FreeBSD manual
download PDF document: bwi.4.pdf
BWI(4) FreeBSD Kernel Interfaces Manual BWI(4)
NAME
bwi - 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:
device bwi
device wlan
device wlan_amrr
device firmware
Alternatively, to load the driver as a module at boot time, place the
following line in loader.conf(5):
if_bwi_load="YES"
DESCRIPTION
The bwi 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/bwi-firmware-kmod port needs to be installed before ifconfig(8)
will work.
HARDWARE
The bwi driver supports Broadcom BCM43xx based wireless devices,
including:
Card Chip Bus Standard
Apple Airport Extreme BCM4306 PCI b/g
Apple Airport Extreme BCM4318 PCI b/g
ASUS WL-100g BCM4306 CardBus b/g
ASUS WL-138g BCM4318 PCI b/g
Buffalo WLI-CB-G54S BCM4318 CardBus b/g
Buffalo WLI-PCI-G54S BCM4306 PCI b/g
Compaq R4035 onboard BCM4306 PCI b/g
Dell Wireless 1390 BCM4311 Mini PCI b/g
Dell Wireless 1470 BCM4318 Mini PCI b/g
Dell Truemobile 1300 r2 BCM4306 Mini PCI b/g
Dell Truemobile 1400 BCM4309 Mini PCI b/g
HP nx6125 BCM4319 PCI b/g
Linksys WPC54G Ver 3 BCM4318 CardBus b/g
Linksys WPC54GS Ver 2 BCM4318 CardBus b/g
TRENDnet TEW-401PCplus BCM4306 CardBus b/g
US Robotics 5411 BCM4318 CardBus b/g
The bwi driver uses the older v3 version of Broadcom's firmware. While
this older firmware does support most BCM43xx parts, the bwn(4) driver
works better for the newer chips it supports. You must use the bwi
driver if you are using older Broadcom chipsets (BCM4301, BCM4303 and
BCM4306 rev 2). The v4 version of the firmware that bwn(4) uses does not
support these chips.
Join a specific BSS network with network name "my_net":
ifconfig wlan create wlandev bwi0 ssid my_net up
Join a specific BSS network with 64-bit WEP encryption:
ifconfig wlan create wlandev bwi0 ssid my_net \
wepmode on wepkey 0x1234567890 weptxkey 1 up
SEE ALSO
arp(4), cardbus(4), intro(4), pci(4), wlan(4), wlan_amrr(4), ifconfig(8),
wpa_supplicant(8)
HISTORY
The bwi driver first appeared in FreeBSD 8.0.
AUTHORS
The bwi driver was written for DragonFly by Sepherosa Ziehau and
subsequently ported to FreeBSD.
BUGS
Some card based on the BCM4306 and BCM4309 chips do not work properly on
channel 1, 2 and 3.
FreeBSD 14.0-RELEASE-p11 August 7, 2015 FreeBSD 14.0-RELEASE-p11