b44 ssb ndiswrapper wl
kolibri@Fruhling:~$ sudo modprobe b43
kolibri@Fruhling:~$ sudo modprobeb44
sudo: modprobeb44: command not found
kolibri@Fruhling:~$ sudo modprobe b44
kolibri@Fruhling:~$ sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart
* Reconfiguring network interfaces... Ignoring unknown interface eth0=eth0.
[ OK ]
kolibri@Fruhling:~$ sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart
* Reconfiguring network interfaces... Ignoring unknown interface eth0=eth0.
[ OK ]

(how do I put that stuff in a scrolling box so i don't take up the whole page?)

It didn't seem to do anything, I think I'm going to try a clean install of intrepid rather than an upgrade.

[thefrozenpenguin]

Thanks Ayuthia will give that a try.

Iain

[JohnBUK]

How come I can download and run Puppy Linux from a USB stick and my Broadcom Wifi works first time (the first time this has ever happened) and yet when I try every live CD for Ubuntu I have never had any joy whatsoever? I have a Dell Inspiron 8600 and I'd love to be able to use Linux but find the whole thing so frustrating I go back to Windows XP every time.