NAME¶

bwn — Broadcom BCM43xx IEEE 802.11b/g wireless network driver

SYNOPSIS¶

To compile this driver into the kernel, place the following lines in your kernel configuration file:

Alternatively, to load the driver as a module at boot time, place the following line in loader.conf(5):

if_bwn_load="YES"

DESCRIPTION¶

The bwn driver provides support for Broadcom BCM43xx based PCI/CardBus network adapters.

It supports station and monitor mode operation. Only one virtual interface may be configured at any time. For more information on configuring this device, see ifconfig(8).

This driver requires firmware to be loaded before it will work. The ports/net/bwn-firmware-kmod port needs to be installed before ifconfig(8) will work. In most cases the bwn_v4_ucode kernel module from the port should be used. However, if an LP (low power) PHY is being used, the bwn_v4_lp_ucode module should be used.

HARDWARE¶

The bwn driver supports Broadcom BCM43xx based wireless devices, including:

Users of older Broadcom chipsets (BCM4301, BCM4303 and BCM4306 rev 2) must use bwi(4) because the v4 version of the firmware does not support these chips. The newer firmware is too big to fit into these old chips.

EXAMPLES¶

Join an existing BSS network (i.e., connect to an access point):

ifconfig wlan create wlandev bwn0 inet 192.168.0.20 \
    netmask 0xffffff00

Join a specific BSS network with network name “my_net”:

Join a specific BSS network with 64-bit WEP encryption:

ifconfig wlan create wlandev bwn0 ssid my_net \
        wepmode on wepkey 0x1234567890 weptxkey 1 up

LOADER TUNABLES¶

Tunables can be set at the loader(8) prompt before booting the kernel or stored in loader.conf(5).

hw.bwn.msi_disable

This tunable disables MSI support on the hardware. The default value is 0.

hw.bwn.usedma

This tunable enables DMA operations on the hardware. If the value is 0, PIO mode would be used. The default value is 1.

SEE ALSO¶

arp(4), bwi(4), cardbus(4), intro(4), pci(4), wlan(4), wlan_amrr(4), ifconfig(8), wpa_supplicant(8)

HISTORY¶

The bwn driver first appeared in FreeBSD 8.1.

AUTHORS¶

The bwn driver was written by Weongyo Jeong <weongyo@FreeBSD.org>.

CAVEATS¶

Some LP PHY devices have DMA operation problems that in that case try to use PIO mode.