{"id":833,"date":"2011-02-25T17:42:46","date_gmt":"2011-02-25T22:42:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/?p=833"},"modified":"2011-02-26T08:05:10","modified_gmt":"2011-02-26T13:05:10","slug":"fix-wifi-mint-debian-on-macbook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/macbook\/fix-wifi-mint-debian-on-macbook","title":{"rendered":"Fix Wifi: Mint Debian on Macbook"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hi all, welcome to my first (I think) post for the year 2011.<\/p>\n

I have been planning to replace my Linux OS (Crunchbang 9.04) with a more “modern” OS for my Macbook 13.3 which dual-boots Snow Leopard 10.6 and Linux.\u00a0\u00a0Of course the choices of distros are nearly limitless, but since my “free time to tinker” is not what it used to be, I chose to install the Linux Mint “Debian” Edition<\/a> (as of this writing, it’s a few months old).<\/p>\n

Why Debian from Mint? \u00a0That was easy. \u00a0Mint is a relatively stable product in general. \u00a0I have used it over the last few years with very little problems. \u00a0The “Debian” choice from Mint is a “rolling” distro. \u00a0The theory is, you install it, and the updates come to you. \u00a0Neat eh?<\/p>\n

While there are advantages to refreshing your Linux OS once per yer (or so), as I mentioned, I like having a somewhat stable environment for those hours\/days that I do have available to tinker. \u00a0Also, Crunchbang<\/a> 9.04 is out of date, although I used it with much success. \u00a0They also do not plan to make it a rolling distribution. \u00a0A rolling distro would cement my vote.<\/p>\n

If you’re reading this, you made it past the intro, (thank you) your patience will now pay off.<\/p>\n

After installing Mint Debian 201012, wifi was not working.<\/h2>\n

Yep, this is a real headache. \u00a0Since a Macbook is a LAPTOP<\/strong>, you would think wireless connectivity would work out-of-the-box after installing the distro. HA!. Not so my friends…not so. \u00a0This happened to me when I tried out Mint 8 about a year ago, and since I didn’t have time to troubleshoot it back then, I immediately re-installed Crunchbang, who had support for the onboard Broadcom wireless hardware in my Macbook.<\/p>\n

I was determined to make my rolling distro get wireless (wifi) connectivity. \u00a0I googled. Not much helpful info, other than to preload drivers to a USB. \u00a0I suppose this is helpful if you are not able to physically connect a cable to a router.<\/p>\n

Get WIFI working on Mint Debian on a Macbook:<\/strong><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Get an Ethernet cable after you have done the install. \u00a0Sorry to admit this, but nothing else seemed to work. \u00a0More on this in a bit.<\/li>\n
  2. Once connected to the internet, use Synaptic and search for any applicable (or all) items matching the search “Broadcom” and either select them for upgrade (if they are marked) or select them for install.<\/li>\n
  3. Use Synaptic to “apply” the changes to the system, thus installing (or updating) any Broadcom firmware for your Macbook under Linux.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Ok, I realize that the solution to this problem kinda defeats the purpose of WiFi in the first place. \u00a0Many of the blog posts from users experiencing a similar issue (no wifi after installing Linux on a Macbook) described the scenario and there seemed little in the way of resolution. It’s somewhat difficult (if not impossible) to update software if you cannot connect to the internet. \u00a0One blogger mentioned that he tethered his iPhone to get “an outside line”.<\/p>\n

    Since I had access to the router, and an ethernet cable, I figured “why not”. \u00a0I know it’s not the most “clever” solution, but I’m sure I’m not alone in deciding to just “GET R DONE” and use the cable to connect to internet and let Synaptic do what it needs to do.<\/p>\n

    The version I installed is ‘201012’, and there is an earlier version is available if you want to try it out and see if wifi works out of the box. \u00a0I don’t recommend it though, because (in general) a later version is better than an earlier version (bug fixes, security patches, etc.)<\/p>\n

    Best of luck out there. Linux Mint Debian is proving to be a great distro so far. \u00a0Openbox is a bit buggy, (wearing “crashy-pants” to coin a phrase) but I can live with that for now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Hi all, welcome to my first (I think) post for the year 2011. I have been planning to replace my Linux OS (Crunchbang 9.04) with a more “modern” OS for my Macbook 13.3 which dual-boots Snow Leopard 10.6 and Linux.\u00a0\u00a0Of course the choices of distros are nearly limitless, but since my “free time to tinker” […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,13,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-833","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-distros","category-macbook","category-freedom-choice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/833","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=833"}],"version-history":[{"count":27,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/833\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":858,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/833\/revisions\/858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=833"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=833"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=833"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}