GNU/Linux Inside

Ubuntu 8.04 “Hardy Heron” Broadcom Wireless

Ubuntu 8.04 LTS was recently released. So I upgraded a couple of my computers (that I’m far too lazy and have no time to maintain Gentoo on) to this new release to find that my wireless PCMCIA card did not work on my laptop. Okay – that’s fine. I’ve had this problem since I began using Linux years ago. However, unlike the previous release, Hardy Heron didn’t seem to list the driver for it in the restricted drivers. Granted, you need an internet connection to download the drivers either way, it would have been nice for it to say “Hey, we’ve got you covered!” So I was worried that it was for some reason removed from this release.

So, for those of you who have this problem – start by plugging it into a wired connection and updating your repositories (sudo apt-get update). Then in System -> Administration -> Hardware Drivers, the driver for your wireless device should be listed. Simply install it and restart and you should be good to go.

No Trackbacks

You can leave a trackback using this URL: http://mikegerwitz.com/ubuntu-804-hardy-heron-broadcom-wireless/trackback/

10 Comments

  1. Lance

    “good to go” I wish was true. I came off using fedora for years, to a clean 8.0.4 install on my Dell XPS M1330 and an internal broadcom network card.

    Your right on the System -> Admin -> Hardware Drivers. The Broadcom is listed, nice green button, enabled yet nothing working. I have 3 neighbors with wireless yet none are seen, no errors, etc.

    I am posting on the ubuntu forums, but who knows … Just someone’s .02!

    Posted May 19, 2008 at 2:04 am | Permalink
  2. Another thing I had to try on another one of the computers in order to get it working was to manually bring up the network interface after configuring everything in the Network Manager.

    Find your wireless interface:
    sudo iwconfig

    Then try (replacing wlan0 with your interface)
    sudo ifdown wlan0
    sudo ifup wlan0

    Why a restart didn’t fix it and that did, I do not know. However, on that computer I also did not need to download the restricted drivers. At the very least, doing the above will allow you to see any errors. If you’re looking for help at UbuntuForums, such output will be helpful.

    Posted May 19, 2008 at 2:16 am | Permalink
  3. Simon

    Thanks very much! Worked like a charm

    Posted May 24, 2008 at 6:53 pm | Permalink
  4. Angelo

    I just installed Ubuntu 8.04 on a clean machine (Inspiron 8500) there is no blue tower for roaming wireless shown, when I click on edit wireless networks there is none shown, it does work with direct wire connection.There are no Hardware drivers shown when I access that. My NIC card is a Bmcom4309, any help would be wonderful.

    Posted June 28, 2008 at 1:20 pm | Permalink
  5. Michael

    Check out this website – http://300lb.blogspot.com/2008/04/how-to-get-broadcom-wireless-to-work-in.html

    I have a broadcom wireless 4306, and this worked like a charm. After installing I had to restart, and no problems since.

    Posted July 28, 2008 at 11:55 pm | Permalink
  6. Jim Lynch

    wlan0 doesn’exist. I can’t see what Im typing so I hope this isn’t garbage. Black on a dark green background is less than optimal.

    No network card listed in Hardware drivers. lspci shows two wireless cards, the built in and the pcmcia card but noting makes them work.

    I even installed Linuxant and it doesn’t.
    Windows works fiee as did Edgy.

    Jim

    Posted July 30, 2008 at 9:24 pm | Permalink
  7. Bill Ataras

    I have tried various methods for installing fwcutter and all have failed. In the most recent attempt, I began with:
    sudo apt-get install ndiswrapper-common

    Things seemed to proceed normally for a while, then this error was reported:

    Quoting:

    Setting up b43-fwcutter (1:011-1) …
    Error parsing proxy URL http://:8080/: Invalid host name.
    dpkg: error processing b43-fwcutter (–configure):
    subprocess post-installation script returned error exit status 1
    Setting up ndiswrapper-common (1.50-1ubuntu1) …
    Errors were encountered while processing:
    b43-fwcutter
    E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

    Can you help resolve this?

    Thank you,
    Bill

    Posted August 3, 2008 at 9:55 pm | Permalink
  8. Bill Ataras

    The problem appears to come from lines in the install fwcutter script that have the following:

    wget http://downloads.openwrt.org/sources/wl_apsta-3.130.20.0.o

    The error message is:

    Error parsing proxy URL http://:8080/: Invalid host name.

    Posted August 3, 2008 at 10:13 pm | Permalink
  9. Does wget work on its own? Try to download some file:

    wget http://site.com/file

    If it gives you the proxy error, check your proxy settings. Port 8080 sounds familiar – perhaps privoxy. I do not use a proxy so I’m not sure how to help.

    Posted August 4, 2008 at 2:05 am | Permalink
  10. i have acer 4310 portable laptop with broadcom wireless.

    i have no conflict with hard ware in ubuntu 8.04

    but i don’t know how to use wireless for my work

    please help me

    Posted November 23, 2008 at 1:54 pm | Permalink

Post a Comment

Your email is never shared. Required fields are marked *

*
*