B4318 conundrum - Lisa. modules location discrepancy

[marawuti]

Props
Just installed Mint to dodge the Gnome interface change in Ubuntu 11.10. Nice install guys. I was all backed up and ready to re-roll it in but the LiveDVD (12 Lisa) kept all of my prior data. Much appreciated.

The problem
The LiveDVD test worked fine for my Broadcom B4318. Just installed b43-fwcutter and firmware-b43-installer and boom! I'm online.
The results for the actual install however, while these two packages are installed, I've had no joy with wifi. De-installed and the command line install found some kind of kernel module location discrepancy (/lib/modules/3.0.0-12-generic/updates/ vs, /lib/modules/3.0.0-14-generic/modules.dep) as follows:

515 > sudo modprobe -r b43 ssb wl
[sudo] password for mmmmmm:
FATAL: Could not load /lib/modules/3.0.0-14-generic/modules.dep: No such file or directory
19:24:18 mmmmmmmmmm:~

516 > inxi -SNc 0
System: Host snelsonLap01 Kernel 3.0.0-14-generic x86_64 (64 bit) Desktop Gnome Distro Linux Mint 12 Lisa
Network: Card-1 Realtek RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ driver 8139too
Card-2 Broadcom BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless LAN Controller driver b43-pci-bridge
19:24:27 mmmmmmmm:~

517 > sudo apt-get install bcmwl-kernel-source
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
bcmwl-kernel-source
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 6 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/1,155 kB of archives.
After this operation, 3,629 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Selecting previously deselected package bcmwl-kernel-source.
(Reading database ... 174830 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking bcmwl-kernel-source (from .../bcmwl-kernel-source_5.100.82.38+bdcom-0ubuntu4_amd64.deb) ...
Setting up bcmwl-kernel-source (5.100.82.38+bdcom-0ubuntu4) ...
Loading new bcmwl-5.100.82.38+bdcom DKMS files...
First Installation: checking all kernels...
Building only for 3.0.0-14-generic
Building for architecture x86_64
Building initial module for 3.0.0-12-generic
Done.

wl:
Running module version sanity check.
- Original module
- No original module exists within this kernel
- Installation
- Installing to /lib/modules/3.0.0-12-generic/updates/

depmod....

DKMS: install Completed.
update-initramfs: deferring update (trigger activated)
Processing triggers for initramfs-tools ...
update-initramfs: Generating /boot/initrd.img-3.0.0-12-generic
Warning: No support for locale: en_US.utf8
19:25:19 mmmmmmmmmm:~

518 > sudo apt-get install b43-fwcutter
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
b43-fwcutter
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 6 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/16.9 kB of archives.
After this operation, 90.1 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Selecting previously deselected package b43-fwcutter.
(Reading database ... 174879 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking b43-fwcutter (from .../b43-fwcutter_1%3a014-9_amd64.deb) ...
Processing triggers for man-db ...
Setting up b43-fwcutter (1:014-9) ...
19:25:51 mmmmmmmmmm:~

519 > sudo apt-get install firmware-b43-installer
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
firmware-b43-installer
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 6 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/3,272 B of archives.
After this operation, 53.2 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Selecting previously deselected package firmware-b43-installer.
(Reading database ... 174886 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking firmware-b43-installer (from .../firmware-b43-installer_1%3a014-9_all.deb) ...
Setting up firmware-b43-installer (1:014-9) ...
This card work with newer 5.10.56.27.3 firmware. Trying to install it.
--2012-01-15 19:26:18-- http://mirror2.openwrt.org/sources/broa ... el.tar.bz2
Resolving mirror2.openwrt.org... 46.4.11.11
Connecting to mirror2.openwrt.org|46.4.11.11|:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 1596823 (1.5M) [application/x-bzip2]
Saving to: `broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3_mipsel.tar.bz2'

100%[======================================>] 1,596,823 271K/s in 6.6s

2012-01-15 19:26:26 (235 KB/s) - `broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3_mipsel.tar.bz2' saved [1596823/1596823]

broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3/driver/
broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3/driver/Makefile
broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3/driver/aiutils.c
broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3/driver/bcmsrom.c
broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3/driver/bcmutils.c
.
.
.
broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3/shared/wl_linux.c
broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3/shared/wlutils.h
broadcom-wl-5.10.56.27.3/wl_exe.o
This file is recognised as:
ID : FW15
filename : wl_prebuilt.o
version : 508.1084
MD5 : 490d4e149ecc45eb1a91f06aa75be071
Extracting b43/ucode19.fw
Extracting b43/lp0initvals14.fw
Extracting b43/ucode16_lp.fw
Extracting b43/ucode16_sslpn.fw
ucode revision: 1084
Extracting b43/lp0bsinitvals14.fw
.
.
.
Extracting b43/sslpn0bsinitvals16.fw
Extracting b43/sslpn1initvals20.fw
19:26:31 mmmmmmmmmm:~

520 > sudo modprobe -r b43 ssb wl
FATAL: Could not load /lib/modules/3.0.0-14-generic/modules.dep: No such file or directory

[xenopeek]

Moved here by moderator

[TBABill]

You do not need the STA driver (wl module). It doesn't support the 4318. After your last command, which removed the three modules (b43, ssb and wl), just follow up with

Code: Select all

sudo modprobe b43

which will activate the b43 module. What happens then?

[marawuti]

You do not need the STA driver (wl module). It doesn't support the 4318. After your last command, which removed the three modules (b43, ssb and wl), just follow up with

Code: Select all

sudo modprobe b43

which will activate the b43 module. What happens then?

Well, my face is a little red. I used the -r option base on a post somewhere else that indicated how to see if the necessary modules were present.
However, after removing the STA kernel code and checking, via Synaptic, that the b43-fwcutter & firmware-b43-installer were present I still get the identical error message - from modprobe b43 - referring to /lib/modules/3.0.0-14-generic/modules.dep vice the /lib/modules/3.0.0-12-generic/updates reference from the kernel code install.

The only directory under /lib/modules is 3.0.0-12-generic.

What diagnostic data would be useful?

[TBABill]

If you have already removed the wl module from the system, perhaps removing the b43 and reinstalling would help? The install process should set it up fine and then to activate without restarting you just need to modprobe the driver once. To make sure it persists through restart just make sure b43 is added to /etc/modules

[TBABill]

You may also want to look at

Code: Select all

sudo rfkill list

and if it says you are soft blocked, then run

Code: Select all

sudo rfkill unblock all

[AlbertP]

Please remove the STA driver (bcmwl-kernel-source) and install firmware-b43-installer if you haven't yet done this.

If the directory /lib/modules/3.0.0-14-generic is not present, make sure linux-image-3.0.0-14-generic is properly installed - reinstall it with Package Manager if necessary.

It's indeed a good idea to check rfkill output as TBABill suggested, but I'd run inxi -N as well to verify that b43 "driver b43-pci-bridge" is loaded and not any other driver.

[marawuti]

Thank you kind sirs. The problem was that linux-...14-generic was not installed - hmmm. Added b43 to the modules file and presto chango.

Could you folks point me at some educational URLs about having multiple linux-...nn-generic's installed. I'm a little confused about what that means.

Thanks again guys.

[AlbertP]

They are different versions of the Linux kernel. The Linux kernel is the base of the operating system: the component that manages your hardware and drivers. It consists of two headers packages and one image package.
Version 3.0.0-12 is installed by default, 3.0.0-13 or 14 are updates in which bugs (most notably printing and sound problems) are fixed. I think, that in your case one of the packages already had already been upgraded, but the others weren't, causing confusion for the driver's installer which thought -14 was installed and in use.