[SOLVED] NICs not enumerated after installation

[Peter Kuykendall]

Hi. I have provisioned dozens of machines with MX 19.2 32 bit without trouble. However the latest installation on an old Dell Inspiron 1300 laptop does not enumerate the NICs. It has a Ethernet NIC (Device-1) and a WiFi NIC (Device-2), see inxi output below. But ifconfig doesn't find them. Running ifconfig eth1 up and ifconfig wlan0 up doesn't work. What does work is plugging in a USB-Ethernet dongle (Device-3). That comes right up, negotiates DHCP, and connects. Any ideas? Thanks - Pete

Code: Select all

$ inxi -Fxxxrza 
System:
  Host: mx Kernel: 4.19.0-10-686-pae i686 bits: 32 compiler: gcc v: 8.3.0 
  parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-4.19.0-10-686-pae 
  root=UUID=8e4eb069-ab98-4530-8ba9-cece490c3a5b ro quiet splash 
  Console: tty 1 dm: LightDM 1.26.0 
  Distro: MX-19.2_386 patito feo May 31  2020 
  base: Debian GNU/Linux 10 (buster) 
Machine:
  Type: Portable System: Dell product: ME051 v: N/A serial: <filter> 
  Chassis: type: 8 serial: <filter> 
  Mobo: Dell model: 0GD366 serial: <filter> BIOS: Dell v: A04 
  date: 12/22/2005 
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT0 charge: 0% condition: 4.4/31.0 Wh (14%) volts: 2.9/14.4 
  model: Panasonic DELL XD1856 type: Li-ion serial: <filter> 
  status: Charging 
CPU:
  Topology: Single Core model: Intel Celeron M bits: 32 type: MCP 
  arch: M Dothan family: 6 model-id: D (13) stepping: 8 microcode: 20 
  L2 cache: 1024 KiB 
  flags: nx pae sse sse2 bogomips: 2792 
  Speed: 1396 MHz min/max: N/A Core speed (MHz): 1: 1396 
  Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: Vulnerable 
  Type: l1tf mitigation: PTE Inversion 
  Type: mds 
  status: Vulnerable: Clear CPU buffers attempted, no microcode; SMT disabled 
  Type: meltdown mitigation: PTI 
  Type: spec_store_bypass status: Vulnerable 
  Type: spectre_v1 
  mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
  Type: spectre_v2 
  mitigation: Full generic retpoline, STIBP: disabled, RSB filling 
  Type: srbds status: Not affected 
  Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel Mobile 915GM/GMS/910GML Express Graphics vendor: Dell 
  driver: i915 v: kernel bus ID: 00:02.0 chip ID: 8086:2592 
  Display: server: X.org 1.20.4 driver: intel 
  unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,vesa tty: 80x24 
  Message: Advanced graphics data unavailable in console. Try -G --display 
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW High Definition Audio vendor: Dell 
  driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus ID: 00:1b.0 chip ID: 8086:2668 
  Sound Server: ALSA v: k4.19.0-10-686-pae 
Network:
  Device-1: Broadcom Limited BCM4401-B0 100Base-TX vendor: Dell driver: N/A 
  port: bfa0 bus ID: 02:00.0 chip ID: 14e4:170c 
  Device-2: Broadcom Limited BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless LAN 
  vendor: Dell driver: N/A port: bfa0 bus ID: 02:03.0 chip ID: 14e4:4318 
  Device-3: ASIX AX88772 type: USB driver: asix bus ID: 2-5:2 
  chip ID: 0b95:7720 serial: <filter> 
  IF: eth0 state: up speed: 100 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter> 
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 37.26 GiB used: 9.02 GiB (24.2%) 
  ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Toshiba model: MK4026GAX size: 37.26 GiB 
  block size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: <unknown> 
  serial: <filter> rev: 2D temp: 30 C scheme: MBR 
Partition:
  ID-1: / raw size: 35.26 GiB size: 34.58 GiB (98.08%) 
  used: 9.02 GiB (26.1%) fs: ext3 dev: /dev/sda2 
  ID-2: swap-1 size: 2.00 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) fs: swap 
  swappiness: 15 (default 60) cache pressure: 100 (default) dev: /dev/sda1 
Sensors:
  Message: No sensors data was found. Is sensors configured? 
Repos:
  No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list 
  1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster-updates main contrib non-free
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list 
  1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster main contrib non-free
  2: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian-security buster/updates main contrib non-free
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list 
  1: deb http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo/ buster main non-free
  No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/various.list 
Info:
  Processes: 162 Uptime: 8m Memory: 1.47 GiB used: 315.2 MiB (21.0%) 
  Init: SysVinit v: 2.93 runlevel: 5 default: 5 Compilers: gcc: 8.3.0 alt: 8 
  Shell: bash v: 5.0.3 running in: tty 1 (SSH) inxi: 3.0.36 

Code: Select all

$ ifconfig
eth0: flags=4163<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,MULTICAST>  mtu 1500
        inet 192.168.56.41  netmask 255.255.255.0  broadcast 192.168.56.255
        inet6 fe80::20aa:86c3:7824:34e6  prefixlen 64  scopeid 0x20<link>
        ether 00:0e:c6:de:44:48  txqueuelen 1000  (Ethernet)
        RX packets 823  bytes 518457 (506.3 KiB)
        RX errors 0  dropped 0  overruns 0  frame 0
        TX packets 753  bytes 83276 (81.3 KiB)
        TX errors 0  dropped 0 overruns 0  carrier 0  collisions 0

lo: flags=73<UP,LOOPBACK,RUNNING>  mtu 65536
        inet 127.0.0.1  netmask 255.0.0.0
        inet6 ::1  prefixlen 128  scopeid 0x10<host>
        loop  txqueuelen 1000  (Local Loopback)
        RX packets 245  bytes 28156 (27.4 KiB)
        RX errors 0  dropped 0  overruns 0  frame 0
        TX packets 245  bytes 28156 (27.4 KiB)
        TX errors 0  dropped 0 overruns 0  carrier 0  collisions 0

[timkb4cq]

The b43 driver that works for your wireless card is blacklisted by default. That's because more broadcom chipsets work with the brodcom-sta "wl" driver than use the b43, b44 drivers - but the two sets are incompatible.
Go to MX-Network Assistant -> Linux Drivers (tab) where you can unblock and load the b43 driver.

[Peter Kuykendall]

YAY! Thanks, that got the WiFi going. Any ideas on how to get the BCM4401-B0 Ethernet NIC going? UPDATE: I unblocked the B44 driver and all is well. WOOT!

[timkb4cq]

Another Broadcom device - Do the same thing but unblock & load b44 in addition to the b43 you already unblocked.