Hi, I'm testing upgrading my Lenovo T430 laptop whish has
[ 1.042448] iwn0 at pci2 dev 0 function 0: Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6205 WiFi (rev. 0x34) [ 1.042448] iwn0: interrupting at msi3 vec 0 [ 1.042448] iwn0: MIMO 2T2R, MoW, address a4:4e:31:e4:43:a8 for wireless network hardware. This laptop now runs 9.99.92 from november 2021, and has the following relevant-ish firmware files: /libdata/firmware/if_iwn/iwlwifi-6000-4.ucode /libdata/firmware/if_iwn/iwlwifi-6000g2a-5.ucode /libdata/firmware/if_iwn/iwlwifi-6000g2b-6.ucode /libdata/firmware/if_iwn/iwlwifi-6050-5.ucode Now, when I booted the latest 9.99.97 kernel from nyftp.netbsd.org, I get in the kernel log: [ 7.371439] iwn0: autoconfiguration error: could not get firmware handle iwlwifi-6000g2a-6.ucode [ 7.371439] iwn0: autoconfiguration error: could not read firmware If I look at what's in the 'base' set in -current, I find ./libdata/firmware/if_iwn/iwlwifi-6000-4.ucode ./libdata/firmware/if_iwn/iwlwifi-6000g2a-6.ucode ./libdata/firmware/if_iwn/iwlwifi-6000g2b-6.ucode ./libdata/firmware/if_iwn/iwlwifi-6050-5.ucode This raises a couple of questions: 1) Could the if_iwn driver fall back to using the 6000g2a-5 microcode without any code changes? (My gut feeling says "yes", but I have no existence proof of that.) 2) Should I have to extract parts of user-land in order to make the wireless driver in the kernel work as intended? I've from habit always done NetBSD upgrades as "extract kernel, install, reboot, and then verify that things work as intended before committing to the new installation by extracting userland, and then lastly do the etc set update (and perhaps a final reboot)", and have only recently larned to put "extract the new modules set" before the first kernel reboot. Should the wireless firmware go into a different set which we also learn the habit of extracting before reboot of the kernel? I have the impression that we generally frown upon a lack of backward compatibility, and kernel features depending on upgraded user-land, and forcing a firmware blob upgrade to make the new kernel work has a non-zero chance of making the old (previous) kernel no longer work as intended as a fallback... What about GPU firmware? I see it also has a new set all of its own, and some of the related compatibility questions can be raised there. Regards, - Håvard
