Arch Linux

zrxpq22

Member

Registered: 2017-12-16

Posts: 1

Trouble with broadcom wireless kernel module

Hello everyone,

I'm having trouble getting my thinkpad x260 to recognise my wireless device after a recent update. I have since completely reinstalled arch, and during the installation process wireless was fully functional. However, after a reboot I appear to be (I suspect) unable to load the correct kernel module.

Entering:

lspci -nn -d 14e4:

Produces:

04:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Limited BCM4356 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter [14e4:43ec] (rev 02)

Which I then cross-reference with this help page to let me know I should be using the brcm80211 kernel drivers.

Since the wiki mentions brcm80211 devices can sometimes be made inaccesible after updating the kernel, I have checked inside /etc/modprobe.d and there do not appear to be any blacklisted modules (or a configuration file - could this be the source of the issue?), and the device still does not appear after invoking ip link. I've also checked that the device is not blocked by any software switches using rfkill.

I've tried to check if the bcma module is available by running:

lsmod | grep bcma

Which produces:

bcma                   61440  0

Which appears to indicate bcma is not in use. I run (as root):

modprobe bcma

And the module is still unused (code 0) after repeating the lsmod command.

Running lspci -v as root produces:

04:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Limited BCM4356 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter (rev 02)
	Subsystem: Lenovo BCM4356 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter
	Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 18
	Memory at f1400000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=32K]
	Memory at f1000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
	Capabilities: [48] Power Management version 3
	Capabilities: [58] MSI: Enable- Count=1/16 Maskable- 64bit+
	Capabilities: [68] Vendor Specific Information: Len=44 <?>
	Capabilities: [ac] Express Endpoint, MSI 00
	Capabilities: [100] Advanced Error Reporting
	Capabilities: [13c] Device Serial Number 00-00-32-ff-ff-9c-18-4f
	Capabilities: [150] Power Budgeting <?>
	Capabilities: [160] Virtual Channel
	Capabilities: [1b0] Latency Tolerance Reporting
	Capabilities: [220] #15
	Capabilities: [240] L1 PM Substates
	Kernel modules: brcmfmac

Following which I've also tried running depmod brcmfmac.

The module brcmfmac does not appear to be in use, as lsmod | grep brcmfmac returns:

brcmfmac              303104  0
brcmutil               16384  1 brcmfmac
cfg80211              733184  2 wl,brcmfmac
mmc_core              159744  3 rtsx_pci_sdmmc,mmc_block,brcmfmac
usbcore               282624  9 rndis_host,usbnet,uvcvideo,usbhid,cdc_ether,xhci

The only lead I have so far is checking the log journalctl -b | grep brcmfmac:

Dec 16 12:57:07 <hostname> sudo[2762]:      joe : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/etc/modprobe.d ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/modprobe brcmfmac
Dec 16 12:57:07 <hostname> kernel: usbcore: registered new interface driver brcmfmac
Dec 16 12:57:07 <hostname> kernel: brcmfmac: brcmf_fw_map_chip_to_name: using brcm/brcmfmac4356-pcie.bin for chip 0x004356(17238) rev 0x000002
Dec 16 12:57:08 <hostname> kernel: brcmfmac 0000:04:00.0: Direct firmware load for brcm/brcmfmac4356-pcie.txt failed with error -2
Dec 16 12:57:10 <hostname> kernel: brcmfmac: brcmf_msgbuf_query_dcmd: Timeout on response for query command
Dec 16 12:57:10 <hostname> kernel: brcmfmac: brcmf_c_preinit_dcmds: Retreiving cur_etheraddr failed, -5
Dec 16 12:57:10 <hostname> kernel: brcmfmac: brcmf_bus_started: failed: -5
Dec 16 12:57:10 <hostname> kernel: brcmfmac: brcmf_pcie_attach_bus: dongle is not responding

Of which this line in particular:

Dec 16 12:57:08 <hostname> kernel: brcmfmac 0000:04:00.0: Direct firmware load for brcm/brcmfmac4356-pcie.txt failed with error -2

Seems to suggest brcmfmac is not loaded properly. Since according to  this page brcmfmac is for (SDIO/USB) devices, I'm also wondering if this is even the correct kernel module?  My wireless is functional on a windows partition, if it matters.

Any advice on where to proceed from here would be appreciated. I apologise if this belongs in the newbie corner (I may be missing something obvious), but I thought it was a specific enough question to be posed here, and while I'm new to Arch I'm not especially new to linux in general.

Thanks in advance.