Broadcom Wireless Doesn't work

In Gutsy, firmware was made available for download in order to run Broadcom 43xx wireless cards. Unfortunately this isn't the case in Hardy. I had the same issue, and ended up going back to Gutsy, where I had no problems. That may be the same case for you.

Oh dear. How do we revert to Gutsy? Is that the only thing to do?

As far as I know, it is the only way. I didn't see enough change in Hardy for me to have to go through all the work to get my wireless card to work. To revert, you'll want to insert your Gutsy live CD, and restart the computer into it. Install as you would usually do it, but at the Partition Editor, choose Manual. Now determine which partition is your Ubuntu Hardy one, and overwrite that.

Remember to back up all of your data before hand though.

Free software can end up being VERY expensive, can't it!

Na, believe me, it's MUCH easier to revert to Gutsy than you think.
Shouldn't take more than 30min.

On Sun, Apr 27, 2008 at 12:32 PM, Glyn Hughes <
<email address hidden>> wrote:

> Question #31064 on Ubuntu changed:
> https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/31064
>
> Status: Answered => Open
>
> Glyn Hughes is still having a problem:
> Free software can end up being VERY expensive, can't it!
>
> --
> You received this question notification because you are a direct
> subscriber of the question.
>

hello all concerned,

pls take a look at question #28867 and #30712; the answers helped Broderick and marc and, hopefully, it'll help you too. for your benefit these are the url's

https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/28867

https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/30712

regards,
peter b

To get my Broadcom 4318 working, I just followed the instructions in dmesg output :)

[ 605.805939] b43-phy0 ERROR: Firmware file "b43/ucode5.fw" not found or load failed.
[ 605.805949] b43-phy0 ERROR: You must go to http://linuxwireless.org/en/users/Drivers/b43#devicefirmware and download the correct firmware (version 4).

ie: I went to that url, and followed the instructions there... worked for me

Thenk you very much indeed for your advice, but I'm afraid this has become far too costly. It has taken a full day to revert to Gutsy, so I will not be advising our company to consider Ubuntu for the time being, though I will certainly be keeping an eye on it.

Thank you again.

I think the broadcom cards work in Hardy. I have set up hardy with a 4328. There is a bug that was causing some problems but there are also workarounds. See https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiDocs/Device/Broadcom_BCM4318_%5bAirForce_One_54g%5d_%28Native_Driver%29 for some info on the 4318 chips. It may apply to others as well.

See also

https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/184600
https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/182716 (not related specifically but a lot of people added comments and some fixes even though the bug was about AD).

Anyway, you can get broadcom chips working in Hardy. However, it would be nice if Broadcom Corp would actually release some drivers.

hello Glyn Hughes,

I understand your concern; however, as mentioned on other posts/howto's the problems associated with broadcom interfaces/drivers in ubuntu are the lack of proprietary data/drivers.

In this forum the members of ubuntu community offer solutions to other fellow members within the constrains of available open source data/drivers and, if available, also on proprietary data if released and open for public use. I hope that you see my point.

So, cognizant of this given situation, I personally do not see at the moment what the community can do in addition to what is presented above. Please be assured that sooner or later broadcom will somehow agree to release some data/drivers to the linux community (it is probably known to you that the situation with ati proprietary drivers was sorted out).

Please close this ticket for the time being and, by all means, keep an eye on the subject as you mentioned.

best regards,
peter b