I am currently running Backtrack 2 on my Gateway Notebook. It has a built in broadcom wireless card. Backtrack 2, by default, works with the card in my computer. I believe that my distro is broken, so I am looking to go into full fledged slackware mode. However, I do not know if it is compatible with broadcom cards. So is it? Thanks in advance.


Unr3a1

Hiya Unr3a1,

I know nothing of backtrack 2 being broken, but slack always works for me.

What chipset is it? I have a dell wlan1300 (which uses bcm43xx) and it works, though not required, I use ndiswrapper and it works fine.

Mine is also a BCM43xx. 4306 I believe. I just want to make sure that it will work by default with Slackware 11.0, because I had FC4, and ndiswrapper didn't work for me. Thanks.


Unr3a1

Hmm, don't know about slack but (X,K)Ubuntu 7.04 does have the BCM43xx driver pre-built as a module.

bcm43xx is part of the kernel-modules package. Both that and ndiswrapper work fine on Slack 11.0

Brian

Broadcom chipsets work just fine in Slackware with either ndiswrapper or bcm43xx, it really depends much more on the actual chipset than on Slackware.

By the way, if you go with bcm43xx, I strongly suggest moving to a 2.6.21 kernel. There were a ton of bug fixes for the driver and it has really improved stability, at least for my 4306 card.

Does a 2.6.21 kernel come with Slackware 11.0 by default?

No, but as of today 2.6.21.1 is the default kernel of Slackware-current (i.e. the "unstable" or development release for those who confuse "current" with "stable").

Eric

if you're going to run slack, why not compile your own kernel anyway?

its probably one of the "easier" steps in setting up a fully capable slackware system. IMHO

and its the heart of running linux.

I have never compiled my own Kernel before. But I guess there is a first time for everything. I am still very much a Linux newbie, however I hope that changes within the coming months. Thanks for all the info. Anything I should know about compiling my own kernel before I do it?


Unr3a1

gather as much info about your system as possible before diving in: lspci -v, lsmod (from working kernels) are good things to know.

I'd recommend starting from vanilla sources and a generic kernel .config..

start with built-in filesystem and drive support so you don't have to mess with an initrd...

_never_ remove your most recent working kernel... always add an entry to lilo and leave at least one fallback kernel around...

/sbin/lilo
/sbin/lilo
/sbin/lilo

^ thats an important and oft-forgotten step

also see link in my sig for the 'basics' and read some of the sticky here in slackware@lq