[UPDATE - CLOSED] Wireless card will not work

I hope I am doing this correctly. Please let me know if this should be somewhere else. I will probably use a lot of incorrect terminology, please be patient with this newb.

My wife ruined my old laptop and since we are very tight on funds right now, my in-laws gave us an old laptop to use. It's 10yrs old I think. HP ze4907. Since this is used mostly for web surfing and making documents / spreadsheets, I thought I could make it work.

It apparently has some upgrades in it, 80g HDD & 2g RAM. But a very old and slow 1.3g Celeron M processer. And it was running on expired XP.

I was able to install Zorin lite using the force pae thing. And it runs pretty good for the most part. However.....

I cannot get the Broadcom 802.11 b/g WLAN to work. I went to the additional drivers section, and Zorin tried to install a driver for it. But I got a "unexpected error". At least, I think that was the error. I don't remember seeing an error code like Windows usually has. But it seems Zorin cannot even see my WLAN now. Or at least I don't know how to find if the OS can see it or not. The additional drivers section is now blank.

I looked at the windows wireless drivers app, but it is looking for an .inf file. I can still get the windows drivers from the HP website, but they are an .exe file.

If I could get the wireless card working, this would be perfect. At this point I am stuck with Ethernet only. I did some messing around while on Ethernet and this old thing was running YouTube videos very nicely in Firefox. I was very pleased and surprised.

Is there any help for this old thing? Or do I need to look at another OS? I saw that there is a windows NT based free OS out there that might be able to run the drivers from the HP website. But I'm not sure if it will run on this old machine. React OS I believe it was.

I would greatly appreciate any help or insight that can be offered. I am trying to make this work as we don't have the money right now to buy a different laptop.

Hi, please take a look here - the packages referred to in the link to the thread should be available via 'Synaptic Package Manager' (you will be asked for your login password to elevate you to 'root' [=administrator]:

http://askubuntu.com/questions/473221/b ... untu-14-04

(Zorin 9 Lite is based on Lubuntu 14.04)

Can you please post back the result of:

lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net

Thanks for stepping in madvinegar!

madvinegar wrote:Can you please post back the result of:

lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net

I will, but it could be a couple of days before I have a chance to get that.

Thank you all for the help!

OK...I was able to work on that tonight. Here is what I got.


02:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8100/8101L/8139 PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter [10ec:8139] (rev 10)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3084]
Kernel driver in use: 8139too
--
02:06.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:4320] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN [103c:12f4]
Kernel driver in use: b43-pci-bridge

Plug an ethernet cable to get internet and run the following commands in terminal, one by one.

Code:

sudo apt-get purge bcmwl-kernel-source
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install firmware-b43-installer


Then reboot.
Let me know if that worked.

madvinegar wrote:Plug an ethernet cable to get internet and run the following commands in terminal, one by one.

Code:

sudo apt-get purge bcmwl-kernel-source
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install firmware-b43-installer


Then reboot.
Let me know if that worked.

It worked sort of, but then it didn't.

I ran the terminal commands you gave. And the light for the wifi (on front of laptop case) turned on for the first time right after install.

I rebooted, but still I did not have access to the wifi even though the light was on.

I went to the "additional drivers" section. Again "do not use Broadcom Device" was selected. And that I needed to install a different driver. I selected to install that driver, but after reboot, the wifi light is off and nothing is working now.

So I went back and tried to run your terminal commands again, but now it does not work. Do I need to reinstall Zorin Lite from scratch again?

Here is the info the system is showing now.....

02:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8100/8101L/8139 PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter [10ec:8139] (rev 10)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3084]
Kernel driver in use: 8139too
--
02:06.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:4320] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN [103c:12f4]
Kernel driver in use: wl

Run again the commands:

sudo apt-get remove --purge bcmwl-kernel-source
sudo apt-get install --reinstall firmware-b43-installer


Please DO NOT install the driver from additional drivers. It is the wrong driver.
Also do not reboot.

Then please post back here the results of:

lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net
lsmod

madvinegar wrote:Run again the commands:

sudo apt-get remove --purge bcmwl-kernel-source
sudo apt-get install --reinstall firmware-b43-installer


Please DO NOT install the driver from additional drivers. It is the wrong driver.
Also do not reboot.

Then please post back here the results of:

lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net
lsmod

My appologies. I have run the commands given per your instructions and here is the info I have.

At this point the light for the wifi is on. However, I cannot seem to find a way to connect or use the wifi. I am not seeing any icons for the wifi connection anywhere.

02:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8100/8101L/8139 PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter [10ec:8139] (rev 10)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3084]
Kernel driver in use: 8139too
--
02:06.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:4320] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN [103c:12f4]
Kernel driver in use: b43-pci-bridge


Module Size Used by
zram 18032 1
arc4 12536 2
snd_intel8x0 33110 1
snd_ac97_codec 105709 1 snd_intel8x0
b43 356470 0
ac97_bus 12642 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm 85501 2 snd_ac97_codec,snd_intel8x0
bcma 42043 1 b43
snd_page_alloc 14230 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
snd_seq_midi 13132 0
snd_seq_midi_event 14475 1 snd_seq_midi
rfcomm 53664 0
bnep 18895 2
bluetooth 342208 10 bnep,rfcomm
mac80211 546118 1 b43
snd_rawmidi 25135 1 snd_seq_midi
snd_seq 55383 2 snd_seq_midi_event,snd_seq_midi
cfg80211 409394 2 b43,mac80211
binfmt_misc 13140 1
snd_seq_device 14137 3 snd_seq,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_midi
pcmcia 51828 0
snd_timer 28584 2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
dm_multipath 22402 0
snd 60939 10 snd_ac97_codec,snd_intel8x0,snd_timer,snd_pcm,snd_seq,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_device,snd_seq_midi
yenta_socket 40201 0
pcmcia_rsrc 18319 1 yenta_socket
joydev 17101 0
pcmcia_core 22328 3 pcmcia,pcmcia_rsrc,yenta_socket
scsi_dh 14458 1 dm_multipath
soundcore 12600 1 snd
serio_raw 13230 0
lpc_ich 16864 0
shpchp 32128 0
parport_pc 31981 0
ppdev 17391 0
lp 13299 0
mac_hid 13037 0
parport 40836 3 lp,ppdev,parport_pc
dm_mirror 21756 0
dm_region_hash 20121 1 dm_mirror
dm_log 18072 2 dm_region_hash,dm_mirror
i915 710018 2
8139too 32571 0
i2c_algo_bit 13197 1 i915
psmouse 95439 0
drm_kms_helper 48868 1 i915
8139cp 27171 0
ssb 51854 1 b43
mii 13654 2 8139cp,8139too
video 18903 1 i915
drm 244037 3 i915,drm_kms_helper
wmi 18673 0

Ok, now run the following 2 commands, the one after the other, and reboot.

echo "blacklist b43" | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf
echo "blacklist ssb" | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

Is the wifi working now?

madvinegar wrote:Ok, now run the following 2 commands, the one after the other, and reboot.

echo "blacklist b43" | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf
echo "blacklist ssb" | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

Is the wifi working now?

I rebooted and now the wifi light is off, it was on prior to the last instructions.

Still nothing in tray that gives me access to wifi.

UPDATED: Here is the info you asked for before.....

02:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8100/8101L/8139 PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter [10ec:8139] (rev 10)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3084]
Kernel driver in use: 8139too
--
02:06.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:4320] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN [103c:12f4]
Kernel driver in use: b43-pci-bridge

