Broadcom Bluetooth brcm/BCM.hcd firmware not found

[Praveenkumar Jangala]

bluetooth device search not working. But hardware works fine in windows OS

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 17.10
Package: bluez 5.46-0ubuntu3
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.13.0-29.32-generic 4.13.13
Uname: Linux 4.13.0-29-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia_uvm nvidia wl
ApportVersion: 2.20.7-0ubuntu3.7
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
Date: Mon Jan 15 15:14:44 2018
InstallationDate: Installed on 2017-06-09 (219 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 17.04 "Zesty Zapus" - Release amd64 (20170412)
InterestingModules: rfcomm bnep btusb bluetooth
MachineType: Dell Inc. Inspiron 3543
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-4.13.0-29-generic.efi.signed root=UUID=6096ccbb-709f-4a74-ad1f-f9f1b7dbee89 ro quiet splash vt.handoff=7
SourcePackage: bluez
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to artful on 2018-01-06 (8 days ago)
dmi.bios.date: 05/13/2016
dmi.bios.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.bios.version: A08
dmi.board.name: 04XW3R
dmi.board.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.board.version: A00
dmi.chassis.type: 8
dmi.chassis.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.chassis.version: Not Specified
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnDellInc.:bvrA08:bd05/13/2016:svnDellInc.:pnInspiron3543:pvrA08:rvnDellInc.:rn04XW3R:rvrA00:cvnDellInc.:ct8:cvrNotSpecified:
dmi.product.name: Inspiron 3543
dmi.product.version: A08
dmi.sys.vendor: Dell Inc.
hciconfig:
 hci0: Type: Primary Bus: USB
  BD Address: 2C:33:7A:F9:C9:20 ACL MTU: 1021:8 SCO MTU: 64:1
  DOWN
  RX bytes:8237 acl:0 sco:0 events:1071 errors:0
  TX bytes:8678 acl:0 sco:0 commands:926 errors:0

[TJ (tj)]

This is caused due to missing Broadcom Bluetooth proprietary firmware image file:

Bluetooth: hci0: BCM: Patch brcm/BCM.hcd not found

This is apparently shipped in the Windows driver package and has to be manually extracted by the user since the licence makes it problematic for Ubuntu redistribute the files.

I understand you may be able to locate and download the correct file that matches the device in the PC and rename it to:

/lib/firmware/brcm/BCM.hcd

From this github repository:

https://github.com/winterheart/broadcom-bt-firmware

[TJ (tj)]

I should add that 'lsusb' shows the device is:

Bus 001 Device 004: ID 0a5c:21d7 Broadcom Corp. BCM43142 Bluetooth 4.0

The USB vendor:device ID is 0a5c:21d7

and I see in the github repository the file:

brcm/BCM43142A0-0a5c-21d7.hcd

so you should be able to install it using:

sudo wget -O /lib/firmware/brcm/BCM.hcd https://github.com/winterheart/broadcom-bt-firmware/blob/master/brcm/BCM43142A0-0a5c-21d7.hcd

After a reboot the Bluetooth device should work.

[Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)]

It sounds like the issue really is that the correct firmware is missing from package 'linux-firmware'.

I don't think any fix would come in the kernel.

[Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. This particular bug has already been reported and is a duplicate of bug 1366418, so it is being marked as such. Please look at the other bug report to see if there is any missing information that you can provide, or to see if there is a workaround for the bug. Additionally, any further discussion regarding the bug should occur in the other report. Feel free to continue to report any other bugs you may find.

[Javier (judd1)]

Many thanks !!

It works perfectly, smoothly and smoothly!