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Ubuntu Edgy Eft, Wifi, and Software Controlled RF Switches

April 18th, 2007 Leave a comment Go to comments

Isn’t it annoying when your PC/Laptop locks up randomly?

Well, I recently got a Fujitsu Siemens Amilo Pro V3405. Works wonderfully with Linux. Except for one thing; during boot it sometimes locked up for no apparent reason. Doing a search on google explained that it has something to do with the radio frequency kill switch; the one that turns wifi on and off. The ipw3945 module used for this laptop just locks the system during boot if the switch was enabled (wifi off). The switch is software controlled and is off by default when the laptop is turned on.

I checked

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  1. awsation
    April 26th, 2007 at 10:01 | #1
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    neat…but i have two questions..

    Q1: “booting to windows, enabling the switch, and rebooting to linux made the problem disappear.” How could that be? elaborate…how can the system remember the status of that volatile software-controlled state of the WLAN/WiFi switch, wouldn’t that be lost after a reboot, or should i just RTFM :-)

    Q2: “/bin/echo 1 > /proc/driver/acerhk/wirelessled ; ”

    Is that line necessary, i thought the ipw3945 module takes care of the LED indicator once it loaded..

  2. Mohammad Al-Shami
    April 27th, 2007 at 00:12 | #2
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    Hey man.

    A1) The switch is ON (No wifi) by default when the machine is turned on, but when it’s rebooted the switch retains it’s state.

    A2) the ipw3945 doesn’t do anything with the led, it actually hangs the system when booting with edgy if the switch was ON. That’s why I used the acerhk module

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