<Solved>Install wireless drivers without internet connection

[themraw435]

So, I have recently acquired an older laptop from a friend because I needed one and being a poor college student this was the way to go. I got everything installed im somewhat familiar with linux so no problems there but I didn't know the ethernet jack is broken on the machine. Now I can't get the wireless to work and I imagine it's a driver issue i know the driver i need is broadcom b43 but I need some help installing it normally I'd just update with the ethernet jack but im SOL on this one. Thanks!

[anandrkris]

Perhaps you can download the wireless driver from another system with internet connection and transfer the installation file using USB and install it then?

http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.p ... zma.tar.gz - Came across this discussion. Hope this helps.

[themraw435]

Thanks! I'm going to try that and mix this with it. That one you posted that OP still had a wired connection I can't even get that but for any one with this same problem I found this

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiD ... net_access

In the contents on the right of the page Section 4 sub section 2 has all the info i think I need I'm going to try it when I get home I will post my results.

[hal9000000]

I'll be curious to see if this works. I'm going to try the same thing -- albeit on a newer Macbook Pro with a dual boot.

[AlbertP]

Which Broadcom chip do you have? You can run inxi -N in terminal to see it.

[hal9000000]

Which Broadcom chip do you have? You can run inxi -N in terminal to see it.

with ixni -N command I get:

Card-1: Broadcom BCM4331 802.11a/b/g/n driver: bcma-pci-bridge

[AlbertP]

Yes, that's the same b43 driver indeed - b43-fwcutter on the wl_apsta.o file would also work for you I think.

[themraw435]

Ok I got it! First off I have BCM4311 and this worked fine for me I imagine it will work with a wide range of Broadcom cards. So I ended up booting into my windows partition and going to this site: http://packages.debian.org/squeeze/b43-fwcutter, and downloaded b43-fwcutter to a flash drive. Then booted into my linux mint partition and installed b43-fwcutter ignoring any warnings about it being an older version. Then i downloaded the b43 tar file that is listed on this site https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiD ... net_access (I downloaded the b43 10.04 to be exact) then as it states in the guide i just ran these two commands to unpack the tar file and install ther drivers:

Code: Select all

tar xfvj broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5.tar.bz2
sudo b43-fwcutter -w /lib/firmware broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5/driver/wl_apsta_mimo

.

rebooted the machine and poof! everything worked so again download and installed b43-fwcutter and then the tar file, ran the commands and good to go!

[0ddstr1der]

I have been fighting this for two days now.

2013 Macbook Pro running Linux Mint 15 with Unet. Have BCM4331 Network controller from Broadcom.

These posts are as far as I have gotten. I am in serious need of help. I followed the instructions exactly but to no avail.

The following seemed to execute successfully:

tar xfvj broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5.tar.bz2
sudo b43-fwcutter -w /lib/firmware broadcom-wl-4.150.10.5/driver/wl_apsta_mimo.o

and yet... no poof for me

[AlbertP]

0ddst1der, you are replying to a topic that is already marked as solved, so people who could help you might easily overlook the topic. I recommend you to open a new topic.

If you have a wired internet connection available, you can use that connection to download "firmware-b43-installer" from the Software Manager. That should also make the 4331 working.

If that driver does not work, you can try the Broadcom STA driver from Driver Manager (also available as "bcmwl-kernel-source" from Software Manager).

Note to everybody involved: you can't just use instructions for a different type of Broadcom chip. It differs by chip type which driver you need, and there are four or five possible drivers.