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#1 2014-03-24 18:20:39

jpjenkins
Member
Registered: 2014-03-24
Posts: 104

[SOLVED]Loading bm4312 wireless during installation

I don't have access to a wired connection and I can't get my wireless to load. I checked the log and shows that the b43 driver fails, however, the card is still detected but obviously not loaded.

I have a bm4312 broadcom card.

My question: is it possible to load a driver during the installation of arch? I have the relevant drivers but don't know how to do it.

Can someone help me out as I want to get this badboy installed, I set aside yesterday to do it but this put a halt to everything.

Cheers

Last edited by jpjenkins (2014-03-26 18:06:20)

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#2 2014-03-24 19:00:50

Gusar
Member
Registered: 2009-08-25
Posts: 3,606

Re: [SOLVED]Loading bm4312 wireless during installation

It's possible, but it's not easy. You'd need to put packages for a whole bunch of stuff (linux-headers, gcc and the rest of the compiler toolchain) onto and usb stick, install them from there while in the live environment, then use them to build broadcom-wl.

There's a simpler method: BCM4312 is supported by the b43 driver, but you need firmware. To get that, download the wl driver tarball and unpack it, copy linux/wl_apsta.o from the unpacked tarball to an usb stick. Then in the Arch install environment, mount the usb stick and extract the firmware like so:

b43-fwcutter -w /usr/lib/firmware /path/to/stick/mountpoint/wl_apsta.o

Adjust the path to where you mounted the stick, of course. Now do a "rmmod b43; modprobe b43" and your wireless should work.

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#3 2014-03-24 19:34:36

frank604
Member
From: BC, Canada
Registered: 2011-04-20
Posts: 1,218

Re: [SOLVED]Loading bm4312 wireless during installation

My lpersonal favourite method is to use usb tether with my android phone and install the network drivers through that connection.

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#4 2014-03-26 15:35:56

jpjenkins
Member
Registered: 2014-03-24
Posts: 104

Re: [SOLVED]Loading bm4312 wireless during installation

Thanks Gusar, that worked a treat, took me a while but I've finally got it up and running smile

Can someone mark this as solved... or tell me how to do it ugh.

Last edited by jpjenkins (2014-03-26 15:39:02)

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#5 2014-03-26 15:54:25

frank604
Member
From: BC, Canada
Registered: 2011-04-20
Posts: 1,218

Re: [SOLVED]Loading bm4312 wireless during installation

jpjenkins wrote:

Thanks Gusar, that worked a treat, took me a while but I've finally got it up and running smile

Can someone mark this as solved... or tell me how to do it ugh.

Edit first post and edit title by adding [solved]

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#6 2014-03-26 18:06:53

jpjenkins
Member
Registered: 2014-03-24
Posts: 104

Re: [SOLVED]Loading bm4312 wireless during installation

Thanks Frank

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#7 2014-03-26 18:28:32

jpjenkins
Member
Registered: 2014-03-24
Posts: 104

Re: [SOLVED]Loading bm4312 wireless during installation

Just to add for future folks, doing rmmod b43 then modprobe b43 caused a weird conflict that kept hanging my system. instead: modprobe -r b43 then modprobe b43 put a boot up the backside of that issue.

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#8 2014-04-05 16:24:33

madscience
Member
From: Ontario, Canada
Registered: 2014-02-11
Posts: 83
Website

Re: [SOLVED]Loading bm4312 wireless during installation

Gusar wrote:

It's possible, but it's not easy. You'd need to put packages for a whole bunch of stuff (linux-headers, gcc and the rest of the compiler toolchain) onto and usb stick, install them from there while in the live environment, then use them to build broadcom-wl.

There's a simpler method: BCM4312 is supported by the b43 driver, but you need firmware. To get that, download the wl driver tarball and unpack it, copy linux/wl_apsta.o from the unpacked tarball to an usb stick. Then in the Arch install environment, mount the usb stick and extract the firmware like so:

b43-fwcutter -w /usr/lib/firmware /path/to/stick/mountpoint/wl_apsta.o

Adjust the path to where you mounted the stick, of course. Now do a "rmmod b43; modprobe b43" and your wireless should work.


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