Motorola WN825G w/new 2.6.16 kernel module bcm43xx

[Steve Scrimpshire]

Here's the details of my card:

< root /home/omar > lspci -v
06:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller (rev 03)
	Subsystem: Motorola WN825G
	Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 64, IRQ 11
	Memory at 36000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=8K]

 

I just discovered that, although I previously had to use ndiswrapper for this cardbus card, with the new kernel module, I can now run it natively. This is still considered an experimental module from what I've read, so your mileage may vary.

 

First, I downloaded bcm43xx-fwcutter from here:

http://developer.berlios.de/project/showfi...p?group_id=4547

 

Then I removed all traces of ndiswrapper from /lib/modules/2.6.16-1mdk/kernel//3rdparty and /lib/modules/2.6.16-1mdk/misc (if you don't, ndiswrapper still runs first, even if you have removed its alias from /etc/modprobe.conf).

 

Then I installed bcm43xx-fwcutter, copied the *.sys file (in my case bcmwl5a.sys) to the bcm43xx-fwcutter-004 directory where I installed from and ran:

bcm43xx-fwcutter bcmwl5a.sys

Then I run

make installfw

as root, of course.

 

I changed my alias in /etc/modprobe.conf to

 

alias wlan0 bcm43xx

 

(If you are doing this and you have never had ndiswrapper running, it may not be wlan0, but eth2 or some other ethX...I'm not sure.)

 

I had to add these modules to /etc/modprobe.preload:

ieee80211softmac

bcm43xx

 

(Due to some problems with Cooker, if that is what you are running previously I also had to add

yenta_socket

pcmcia

pcmcia_core

to /etc/modprobe.preload for some reason they had stopped loading automatically, even before switching to the new kernel module)

 

bcm43xx defaults to 11 Mbps, so I had to also add this line to my /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-wlan0:

WIRELESS_RATE=54M

 

For some reason after switching to this module if you do

service network restart

you lose internet connection and have to do

rmmod bcm43xx && modprobe bcm43xx && ifup wlan0

to get it back.

 

I hope this helps some people. Please comment on how these steps work for you. I am using Cooker last updated on Jun 2, 2006.

Edited June 5, 2006 by Steve Scrimpshire

[spinynorman]

Steve - although this qualifies as a tip or trick, we do allow such posts in the Cooker forum. We don't claim to support cooker, so it's more of a discussion forum. :)

[iphitus]

it's relevant for any kernel with the open source broadcom module (2.6.17 and 2.6.16 when it's been backported) , so it is well worth chuckin in tips and tricks.

 

just add a message sayin that it only applies to the aforementioned kernels.

 

James

[Steve Scrimpshire]

Well, I sorta agree with both of you. While it may be relevant for those kernels that may be available to non-Cooker users, I don't know if my instructions will work fro non-Cooker with those kernels. I will have to check on my non-Cooker box as soon as I can. I will post back with results and see if we can't get this moved back. :D

 

Apparently, this is not true:

For some reason after switching to this module if you do

service network restart

you lose internet connection and have to do

rmmod bcm43xx && modprobe bcm43xx && ifup wlan0

to get it back.

 

It just takes about 30 seconds to regain connectivity after doing 'service network restart', even though it says "Determining ip address for wlan0 OK"

Edited June 5, 2006 by Steve Scrimpshire

[Steve Scrimpshire]

Update:

I've tried this with my Belkin Air Force One with the BCM4318 chipset on a non-Cooker system with kernel-2.6.16.1mdk and so far no luck, but I think that make installfw is just putting the firmware in a place the module cannot find it. On system shutdown, I got an error about not being able to load bcm<<something>>.fw.

 

More on this later.

 

SUCCESS (sort of):

Before doing make installfw, do:

export FIRMWARE_INSTALL_DIR=/usr/lib/hotplug/firmware

 

But, installing the 2.6.16.1mdk kernel on my system broke the nvidia driver, since the version of gcc used to compile that kernel is differenet from the one on a non-Cooker system. Trying to update gcc gives a ton of dependency problems, so maybe installing the 2.6.16 kernel from source would be the way to go if you wish to do this.

Edited June 5, 2006 by Steve Scrimpshire

[Steve Scrimpshire]

Fixed the nvidia problem by installing the kernel *src.rpm and the kernel-source *.src.rpm and also had to install wireless-tools from Cooker and libiw from Cooker to support this, but the AirForceOne doesn't do 54M with this driver and drops lots of packets at 24M, 36M, 48M. This is still promising though as the driver matures.

[oshunluvr]

I'm a noob, but learning.

I have an HP ZD7000us that has a Broadcom BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller (rev 02) internal card.

 

I did a new install of Mandriva One (to replace 10.1) and then updated to KDE 3.5.3 and updated to kernel 2.6.16-1mdk--i586-up-1GB.

 

When I did this ndiswrapper brokereporting "loadndisdriver: main(629): version 1.2 doesn't match driver version 0".

 

I tried your instructions to the letter EXCEPT: There was no file "bcm43xx-fwcutter" in the archive so I ran "make" first.

The additional step of "export..." was required.

 

I appears that I am up and running - still some testing to do reguarding settings and the like but it seems to be running. I am wondering now if the on/off button will respond correctly and I may need to build a script to restart the card - not a major hurdle. It seems to be dumping a lot of messages to the log so I'll have to look into what's going on there.

 

Thanks for your detailed instructions. It really helps a lot of beginners when the steps are laid out without assuming the reader gets what you mean.

I'll report back with my end results.

[oshunluvr]

Steve - on another note - the nVidia driver...

 

If you've updated to 8762 the modeline entries have changed. Since this is off topic I won;t go into detail, but if you're still needing help with this - contact me and I'll fill you in.