How to use non-free drivers during debian install
- by blokeley
I'm trying to install debian stable using unetbootin. The install process fails with "network autoconfiguration failed", probably due to the ethernet driver not working.
My Lenovo U350 has a Broadcom BCM57780 which does not seem to be supported out-of-the-box: there are various bug reports here, here and here, but I don't know if the fix has made it into debian (6) stable.
One discussion says that you have to use an ethernet driver from the firmware-linux-nonfree package. I'm not sure that this is correct because the BCM57780 is not in the list of drivers in firmware-linux-nonfree.
The specific question tree is:
Is BCM57780 supported in debian stable?
If so, what could be wrong? Should I install debian unstable instead?
If not, do I need to use firmware-linux-nonfree during installation and, if so, how do I do this?
Please note: I've used ubuntu and debian loads in the past but please post line-by-line guidance rather than some cryptic abbreviation of any instructions.
Thanks in advance for any help.
Updates:
Debian stable with non-free drivers did not work.
Debian unstable (free drivers only) did not work.
Tried loading firmware-iwlwifi_0.28_all.deb from another USB stick to get wireless working rather than BCM57780. The .deb file was found but the network configuration still failed!
That's it, I'm giving up. Unfortunately I'll use ubuntu even though the Unity user interface will be very unstable for the next couple of years :(