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Broadcom Linux STA Driver

by daMaestro — last modified Feb 04, 2011 04:09 PM
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These packages contain Broadcom's IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n hybrid Linux® device driver for use with Broadcom's BCM4311-, BCM4312-, BCM4321-, and BCM4322-based hardware. However, this driver is known to support other chipsets labelled differently (such as the BCM4328.)

Requirements

  1. Read our Getting Started with Wireless Guide.
  2. Existing connection to the Internet. For example, wired internet.
  3. You must  configure the RPMFusion Repo.
  4. You must have an updated system:
    1. Open a terminal

    2. Run a yum update:

      3. su -c 'yum update'

Doing the Work - With a wired connection

  1. Open a terminal .
  2. Install the broadcom-wl packages depending on what kernel you are running:
    3. su -c 'yum install broadcom-wl'
    or
    su -c "yum install broadcom-wl-PAE
  3. You now have the driver installed. Try loading it:
    su -c 'modprobe wl'
  4.  If you don't plan on fiddling around to get it working and it didn't work after the modprobe, just reboot:
    su -c 'reboot'

Using the akmod Rather then the kmod

If you want to use the akmod rather then the static kmod, install the akmod package and lets dependencies pull in broadcom-wl:

  1. Open a terminal .
  2. Install the broadcom-wl packages:
    3. su -c 'yum install akmod-wl'
  3. Build the kmod:
    su -c 'akmods --akmod wl'
  4. You now have the driver build and installed. Try loading it:
    su -c 'modprobe wl'
  5.  If you don't plan on fiddling around to get it working and it didn't work after the modprobe, just reboot:
    su -c 'reboot'


Doing the Work - Without a pre-existing wired connection (aka: sneakernet)

If after a fresh install of Fedora you want to get your broadcom wireless working without having to first setup a wired connection on the target machine, or it has no wired port, then you can also download the needed wireless drivers ahead of time and manually install them later.

You need to download three (3) packages from a RPMFusion "Everything" mirror that matches the architecture you have installed (such as this one http://mirrors.cat.pdx.edu/rpmfusion/nonfree/fedora/releases/13/Everything/i386/os/). It is important to note that the wireless packages listed below are built for the original kernel that ships with the initial Fedora release, which you'll need before you can yum update the first time to get a newer kernel and newer kmods. The links below are for 32bit non-PAE kernels; drill down the url to download the right packages.

Fedora 13:
  1. kmod-wl-2.6.33.3-85.fc13.i686-5.60.48.36-1.fc13.5.i686.rpm
  2. kmod-wl-5.60.48.36-1.fc13.5.i686.rpm
  3. broadcom-wl-5.60.48.36-1.fc13.noarch.rpm

Fedora 12:
  1. kmod-wl-2.6.31.5-127.fc12.i686-5.10.91.9.3-3.fc12.6.i586.rpm
  2. kmod-wl-5.10.91.9.3-3.fc12.6.i586.rpm
  3. broadcom-wl-5.10.91.9.3-1.fc12.noarch.rpm

Install them post-install:
rpm -ivh *rpm
Now "modprobe wl" (or reboot) and your wireless should be working (click on your NetworkManager icon). Before your first full yum update, be sure to have the rpmfusion repo installed, or else you'll lose wireless when your kernel is updated but the kmod-wl isn't.

Troubleshooting

How to test

Open a terminal.

Ping yahoo: (or any host)
ping yahoo.com

Results similar to the ones below should be displayed:

PING yahoo.com (216.109.112.135) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from w2.rc.vip.dcn.yahoo.com (216.109.112.135): icmp_seq=0 ttl=53 time=274 ms
[...]

More Information

Disclaimer

We test this stuff on our own machines, really we do. But you may run into problems, if you do, come to #fedora on irc.freenode.net

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