Wireless (was: Questions about Ubuntu)

[Jerry Feldman]

On 09/18/2008 03:58 PM, Ben Scott wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 18, 2008 at 3:40 PM, Jarod Wilson <jarod at wilsonet.com> wrote:
>   
>> Just to add some more evidence as to the current solid state of Linux
>> wireless support...
>>     
>
>   In my experience, it has also depended on the packaging policies of
> the distribution and the hardware one happens to have.  In particular,
> since Broadcom chips need firmware loaded by the driver, and I guess
> the distros cannot legally distribute the Broadcom firmware, one could
> run into chicken-and-egg problems when booting from a live CD and with
> only wireless available.
>
>   Maybe things have improved, but I don't see how anyone could get
> around the firmware issue.
>
>   For chips made by companies that don't suck like Broadcom does,
> things have been pretty good for a number of years.  The problem is it
> seems like everything uses a cheap Broadcom chip these days.
>
>   
My experience with Ubuntu is that if you install b43-fwcutter on Ubuntu 
(not the legacy bcm43xx-wcutter) the firmware will be installed. It was 
surprised when it did that because o my previous experiences with the 
broadcom chip.

-- 
--
Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>
Boston Linux and Unix
PGP key id: 537C5846
PGP Key fingerprint: 3D1B 8377 A3C0 A5F2 ECBB  CA3B 4607 4319 537C 5846


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