Regression: bcm4312 lp-phy device not working in 4.17-rc5 kernel

[Chris Vine]

I have an old netbook with a Broadcom bcm4312 802.11b/g lp-phy
[14e4:4315] (rev 01) wifi device. This works up to and including the
4.16 kernel, but not with 4.17-rc5.

The b43, mac80211, cfg80211, ssb and mmc_core modules are loaded OK, as
is the firmware, and the wlan0 interface will come up, but any attempt
to use the interface fails and it cannot (for example) scan.

No useful error messages are given. The interface (wlan0) is just
reported as not being ready.

Chris

[Michael Büsch]

On Mon, 14 May 2018 18:49:53 +0100

Post by Chris Vine
I have an old netbook with a Broadcom bcm4312 802.11b/g lp-phy
[14e4:4315] (rev 01) wifi device. This works up to and including the
4.16 kernel, but not with 4.17-rc5.
The b43, mac80211, cfg80211, ssb and mmc_core modules are loaded OK, as
is the firmware, and the wlan0 interface will come up, but any attempt
to use the interface fails and it cannot (for example) scan.
No useful error messages are given. The interface (wlan0) is just
reported as not being ready.

Hi,

thanks for your report.

Can you please provide all kernel log messages anyway?
And what does "not ready" mean exactly?

It would be extremely helpful if you'd do a git bisect to find the
commit that broke it.

[Michael Büsch]

On Mon, 14 May 2018 19:55:39 +0200

Post by Michael Büsch
On Mon, 14 May 2018 18:49:53 +0100

Post by Chris Vine
I have an old netbook with a Broadcom bcm4312 802.11b/g lp-phy
[14e4:4315] (rev 01) wifi device. This works up to and including the
4.16 kernel, but not with 4.17-rc5.
The b43, mac80211, cfg80211, ssb and mmc_core modules are loaded OK, as
is the firmware, and the wlan0 interface will come up, but any attempt
to use the interface fails and it cannot (for example) scan.
No useful error messages are given. The interface (wlan0) is just
reported as not being ready.

Hi,
thanks for your report.
Can you please provide all kernel log messages anyway?
And what does "not ready" mean exactly?
It would be extremely helpful if you'd do a git bisect to find the
commit that broke it.

Ok, I just noticed that mainline still contains the ssb breakage.

So you are most likely hitting this:
https://patchwork.kernel.org/patch/10393729/

[Chris Vine]

On Mon, 14 May 2018 20:02:05 +0200

Post by Michael Büsch
On Mon, 14 May 2018 19:55:39 +0200

Post by Michael Büsch
On Mon, 14 May 2018 18:49:53 +0100

Post by Chris Vine
I have an old netbook with a Broadcom bcm4312 802.11b/g lp-phy
[14e4:4315] (rev 01) wifi device. This works up to and including the
4.16 kernel, but not with 4.17-rc5.
The b43, mac80211, cfg80211, ssb and mmc_core modules are loaded OK, as
is the firmware, and the wlan0 interface will come up, but any attempt
to use the interface fails and it cannot (for example) scan.
No useful error messages are given. The interface (wlan0) is just
reported as not being ready.

Hi,
thanks for your report.
Can you please provide all kernel log messages anyway?
And what does "not ready" mean exactly?
It would be extremely helpful if you'd do a git bisect to find the
commit that broke it.

Ok, I just noticed that mainline still contains the ssb breakage.
https://patchwork.kernel.org/patch/10393729/

Yes thanks, applying that patch resolves the issue fine. There was a
similar problem with disabled PCI support for b43 which found its way
into the 4.15.0/4.15.1 kernels:
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/kvalo/wireless-drivers.git/commit/?id=a9e6d44ddeccd3522670e641f1ed9b068e746ff7
At least this bug should avoid getting into the mainline release.

Chris