Re: Firmware for Broadcom BCM4318 Wireless LAN Controller

[Cedar Maxwell <cedarmaxwell@mac.com>]

Hello,

I am facing a similar issue:

cedar@ibook-g4:~$ sudo apt install firmware-b43-installer

[sudo] password for cedar:

Solving dependencies... Error!

Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have

requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable

distribution that some required packages have not yet been created

or been moved out of Incoming.

The following information may help to resolve the situation:

Unsatisfied dependencies:

firmware-b43-installer : Depends: b43-fwcutter (>= 1:019-14) but 1:019-12+ports is to be installed

Error: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

Error: The following information from --solver 3.0 may provide additional context:

Unable to satisfy dependencies. Reached two conflicting decisions:

1. firmware-b43-installer:powerpc=1:019-14 is selected for install

2. firmware-b43-installer:powerpc=1:019-14 Depends b43-fwcutter (>= 1:019-14)

but none of the choices are installable:

[no choices]

cedar@ibook-g4:~$ apt show b43-fwcutter

Package: b43-fwcutter

Version: 1:019-12+ports

Priority: optional

Section: contrib/utils

Maintainer: Debian QA Group <packages@qa.debian.org>

Installed-Size: 113 kB

Depends: debconf (>= 0.5) | debconf-2.0, libc6 (>= 2.34)

Homepage: https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/users/drivers/b43

Download-Size: 25.3 kB

APT-Manual-Installed: yes

APT-Sources: http://deb.debian.org/debian-ports unreleased/main powerpc Packages

Description: utility for extracting Broadcom 43xx firmware

This package provides a tool for extracting BCM43xx wireless chip

firmware from Broadcom's proprietary driver files.

.

It is used by the firmware-b43(legacy)-installer packages as part of

the automated process of downloading and installing firmware.

Please advise.

Thanks,

Cedar Maxwell

On Thu, 2024-09-26 at 22:47 +0200, Claudia Neumann wrote:

Hi all,

hi John,

thanks to the new package b43-fwcutter the wlan works as expected. Many thanks to John Glaubitz!

Now I can report, that the iMac G5 works with Debian Trixie/Sid:

Hardware from hwinfo:

cpu:                       PPC970FX, altivec supported, 2100 MHz

monitor:               Apple Color LCD

graphics card:     Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] RV380 [Radeon X550/X600]

sound:                  Apple Multimedia audio controller

storage:                Broadcom K2 SATA

network:

  enP1p3s15f0   Apple Shasta (Sun GEM)

  wlan0               Broadcom BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless LAN Controller

disk:

  /dev/sda             WDC WD2500JS-40M

cdrom:

  /dev/sr0             MATSHITA DVD-R   UJ-846

usb controller:

                       NEC USB Controller

                       NEC USB Controller

                       NEC uPD72010x USB 2.0 Controller

bridge:

                       Apple U4 HT Bridge

                       Apple Shasta PCI Bridge

                       Apple Shasta PCI Bridge

                       Apple CPC945 PCIe Bridge

                       Apple Shasta PCI Bridge

memory:

                       Main Memory 1GB + 384 MB

firewire controller:

                       Apple Shasta Firewire

unknown:

                       DMA controller

                       PS/2 Controller

                       Apple Shasta IDE

                       Apple Shasta Mac I/O

                       PROM

                       Apple Built-in iSight (no firmware loaded)

  /dev/input/event2    Apple Bluetooth HCI MacBookPro (HID mode)

                       Apple Built-in IR Receiver

I took Xfce for window manager. LibreOffice works fine, Firefox gives a segmentation fault on start. As browser I use links2, not very comfortable.

Because I use the iMac only as an thin client I am satisfied with this.

@John: If I can help looking for the reason why firefox gives a segmentation fault, tell me what I should do. Compiling software is not a problem to me.

Best regards

Claudia

Am Donnerstag, 26. September 2024, 16:20:06 CEST schrieb John Paul Adrian Glaubitz:

> On Thu, 2024-09-26 at 15:53 +0200, Steffen Grunewald wrote:

> > > I will build the package manually and upload it to "unreleased" for both

> > > powerpc and ppc64. It will be available by tonight.

> >

> > Even better!

>

> ;-)

>

> > > You will need to add "unreleased" to your sources.list to use it:

> > >     deb http://ftp.ports.debian.org/debian-ports/ unreleased main

> >

> > Many thanks for your extremely fast and knowledgeable support,

>

> You're very welcome. I'm always very glad to get such positive feedback! Tt

> really means a lot to me since not everyone understands that even keeping

> the powerpc and ppc64 ports in the current state they are is anything but

> easy.

>

> I understand well the frustrations with the problems people run into, but

> unfortunately not all of them are straight-forward to solve. One of the

> biggest problems is that the Debian Ports infrastructure doesn't allow

> polished releases like for the standard Debian infrastructure due to the

> lack of stable releases and the lack of the "contrib" and "non-free"

> sections.

>

> But I'm trying my best and I really welcome anyone who is willing to help!

>

> Adrian

>

> --

>  .''`.  John Paul Adrian Glaubitz

>

> : :' :  Debian Developer

>

> `. `'   Physicist

>   `-    GPG: 62FF 8A75 84E0 2956 9546  0006 7426 3B37 F5B5 F913