i am running opensuse 11.2 on my hp 2133 mini notebook, I have been having trouble connecting my broadcom 43xx internal wireless modem to my BT Home Hub, I have looked at the b43 driver that comes pre-bundled with the live dvd and understand that the driver doesnt work, I have looked at the YaST Package Search and to my horror found 50 seperate packages, from: wl-kmp desktop - wireless driver for broadcom 43xx series of chips to sta-pae kernal for 43xx series of chips?????
How do i know which Kernal and driver i need to get my wireless network running and which i dont?

My first suggestion would be to figure out which broadcom card you have. Run 'lspci' from terminal without the quote marks and it should give you the chip number. There are several different ways and drivers depending on your chip number.

after typing in lspci this is the information that was displayed.

00:00.0 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 Host Bridge
00:00.1 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 Host Bridge
00:00.2 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 Host Bridge
00:00.3 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 Host Bridge
00:00.4 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 Host Bridge
00:00.5 PIC: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 I/O APIC Interrupt Controller
00:00.6 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 Security Device
00:00.7 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 Host Bridge
00:01.0 PCI bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8237/VX700 PCI Bridge
00:02.0 PCI bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 PCI to PCI Bridge Controller (rev 80)
00:03.0 PCI bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 PCI to PCI Bridge Controller (rev 80)
00:0f.0 IDE interface: VIA Technologies, Inc. Device 5372
00:10.0 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev b0)
00:10.2 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev b0)
00:10.3 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev b0)
00:10.4 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. USB 2.0 (rev 90)
00:11.0 ISA bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8237S PCI to ISA Bridge
00:11.7 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8251 Ultra VLINK Controller
00:13.0 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8237A Host Bridge
00:13.1 PCI bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8237A PCI to PCI Bridge
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. CN896/VN896/P4M900 [Chrome 9 HC] (rev 01)
02:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g (rev 01)
07:03.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme BCM5788 Gigabit Ethernet (rev 03)
80:01.0 Audio device: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT1708/A [Azalia HDAC] (VIA High Definition Audio Controller) (rev 10)


This still doesnt make much sense to me. sorry

Your broadcom chip is a BCM4312 and you need to install firmware 'fwcutter' and the driver 'b43xx' driver. Here is a link to one of the easiest ways.
Install wireless

If you can not connect to the internet and have the suse 11.2 dvd you can install them through YaST in Soft Ware Management.

After installing the drivers you may have to reboot before the wireless will work and also make sure it is turned on if there is a switch to turn off.