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brcm80211 is a free and open source mac80211 driver currently in development, supporting specific Broadcom 802.11n/g PCIe wireless LAN chipsets: brcm80211 is a free and open source mac80211 driver currently in development, supporting specific Broadcom 802.11n PCIe wireless LAN chipsets:
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The following list is based on the ''alias'' fields of {{{modinfo brcm80211}}} in Debian 2.6.32 (2.6.32-25) kernel images. The following list is based on the ''alias'' fields of {{{modinfo brcm80211}}} in Debian 2.6.32 (2.6.32-27) kernel images.
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PCI: 14E4:4727 Broadcom Corporation BCM4313 802.11b/g LP-PHY PCI: 14E4:4727 Broadcom Corporation BCM4313 802.11b/g/n Wireless LAN Controller

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Broadcom 4313, 43224, 43225 devices (brcm80211)

This page describes how to enable support for WiFi devices based on Broadcom BCM4313, BCM43224, BCM43225 chipsets on Debian systems.

Contents

  1. Broadcom 4313, 43224, 43225 devices (brcm80211)
    1. Installation
      1. Lenny
      2. Squeeze
    2. Supported Devices
    3. See Also
    4. External Links

brcm80211 is a free and open source mac80211 driver currently in development, supporting specific Broadcom 802.11n PCIe wireless LAN chipsets:

  • BCM4313 (PCI-ID: 14E4:4727)
  • BCM43224 (PCI-ID: 14E4:4353)
  • BCM43225 (PCI-ID: 14E4:4357)

It is included in Debian Linux kernel images since linux-2.6 2.6.32-22. Non-free firmware is required and must be installed prior to device operation.

<!> This staging driver is only available for the x86 and x86-64 architectures (Debian i386 and AMD64 ports respectively) at this time.

{i} For support of other Broadcom PCI wireless LAN chipsets, see bcm43xx.

Installation

Lenny

  1. Manually acquire the squeeze/firmware-brcm80211 package from http://packages.debian.org/squeeze/all/firmware-brcm80211/download. For example: 

    $ wget http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/pool/non-free/f/firmware-nonfree/firmware-brcm80211_0.27_all.deb

  2. Install the squeeze/firmware-brcm80211 package via dpkg: 

    $ su
# dpkg -i firmware-brcm80211*deb

  3. Add the Debian Backports repository to /etc/apt/sources.list, for example: 

    # Backported packages for Debian Lenny
deb http://backports.debian.org/debian-backports lenny-backports main

  4. Update the list of available packages and install a Linux 2.6.32 kernel image appropriate for your system, along with the wireless-tools package. For example: 

    # aptitude update
# aptitude -t lenny-backports install linux-image-2.6-$(uname -r | sed 's,.*-,,') wireless-tools
  5. Restart your system and boot with the newly installed kernel.

  6. The necessary kernel module should be automatically loaded. If necessary, it can be manually loaded via: 

    $ su
# modprobe brcm80211

  7. Verify your device has an available interface: 

    # iwconfig

  8. Configure your wireless interface as appropriate.

Squeeze

  1. Add a "non-free" component to /etc/apt/sources.list, for example: 

    # Debian Squeeze (testing)
deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian squeeze main contrib non-free

  2. Update the list of available packages and install the firmware-brcm80211 and wireless-tools packages: 

    # aptitude update
# aptitude install firmware-brcm80211 wireless-tools

  3. As the driver may already be loaded, reinsert the module to access installed firmware: 

    # modprobe -r brcm80211 ; modprobe brcm80211

  4. Verify your device has an available interface: 

    # iwconfig

  5. Configure your wireless interface as appropriate.

Supported Devices

The page HowToIdentifyADevice/PCI explains how to identify a PCI device.

The following list is based on the alias fields of modinfo brcm80211 in Debian 2.6.32 (2.6.32-27) kernel images. 

  • PCI: 14E4:4353 Broadcom Corporation BCM43224 802.11a/b/g/n
PCI: 14E4:4357 Broadcom Corporation BCM43225 802.11b/g/n
PCI: 14E4:4727 Broadcom Corporation BCM4313 802.11b/g/n Wireless LAN Controller

See Also

CategoryHardware | CategoryWireless