AzureWave Broadcom BCM94352HMB bluetooth driver for Vaio VPCZ13

Bought the AzureWave Broadcom BCM94352HMB (AzureWave AW-CE123H) from Amazon to install it on my Sony Vaio VPC Z13 (W-Lan card, 802.11ac + BT4.0 Mini PCI-e, 867 Mbit/s). The wifi works out of the box with the Broadcom driver, however the bluetooth doesn't. The operating system is Windows 10. Does anybody know where to get the bluetooth driver?

 

Ok, just contacted Broadcom few minutes ago about asking for bluetooth drivers for Windows 10. Let's see if they can solve the problem with their product. Either they do or don't, I'll let you know.

 

More updates on the BCM94352HMB:

Bluetooth works out of the box in Ubuntu. In order to send files to any device you must add it first from the bluetooth manager, then you can send files to it. You can't do it directly from the contextual menu like in Windows:



Next, the Wifi does not work out the box, because requires proprietary drivers. You can nevertheless install it from "Additional drivers" panel:





The driver is "Broadcom 802.11 Linux STA wireless driver source from bcmwl-kernel-source (proprietary)". However, the wifi speed was quite slow (about 8MBps).

 

Try installing the VAIO Smart Network from the Sony support page for your model. Note that this is a PITA and will not install easily (try compatibility and admin modes) and, once you have installed it, will not uninstall. A system restore point is recommended if you want to get rid of it later. It will not tell you anything about whether or not it has installed properly, but reboot and it will show up as an icon in your system tray.

Click the icon in the system tray to change the wifi and bluetooth modes as desired.

 

VAio Smart Nettwork is already installed. The Intel Centrino bluetooth that came with the notebook works out of the box obviously, just was trying to upgrade the wireless card to get dual band wifi and bluetooth 4.0.

 

This is what my device manager looks like. If nothing else, perhaps a clean install of Windows 10 will fix things. You could do it in a VHD so you don't mess up your current system.
Btw. I have HyperV installed instead of your VMware. Do you think VMware is remembering your old adapter and not letting go?

 

Do you have the same adapter? I don't use vmware, no idea why you say that.

 

No, I have the stock adapter which my laptop came with.
Look at the third picture you posted above - the first device manager screenshot. VMware is listed there, as is VirtualBox. Perhaps you tried them ages ago and forgot.

Btw, not a good idea to reveal your MAC ID in a public forum. Please edit the picture of your network adapter to smudge that out.

 

In my opinion, try to upgrade Broadcom driver version to 6.5.1.6930 04/08/16

 

Don't worry, the pictures are from Amazon, not mine. Anyway, I don't have any issue with VMWare or Virtualbox. That's not the problem.

 

LOL I'm relieved.
If VMware and VirtualBox were installed when you had your old wifi card, they might have bound themselves to it, so when you changed adapters, you got left with this mess.

Do you know how to install Windows on a VHD? This is a painless way of doing a temporary clean install. Do it, find out if things work properly, then decide whether you want to do a clean install for your main OS installation or stick with it (just delete the VHD). You'll need some 30GB free space and Windows installation media.

 

Not sure if BT will work this way.. VPCZ1 like VGN-Z have a separate BT module and antenna. Check the service manual diagrams.
You need a proper driver anyway.

The idea of a clean install on a vhd is good! Alternatively, you may try a repair install, it may also fix such issues.

 

Since the card uses Broadcom chips, have you tried the Bluetooth driver from official Broadcom site?

 

Ok, issue solved partially. The official Broadcom drivers from official site didn't work the first time because I downloaded the 32 bits version, but it has to be the 64 bits version. The downloaded file is named "BTW_12.0.1.940_win8_10_x64.zip". On the official site they are listed as "WIDCOMM® Bluetooth Windows® Software for Windows 10 & 8, 64-Bit". Now bluetooth works, the wifi already worked with the driver installed by Windows 10.

One thing to consider though: when moving the physical slider for Vaio Smart Network, it may cause the bluetooth module not being connected or disconnected properly. For the Wifi, the enabled/disabled usually always goes in conjunction with the slider, but however with the bluetooth it may not be on pair. So, sometimes when you move the slider the wifi usually obeys, but the bluetooth may persist in the current state, and then when moving again the slider just change, so sometimes you get wifi+bt enabled at the same time while other times they go the opposite. Quite weird.
The way I've found to workaround this, is to move the slider two times fast, so the wifi changes the two times the state while the bluetooth only once, and you sync them again. If you start the computer with the slider on "on" position, both will work right away, the problem is when you switch it.

