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Broadcom wireless - can't see any networks

PostPosted: Sep 14th, '11, 18:10
by quartz
Hi folks

I successfully moved my desktop from Mandriva to Mageia a while ago, and decided it was time to do the laptop as well.

Unfortunately I ran into the Broadcom wireless driver problem that has exercised several other forum members.

I first came across this post, and did the following:

Code: Select all
    wget http://mirror2.openwrt.org/sources/broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5.tar.bz2
    tar xf broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5.tar.bz2
    cd broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5/driver
    su
    b43-fwcutter -w /lib/firmware wl_apsta_mimo.o
    modprobe b43


That didn't work, when I went to set up a wireless connection, it complained of missing files.

I then foundthis posting, and tried:

Code: Select all
urpmi dkms-broadcom-wl
echo blacklist brcm80211 >> /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-mga


Success - the system recognised the Broadcom wireless on eth1 ... BUT ... it cannot see any wireless networks!

The obvious things: yes, the router is on, wireless is running. If I reboot into windows, all is well. Have I broken it in some way by running the first bit of code, and if so, how do I reverse it? Or is there something else I've missed?

Many thanks,
Quartz.

Re: Broadcom wireless - can't see any networks

PostPosted: Sep 14th, '11, 19:35
by salebih
On my notebook after installing broadcom drivers I had to turn on wifi by pressing Fn + F3 (your laptop might have different button assigned) for some reason it is not like in Windows, I had to hold the buttons pressed a bit longer and then it turned on... only after that I was able to use WiFi :/

Try it, you have nothing to lose :/

Re: Broadcom wireless - can't see any networks

PostPosted: Sep 14th, '11, 19:51
by doktor5000
@quartz:

With the first codeblock you setup the b43 driver and the needed firmware.
And with the second codeblock you additionally installed the broadcom-wl driver.
One of them needs to be either removed or blacklisted, too.

Please post the output of
Code: Select all
lspci -nn -k | grep -i net -A3

Re: Broadcom wireless - can't see any networks

PostPosted: Sep 15th, '11, 07:25
by quartz
Thank you for the replies - but it seems that it works now! I'm not sure what has changed since yesterday, but I am posting this message wirelessly from the laptop.

For the sake of completeness, here is the output of lspci -nn -k | grep -i net -A3, as requested by doktor5000:
Code: Select all
09:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme BCM5752 Gigabit Ethernet PCI Express [14e4:1600] (rev 02)
        Subsystem: Dell Latitude D620 [1028:01c2]
        Kernel driver in use: tg3
        Kernel modules: tg3
0c:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g LP-PHY [14e4:4315] (rev 01)
        Subsystem: Dell Wireless 1395 WLAN Mini-Card [1028:000b]
        Kernel driver in use: wl
        Kernel modules: wl, ssb

The second of those is the active connection.