(SOLVED) Broadcom Wireless Disconnects

I have an old Compaq Presario V5000 which I'd like to keep alive as a Linux box. I've used Zorin for several years without issues, but this one stumps me.

I've installed Zorin 6.4 32-bit because the machine is old and needs a light OS.

The V5000 has an internal Broadcom adapter called an AirForce One 54g. Using lspci I discovered that the chipset is BCM4318, which is not supported by the proprietary wl driver. Instead I downloaded and installed the b43 driver, which allows my wireless card to at least power up (the blue LED "on" lamp is lit). The network manager shows several SSIDs in my area, including mine. I choose mine and provide the key. The progress indicator in the panel spins as if negotiating a connection, then it stops and the Broadcom says its disconnected. What's up?

Hi,

have you tried with "Windows Wireless Drivers tool"?, it uses "ndiswrapper" and you will need the Windows driver disk with the wireless drivers in its folder!.

Basically point the tool to the file ending in ".inf" and it might work. Madviengar is the WiFI expert, you can wait for him too!.

See point 3 here:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiD ... diswrapper

(Ndiswrapper is already installed in Zorin OS: Menu > System Tools > Administration > Windows Wireless Drivers)

Can you please post back the results of:

lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net
lsmod

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

lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net
lsmod

Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 801.11g Wireless LANController [14e4:4318] (rev 02)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN [103c:1355]
Kernel driver in use: b43-pci-bridge

Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ [10ec:8139] (rev 10)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:30a4]
Kernel driver in use: 8139too

Wolfman wrote:Hi,

have you tried with "Windows Wireless Drivers tool"?, it uses "ndiswrapper" and you will need the Windows driver disk with the wireless drivers in its folder!.

Basically point the tool to the file ending in ".inf" and it might work. Madviengar is the WiFI expert, you can wait for him too!.

See point 3 here:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiD ... diswrapper

(Ndiswrapper is already installed in Zorin OS: Menu > System Tools > Administration > Windows Wireless Drivers)

Yes, that what I tried after the proprietary driver didn't work. I visited the HP support page for the V5000 and downloaded the Broadcom driver from there. That came as a Windows self-extracting archive. I extracted the files and copied them to a thumb drive. I used Ndiswrapper and got c*** that wouldn't even allow the adapter to power up. Evidently the driver HP has on its site is for a different revision of my machine with a different BCM chipset. They've been known to do that in the past.

Results of lsmod:

ismodray@Presario:~$ lsmod
Module Size Used by
bnep 17830 2
rfcomm 38139 0
bluetooth 158447 8 bnep,rfcomm
parport_pc 32114 0
ppdev 12849 0
snd_atiixp 19381 2
snd_atiixp_modem 18656 0
snd_ac97_codec 110213 2 snd_atiixp,snd_atiixp_modem
ac97_bus 12642 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm 80916 3 snd_atiixp,snd_atiixp_modem,snd_ac97_codec
snd_seq_midi 13132 0
snd_rawmidi 25424 1 snd_seq_midi
snd_seq_midi_event 14475 1 snd_seq_midi
snd_seq 51592 2 snd_seq_midi,snd_seq_midi_event
snd_timer 28931 2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
joydev 17393 0
snd_seq_device 14172 3 snd_seq_midi,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq
arc4 12473 2
snd 62218 12 snd_atiixp,snd_atiixp_modem,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq,snd_timer,snd_seq_device
b43 342801 0
hp_wmi 13652 0
soundcore 14635 1 snd
sparse_keymap 13658 1 hp_wmi
dm_multipath 22747 0
mac80211 436493 1 b43
psmouse 86546 0
snd_page_alloc 14108 3 snd_atiixp,snd_atiixp_modem,snd_pcm
cfg80211 178877 2 b43,mac80211
bcma 25651 1 b43
serio_raw 13027 0
i2c_piix4 13093 0
k8temp 12905 0
binfmt_misc 17292 1
shpchp 32265 0
mac_hid 13077 0
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 638387 0
zlib_deflate 26622 1 btrfs
libcrc32c 12543 1 btrfs
8139too 23283 0
radeon 738095 4
8139cp 26718 0
ssb 50691 1 b43
pata_atiixp 12999 2
video 19115 0
ttm 65344 1 radeon
drm_kms_helper 45466 1 radeon
drm 197641 6 radeon,ttm,drm_kms_helper
wmi 18744 1 hp_wmi
i2c_algo_bit 13199 1 radeon
ati_agp 13242 0
zram 18193 1
ray@Presario:~$

Forget ndiswrapper and windows drivers. Unload any windows driver you used.
Open terminal, plug an ethernet cable to get internet and run the following 4 commands.

sudo apt-get remove --purge bcmwl-kernel-source broadcom-sta-common broadcom-sta-source
sudo apt-get install b43-fwcutter firmware-b43-installer
sudo modprobe -r b43
sudo modprobe b43

Your wireless should start working. A reboot may be required.

Thanks madvinegar. When before I installed b43 I tried to purge the proprietary driver using this syntax:

sudo apt-get remove --purge bcmwl-kernel-source

Which produced "driver not installed" or something like that. I was evidently using the wrong or incomplete designation. Wireless is working now as it should.

Note to moderator: Please mark this thread as SOLVED.

Glad I helped my friend.

You and Wolfman were Johnnie-on-the-spot with excellent assistance. I'm very impressed with the Zorin community.

Again, many thanks!

120 blue jewels a-piece to Wolfman and madvinegar!