oh, broadcom...

2019/03/27 2:46 AM (UTC -5) | tildearrow

i'm so pissed off at how my Broadcom wireless adapter is behaving!

ok, so let me tell you. in Linux there are 2 drivers for broadcom routers: an open-source one, and a proprietary one. and both drivers suck!

the open-source one appears to work perfectly on first try, despite requiring me to cut some firmware.
however, after I tried to upload a file (yes, any file), it fails and screws up the connection! which pretty much makes the driver unsuitable... so screw it, i'm going proprietary.

now this proprietary driver works well, and I can upload my huge files, BUT HERE IS THE ISSUE: the driver adds a random (apparently) delay when connecting to a network. one day it takes 5 seconds to connect, another day 8, another 10, another 20...
but then sometimes the driver takes TOO LONG, and it causes the KDE UI to think the connection has failed. which means, since the most common cause is a wrong password, it asks me for the password AGAIN!
but it's like, i gave it the freaking correct password! why does it have to ask me again if it takes too long?

so I have 3 options.
the first one is to just type my password again (hell, I don't even have to deal with this).
the second one is to cancel and hope for the best.
and the third one is to force reboot.

the first one is useless because even if I type the correct password it STILL FAILS!
the second one deletes my network connection, and I have to set it up all over again, unless I am fast enough to force reboot before the changes are written to disk...
so my only viable option is the third one, and try again until it works.

but, it's like, i don't have to do all of this, right?! I should just be able to connect and that's it! I don't care about having to reboot or whatever; I just wanna connect and do my work!

...

but that's not all... even Windows has issues!
under Windows there is a 1/2 chance the network adapter simply won't appear.
instead, it appears as a second network adapter (Wi-Fi 2)!!! IT'S THE ONLY ADAPTER IN MY COMPUTER! WHY CREATE ANOTHER ONE?!?!!

so, as you can see, broadcom sucks, and it will keep sucking.