[sf-lug] Installing Void, C.E. Sign-in at SF-LUG mtg of 2017-11-05

[Akkana Peck]

Rick Moen writes:
> If you're driving by Broadcom headquarters, it might help to fly a paper
> airplane in the front door with, written on it, 'Hey, doofuses!  Try
> expending the cost of a first-class stamp on permitting unmodified 
> redistribution of your chips' firmware initialisation files.'  Love, the
> open source community.'

I've had to wrestle with too many Linux laptops with Broadcom
wi-fi chips over the years. By far the best and easiest solution,
if it's a laptop that's relatively easy to open, is research what
format the Broadcom card is in your laptop (or just open it and
see), and then order an Intel wi-fi card of the same size. They
typically cost maybe $20-30, which is well worth it versus the
time and sweat and frustration you'll put into fighting with the
Broadcom.

Alas, my current laptop is exceptionally difficult to open so it
still has a Broadcom in it, and I've spent WAY too many hours in
hotels in Outer Podunk fiddling with rfkill and ifconfig and
iwconfig to try to figure out why the laptop won't talk to this
particular network. Even when you get a driver, Broadcom wifi chips
just don't work very well with the available drivers.

        ...Akkana