Module Size Used by
zram 18032 1
rfcomm 53664 0
bnep 18895 2
bluetooth 342208 10 bnep,rfcomm
ip6t_REJECT 12809 1
snd_intel8x0 33110 1
xt_hl 12465 6
snd_ac97_codec 105709 1 snd_intel8x0
ip6t_rt 13259 3
ac97_bus 12642 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm 85501 2 snd_ac97_codec,snd_intel8x0
nf_conntrack_ipv6 14318 8
nf_defrag_ipv6 26163 1 nf_conntrack_ipv6
ipt_REJECT 12485 1
xt_LOG 17445 10
snd_page_alloc 14230 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
binfmt_misc 13140 1
snd_seq_midi 13132 0
xt_limit 12541 13
snd_seq_midi_event 14475 1 snd_seq_midi
xt_tcpudp 12756 18
xt_addrtype 12563 4
snd_rawmidi 25135 1 snd_seq_midi
nf_conntrack_ipv4 14492 8
nf_defrag_ipv4 12649 1 nf_conntrack_ipv4
xt_conntrack 12664 16
ip6table_filter 12711 1
ip6_tables 17819 1 ip6table_filter
snd_seq 55383 2 snd_seq_midi_event,snd_seq_midi
nf_conntrack_netbios_ns 12585 0
nf_conntrack_broadcast 12541 1 nf_conntrack_netbios_ns
pcmcia 51828 0
nf_nat_ftp 12645 0
nf_nat 20861 1 nf_nat_ftp
nf_conntrack_ftp 14056 1 nf_nat_ftp
nf_conntrack 83879 8 nf_nat_ftp,nf_conntrack_netbios_ns,nf_nat,xt_conntrack,nf_conntrack_broadcast,nf_conntrack_ftp,nf_conntrack_ipv4,nf_conntrack_ipv6
snd_seq_device 14137 3 snd_seq,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_midi
iptable_filter 12706 1
ip_tables 17987 1 iptable_filter
snd_timer 28584 2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
x_tables 22067 13 ip6table_filter,xt_hl,ip_tables,xt_tcpudp,xt_limit,xt_conntrack,xt_LOG,iptable_filter,ip6t_rt,ipt_REJECT,ip6_tables,xt_addrtype,ip6t_REJECT
yenta_socket 40201 0
dm_multipath 22402 0
snd 60939 10 snd_ac97_codec,snd_intel8x0,snd_timer,snd_pcm,snd_seq,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_device,snd_seq_midi
pcmcia_rsrc 18319 1 yenta_socket
soundcore 12600 1 snd
pcmcia_core 22328 3 pcmcia,pcmcia_rsrc,yenta_socket
joydev 17101 0
scsi_dh 14458 1 dm_multipath
serio_raw 13230 0
lpc_ich 16864 0
shpchp 32128 0
parport_pc 31981 0
ppdev 17391 0
lp 13299 0
mac_hid 13037 0
parport 40836 3 lp,ppdev,parport_pc
dm_mirror 21756 0
dm_region_hash 20121 1 dm_mirror
dm_log 18072 2 dm_region_hash,dm_mirror
8139too 32571 0
i915 710018 3
8139cp 27171 0
i2c_algo_bit 13197 1 i915
mii 13654 2 8139cp,8139too
psmouse 95439 0
drm_kms_helper 48868 1 i915
ssb 51854 0
drm 244037 4 i915,drm_kms_helper
wmi 18673 0
video 18903 1 i915

I will be closing this thread. I was not able to get Zorin to work with the wifi on my machine. I loaded the non-pae version of LXLE (due to processor age) and everything is working perfectly out of the box.

Thank you all for trying to help. Zorin got me interested in something other than windows and after many hours of research on-line this week, I thought I would give the LXLE a try to see if I could make this old laptop usable. Well, I am typing this very message on it while using the wi-fi, so it seems to work better.....at least for my apparently picky and old machine. At this point, I am seriously thinking of using this in the future on other computers as well. I am very impressed with these Lubuntu Distros. Keep up the good work guys!

Now that you use lxle, can you please post back the results of

lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net
lsmod


I would like to see which driver is used by LXLE.
Thanks.

madvinegar wrote:Now that you use lxle, can you please post back the results of

lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net
lsmod


I would like to see which driver is used by LXLE.
Thanks.

Sure thing....and maybe it has something to do with the fact that I had to force pae this old machine with Zorin Lite since it's and older Celeron M processor. The LXLE I am running is an non-pae version. Maybe not...just guessing.

02:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ [10ec:8139] (rev 10)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3084]
Kernel driver in use: 8139too
--
02:06.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:4320] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN [103c:12f4]
Kernel driver in use: b43-pci-bridge

