"No network devices available" + WARNING: /sys/module/wl/drivers does not exist, cannot rebind wl driver -> wireless not working using bcmwl-kernel-source (wl) driver after upgrade from Xubuntu 11.10 to Xubuntu 12.04 on Dell Inspiron 1521

Can you give the output of:

sudo lshw -C display; lsb_release -a; uname -a; sudo rfkill list; dmesg | grep -i firm

Thanks

Sure:

  *-display
       description: VGA compatible controller
       product: RS690M [Radeon X1200 Series]
       vendor: Hynix Semiconductor (Hyundai Electronics)
       physical id: 5
       bus info: pci@0000:01:05.0
       version: 00
       width: 64 bits
       clock: 33MHz
       capabilities: pm msi vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom
       configuration: driver=radeon latency=64
       resources: irq:42 memory:e0000000-efffffff memory:fe9f0000-fe9fffff ioport:ee00(size=256) memory:fea00000-feafffff
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS
Release: 12.04
Codename: precise
Linux jttheninja-laptop 3.2.0-24-generic-pae #37-Ubuntu SMP Wed Apr 25 10:47:59 UTC 2012 i686 athlon i386 GNU/Linux
0: dell-wifi: Wireless LAN
 Soft blocked: no
 Hard blocked: no
1: dell-bluetooth: Bluetooth
 Soft blocked: no
 Hard blocked: no
3: hci0: Bluetooth
 Soft blocked: no
 Hard blocked: no

More information...so I was able to get the wired connection working...somehow. I figured it might be because I had forgotten to turn back on proprietary drivers. There was one in the list, for the broadcom wireless driver (jockey). When I pressed "activate" the first time, an error message showed but the wired connection started working. I keep trying to activate it, but it keeps giving me an error, and wireless is still not activated.

The end of the log file /var/log/jockey.log shows the following:

2012-04-27 13:25:42,507 WARNING: /sys/module/wl/drivers does not exist, cannot rebind wl driver
2012-04-27 13:25:42,661 DEBUG: BroadcomWLHandler enabled(): kmod disabled, bcm43xx: blacklisted, b43: bl
acklisted, b43legacy: blacklisted
2012-04-27 13:25:44,332 DEBUG: BroadcomWLHandler enabled(): kmod disabled, bcm43xx: blacklisted, b43: bl
acklisted, b43legacy: blacklisted
2012-04-27 13:25:44,389 DEBUG: BroadcomWLHandler enabled(): kmod disabled, bcm43xx: blacklisted, b43: bl
acklisted, b43legacy: blacklisted
2012-04-27 13:25:44,469 DEBUG: BroadcomWLHandler enabled(): kmod disabled, bcm43xx: blacklisted, b43: bl
acklisted, b43legacy: blacklisted

I tried downloading the package jockey-kde, but it had no effect.

Just to keep this active. Currently, I must open Additional Drivers every time I start up my computer and attempt to activate the driver (Broadcom STA wireless driver), which still always fails, just to get the ethernet to work. Upon trying to activate it a second time, it still always fails, and for a moment the ethernet goes out and then reconnects.

Any ideas? I've tried running this under multiple desktop environments as well (regular Ubuntu/unity and MATE), with the same results.

And the wireless, of course, still does not work, therefore.

This rings bells from way back. There were two Broadcom drivers offered. The 'approved' one never worked for me. The other one did. If you are offered two, try each in turn.

Oh, if only...only one is available in the list, or I'd have tried it.

Is there a way I can download and install one outside of the Additional Drivers application?

Following solution worked (found on Ubuntu forums: http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=11882998&postcount=4):

sudo apt-get install --reinstall bcmwl-kernel-source

sudo modprobe wl

Peace,
JT