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BCM43xx; the dreaded Broadcom Drivers

Posted on April 26, 2007 by nseidm1.
Categories: bcm43xx.

Broadcom has zero(0) support for linux drivers. Ubuntu Feisty will recognize the wireless card, but it lacks the firmware to operate the device. The Broadcom BCM43xx drivers have been reverse engineered, albeit in a preliminary stage, and are not incredibly fast. I personally preferring using an ethernet cable over WiFi as it is much faster, but if you want to install the firmware to at leas get your wireless card to see hotspots do the following. It is supported by the main Ubuntu apt repositories, therefore you will be notified of updates automatically.

sudo apt-get install bcm43xx-fwcutter

This will installed a simple piece of software that will ask you if you want to automatically download the Windows drivers, and cut (extract) a linux compatible conversion. It will automatically install them for you! Just follow the on-screen instructions and your card will be working in seconds.

You will have to restart to get your hardware working, but if your in a rush to see it you can manually get it working instantly with the following commands that you will type into a terminal:

sudo rmmod bcm43xx

sudo modprobe bcm43xx

After the second command your light on the wireless card will obviously show that your card is operational. Then you can go to the network manager in the upper right hand task bar and you will see that your wireless card see available hotspots.

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