Module Size Used by
ufs 78131 0
qnx4 13309 0
hfsplus 83544 0
hfs 49479 0
minix 31453 0
ntfs 100206 0
vfat 17308 0
msdos 17132 0
fat 55605 2 vfat,msdos
jfs 175085 0
xfs 743438 0
reiserfs 230943 0
ext2 67987 0
nvram 14029 0
msr 12772 0
coretemp 13290 0
microcode 18187 0
joydev 17393 0
snd_intel8x0 33455 2
snd_ac97_codec 110213 1 snd_intel8x0
ac97_bus 12642 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm 80916 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec
ip6t_LOG 16846 4
snd_seq_midi 13132 0
xt_hl 12465 6
ip6t_rt 12473 3
arc4 12473 2
snd_rawmidi 25424 1 snd_seq_midi
nf_conntrack_ipv6 13581 7
nf_defrag_ipv6 13175 1 nf_conntrack_ipv6
ipt_REJECT 12512 1
snd_seq_midi_event 14475 1 snd_seq_midi
ipt_LOG 12783 5
xt_limit 12541 12
b43 342801 0
xt_tcpudp 12531 18
xt_addrtype 12596 4
dm_multipath 22747 0
xt_state 12514 14
snd_seq 51592 2 snd_seq_midi,snd_seq_midi_event
ip6table_filter 12711 1
ip6_tables 22528 3 ip6t_LOG,ip6t_rt,ip6table_filter
nf_conntrack_netbios_ns 12585 0
mac80211 436544 1 b43
nf_conntrack_broadcast 12541 1 nf_conntrack_netbios_ns
snd_timer 28931 2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
snd_seq_device 14172 3 snd_seq_midi,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq
nf_nat_ftp 12595 0
nf_nat 24959 1 nf_nat_ftp
nf_conntrack_ipv4 19084 9 nf_nat
nf_defrag_ipv4 12649 1 nf_conntrack_ipv4
nf_conntrack_ftp 13183 1 nf_nat_ftp
cfg80211 178877 2 b43,mac80211
nf_conntrack 73847 8 nf_conntrack_ipv6,xt_state,nf_conntrack_netbios_ns,nf_conntrack_broadcast,nf_nat_ftp,nf_nat,nf_conntrack_ipv4,nf_conntrack_ftp
iptable_filter 12706 1
pcmcia 39826 0
snd 62250 11 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq,snd_timer,snd_seq_device
ip_tables 18106 1 iptable_filter
x_tables 22011 13 ip6t_LOG,xt_hl,ip6t_rt,ipt_REJECT,ipt_LOG,xt_limit,xt_tcpudp,xt_addrtype,xt_state,ip6table_filter,ip6_tables,iptable_filter,ip_tables
psmouse 97340 0
soundcore 14635 1 snd
serio_raw 13027 0
snd_page_alloc 14115 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
bcma 25651 1 b43
yenta_socket 27428 0
pcmcia_rsrc 18367 1 yenta_socket
pcmcia_core 21511 3 pcmcia,yenta_socket,pcmcia_rsrc
shpchp 32265 0
bnep 17830 2
rfcomm 38139 0
bluetooth 158447 8 bnep,rfcomm
parport_pc 32114 0
ppdev 12849 0
mac_hid 13077 0
binfmt_misc 17292 1
lp 17455 0
parport 40930 3 parport_pc,ppdev,lp
dm_raid45 76451 0
xor 25987 1 dm_raid45
dm_mirror 21822 0
dm_region_hash 16100 1 dm_mirror
dm_log 18193 3 dm_raid45,dm_mirror,dm_region_hash
btrfs 638343 0
zlib_deflate 26622 1 btrfs
libcrc32c 12543 1 btrfs
ssb 50691 1 b43
8139too 23283 0
8139cp 26688 0
i915 428488 2
drm_kms_helper 45466 1 i915
drm 197641 3 i915,drm_kms_helper
wmi 18744 0
i2c_algo_bit 13199 1 i915
video 19115 1 i915

I wanted to give an update.

I made several physical upgrades to this old laptop. It seems that this is old enough, the changes are REAL cheap.

I changed the processor from a 1.3G Celeron to a 2.26G Pentium M ($17 on eBay). I was able to confirm the chipset supported this and things are running better now.

I confirmed it is maxed out at 2G of RAM.

I was having issues before these upgrades with getting the Wi-Fi to be usable. I had switched to LXLE and the Wi-Fi worked out of box and the system was running OK. But video playback was not real great. Especially on DVD's. The frame rate (I think that is what they call it) was to slow. DVD's were jumpy and skippy. Which is odd, because the old XP played DVD's just fine when this system still had the old 1.3G Celeron in it.

While doing some research on how to fix this in LXLE, I found out about the networking bug in Lubuntu. Apparently it was a problem with LXSession not starting the networking app like it should. Link is below.

http://m.webupd8.org/2014/06/lubuntu-14 ... r.html?m=1

So I thought I would give Zorin Lite a try again. Based on several reviews I have read, Zorin Lite should give me the best bang for the buck on this old machine. I still needed to follow the instructions that Madvinegar gave in the 7th post of this thread to get the wifi card working after the initial install. Then I ran the software updates (which apparently also updated LXSession)....and after a reboot, everything works.

As best as I can tell, the .ISO download from the website has the network bug still in it. But once you use the software updates app, the bug appears to be fixed.

Running good so far. Still some visual tweaks I want to make, but I am very, very happy Zorin Lite is working for my machine now.

Great job and thanks for keeping us informed.