[awais_rauf]

Hi

I just switched from windows to ubuntu. Some days before i setup my wireless card by installing bcm43xx-fwcutter while in the LiveCD enviornment and it worked fine. But now when i installed ubuntu wireless is not working. I have installed and uninstalled bcm43xx-fwcutter many times hoping it will work but it hasn't. I did lshw and the results are below

*-network:1
description: Wireless interface
product: BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller
vendor: Broadcom Corporation
physical id: 2
bus info: pci@0000:02:02.0
logical name: eth1
version: 03
serial: 00:0b:7d-xx-xx-xx
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: bus_master ethernet physical wireless
configuration: broadcast=yes driver=bcm43xx driverversion=2.6.22-14-generic latency=32 module=bcm43xx multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11b/g

Can anyone help me out.

[awais_rauf]

iwconfig output

eth1 IEEE 802.11b/g ESSID:"RAUFSNETWORK" Nickname:"Broadcom 4306"
Mode:Managed Frequency=2.472 GHz Access Point: Invalid
Bit Rate=1 Mb/s Tx-Power=15 dBm
RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Link Quality=0/100 Signal level=-256 dBm Noise level=-256 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0

[waterhead]

Bcm43xx-fwcutter is not a driver. It is a tool that extracts the firmware from a WindowsXP driver. This firmware is place in the /lib/firmware folder (usually) so it can be loaded when the wireless calls for it. It is the companion program to the bcm43xx driver.

If you have a newer kernel, you would use the newer b43 driver module. This uses b43-fwcutter to extract the firmware. To find which module is loading, enter this into a terminal, and post the output.

lsmod

To see if there are any boot errors concerning the wireless, enter these commands (one at a time) and post the output.

dmesg | grep b43
dmesg | grep bcm43xx
dmesg | grep wlan0

[awais_rauf]

Thanks for reply

Output of lsmod is:

Module Size Used by
arc4 2944 2
ecb 4608 2
blkcipher 7556 1 ecb
ieee80211_crypt_wep 6272 1
isofs 36412 1
udf 87204 0
i915 25856 2
drm 83348 3 i915
rfcomm 42136 2
l2cap 26240 11 rfcomm
bluetooth 57060 4 rfcomm,l2cap
ppdev 10244 0
snd_atiixp_modem 17160 0
snd_via82xx_modem 16264 0
snd_intel8x0m 18572 5
speedstep_lib 6404 0
cpufreq_stats 7232 0
cpufreq_powersave 2688 0
cpufreq_conservative 8072 0
cpufreq_userspace 5280 0
cpufreq_ondemand 9612 0
freq_table 5792 2 cpufreq_stats,cpufreq_ondemand
sbs 19592 0
container 5504 0
dock 10656 0
battery 11012 0
ac 6148 0
button 8976 0
video 18060 0
nls_iso8859_1 5120 1
nls_cp437 6784 2
vfat 14080 1
fat 54300 1 vfat
ipv6 273892 8
parport_pc 37412 0
lp 12580 0
parport 37448 3 ppdev,parport_pc,lp
pcmcia 41388 0
joydev 11328 0
snd_intel8x0 34972 1
snd_ac97_codec 100644 4 snd_atiixp_modem,snd_via82xx_modem,snd_intel8x0m,s nd_intel8x0
ac97_bus 3200 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm_oss 44672 0
snd_mixer_oss 17664 1 snd_pcm_oss
snd_pcm 80388 8 snd_atiixp_modem,snd_via82xx_modem,snd_intel8x0m,s nd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm_oss
snd_seq_dummy 4740 0
snd_seq_oss 33152 0
snd_seq_midi 9600 0
snd_rawmidi 25728 1 snd_seq_midi
snd_seq_midi_event 8448 2 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi
bcm43xx 127336 0
yenta_socket 27532 1
rsrc_nonstatic 14080 1 yenta_socket
pcmcia_core 40980 3 pcmcia,yenta_socket,rsrc_nonstatic
ieee80211softmac 31360 1 bcm43xx
ieee80211 35656 2 bcm43xx,ieee80211softmac
ieee80211_crypt 7040 2 ieee80211_crypt_wep,ieee80211
snd_seq 53232 6 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi,snd_seq_mid i_event
snd_timer 24324 2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
snd_seq_device 9228 5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi,snd_rawmidi ,snd_seq
pcspkr 4224 0
iTCO_wdt 11940 0
iTCO_vendor_support 4868 1 iTCO_wdt
snd 54660 23 snd_atiixp_modem,snd_via82xx_modem,snd_intel8x0m,s nd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_o ss,snd_pcm,snd_seq_oss,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq,snd_tim er,snd_seq_device
soundcore 8800 1 snd
serio_raw 8068 0
psmouse 39952 0
shpchp 34580 0
pci_hotplug 32704 1 shpchp
snd_page_alloc 11400 5 snd_atiixp_modem,snd_via82xx_modem,snd_intel8x0m,s nd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
intel_agp 25620 1
agpgart 35016 3 drm,intel_agp
af_packet 24840 8
evdev 11136 5
ext3 133896 1
jbd 60456 1 ext3
mbcache 9732 1 ext3
sg 36764 0
sd_mod 30336 5
sr_mod 17828 1
cdrom 37536 1 sr_mod
ata_piix 17540 5
b44 28300 0
mii 6528 1 b44
ata_generic 8452 0
libata 125168 2 ata_piix,ata_generic
scsi_mod 147084 4 sg,sd_mod,sr_mod,libata
ehci_hcd 36492 0
uhci_hcd 26640 0
usbcore 138632 3 ehci_hcd,uhci_hcd
thermal 14344 0
processor 32072 1 thermal
fan 5764 0
fuse 47124 3
apparmor 40728 0
commoncap 8320 1 apparmor


Output of Boot error commands are:

awais@RAUFS-LAPTOP:~$ dmesg | grep b43
awais@RAUFS-LAPTOP:~$ dmesg | grep bcm43xx
[ 23.216000] bcm43xx driver
awais@RAUFS-LAPTOP:~$ dmesg | grep wlan*
awais@RAUFS-LAPTOP:~$ dmesg | grep wlan0

[awais_rauf]

The Kernel version is

2.6.22-14-generic

[waterhead]

You are obviously loading the bcm43xx driver, but the fact that you didn't get anything from the dmesg | grep bcm43xx command is interesting. I still think that there may be a problem loading the needed firmware. You can look though the output of this for any info.

dmesg

If you haven't extracted the firmware with the fwcutter tool, do that first. To see a list of the options, and an example of how to enter the command, type in the command without any options.

bcm43xx-fwcutter

Remember, you need the WinXP driver to extract the firmware from.

Now, the bcm43xx driver is usable, but it has been replaced by the b43 driver. Officially, it is in the 2.6.24 kernel (Welcome - Linux Wireless), but I have it on Fedora 8 with the 2.6.23.14-115.fc8 kernel. I think that it is a better driver, and you can get it by upgrading the kernel, or install it on your current kernel from the sources.

If you don't want to try and get the b43 driver, then I would recommend using NDISwrapper instead of bcm43xx. It too uses the WinXP driver, but it is used instead of the bcm43xx driver. In fact the bcm43xx driver must be removed before NDISwrapper will work. This is easily done, if you go that route.