This a screen capture of Device Manager with BT+WIFI working at the same time after several times changing position on the physical slider and getting them to work on pair again after the fast switch trick:




The speed transfer over bluetooth to the LG G4, which has BT 4.1, averages 200 KBps. The Broadcom BCM94352HMB is BT 4.0 so this should be the limiting factor. It seems pretty slow to me:




It may rise the error "FTP operation in progress...please try again later" but sending files over bluetooth will work again, because there will appear two times the remote device in the "send to" window, usually the first one is the appropriate.




Duplicate remote device, one gives the "FTP operation" error, the other doesn't.

In any case, I've also found that the physical state of the devices is not reflected on Device Manager, so if you just move the slider to off both wifi+bt will still be shown there, although the networks don't work. Probably I'll replace the card again and put the Centrino that came with the computer. At least it works always as expected.

 

But then you would move back to slow WiFi again?! I have just received an Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260 (7260.HMWWB.R) wireless 802.11ac standard, which i will switch in in a couple of days, together with new SSD. Will let you know how it works!

Sent from my E6653 using Tapatalk

 

Just checking - have you removed the old bluetooth module?

 

The bluetooth and wifi chipsets go in the same mini-pci express card. There are two antennas one for each thing I guess. You can see the pictures on the first post.

 

AFAIK the old bluetooth module is the little narrow strip sitting on the top edge of the motherboard, near the battery connector. About 1 cm x 3 cm.

 

Are you talking about this?



Probably the picture from this post is how it looks on the other side?
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...tion-news-thread.556513/page-462#post-7712600

 

Yes.

 

If you don't fancy opening up the laptop and yanking stuff out, try disabling the old bluetooth adapter in Device Manager.

 

It seems that the only bluetooth device that is working is the original one [Single-Chip Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR Adapter], displayed as "FOXCONN-T77H114-BCM2070" in Device Manager, also mentions "Hon Hai" and it appears to be connected using USB interface.
If I disable it from Device Manager I've got to move the physical slider to "off" position. Then the bluetooth from the mini-pci express card works, but however I don't have wifi. If I leave the slider to "on" no bluetooth at all.


Bluetooth from BCM94352HMB working while Wi-Fi not.

Removing physically the stock bluetooth module will make everything work as expected?

 

With two bluetooth adapters sitting there, the OS is confused how to deal with it. I've never encountered a scenario quite like this. If it was me, I'd remove the old bluetooth adapter and reinstall Windows (clean install) and let the OS find and configure the new hardware.

Have you searched this forum thoroughly? I'm pretty sure you aren't the first to have updated your wifi adapter. How did the other guys do it?

 

Ok, enough is enough. I've removed physically the bluetooth card module from the VPCZ1, to leave only the AW-CE123H card. The wifi works perfectly with the physical slider, however the bluetooth doesn't work well. There appears a generic bluetooth device but I've got trouble connecting to devices, I get the error "The request could not be honored". Even on ubuntu the bluetooth doesn't work properly. Finally installed back the original bluetooth module + the original Intel Centrino 6200, which both work perfectly on Windows 10 and Ubuntu, and even on OSX Yosemite with hackintosh on my Vaio VPCZ13.

The thing I discovered, is that I can enable the 5GHz band on the Intel 6200, so now I have dual band. Anyway I have only a/b/g instead, of newer cards that support a/b/g/n/ac, but in any case the speed of the card is way faster than my internet connection. Will try out the Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260 (7260.HMWWB.R) as soon as @galaxyge says something about the compatibility. This should be great in case you want to use wireless hard drives, and the router must support the faster speeds.

[TIP] How to enable 5 GHz on Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6200 AGN

In case I wanted to have bluetooth 4.0 (and the upcoming 5.0), I could buy some nano usb dongle, for example to use with bluetooth ear or headphones, for maximum quality.

The point here, would be to get a new bluetooth-only card which fits perfectly in the place of the old one on the VPCZ1, but I doubt there are bluetooth 4.0 versions of it.

 

about compatibility, I got the Intel ac WiFi card based on this:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/index.php?threads/752394/

So pretty sure it will work, planning to exchange it this weekend.

Sent from my E6653 using Tapatalk

 

so, both WiFi card and SSD replaced!

The Intel card has also both Wi-Fi and BT (not sure is it 4.0, 4.1 or 4.2). Both working without issues.

Will give full details bit later in a separate post.


Sent from my E6653 using Tapatalk

 

@Paloseco it's up

http://forum.notebookreview.com/index.php?posts/10353150


Sent from my E6653 using Tapatalk