Bug#973733: RTW88_8821ce module fails to find firmware during install and must be reloaded

["Brandon Werner" <brandon_code@fastmail.fm>]

On Tue, Nov 3, 2020, at 10:52 PM, Brandon Werner wrote:
> package: src:linux
> 
> Hi,
> I downloaded one of the firmware netinstall builds of Debian from today 
> (11/03/2020) to try installing on my netbook with the 8821ce wifi card 
> since Debian now has the 5.9 kernel. During the text install with 
> speech, I received an error that the network card could not be found. I 
> opened a console and looking at dmesg showed the driver not finding the 
> firmware with a -2 error, however, I noticed that the requested files 
> had been unpacked to /lib/firmware. I unloaded rtw88_8821ce and 
> reloaded it using modprobe and the firmware was found, after which the 
> network interface was successfully brought up.
I took a look at the installer logs and found something that looks like it could be the likely problem.

Nov  3 22:09:17 check-missing-firmware: removing and loading kernel module rtw_8821ce

I think some substitution is going wrong in the installer because it seems like the module should be called rtw88_8821ce.
> I was able to continue through the rest of the install without issue. I am not sure what logs 
> would help but would be happy to provide anything requested to diagnose 
> this issue.