Ubuntu: How do I fix a "Wireless is disabled by hardware switch" error?
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As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Ubuntu: How do I fix a "Wireless is disabled by hardware switch" error?
The Question: I just updated to Ubuntu 12.04 from 11.10 but soon after updating I was
disappointed to see that
Wireless is disabled by hardware switch.
I can not click the button 'Enable wireless' which is greyed out. Without
wireless my computer is useless as I have to connect by wire which is not
practical. I have a Acer TravelMate 4500
Solutions Sample (Please watch the whole video to see all solutions, in order of how many people found them helpful):
== This solution helped 2 people ==
I don't know the Acer Travelmate 4500 but I had a similar problem with a Dell
laptop.
Firstly I assume there is no hardware switch ie a physical wireless switch on
the side or underneath the laptop?
If not then, interrupt the boot sequence by pressing the F2 key "Set up" (it
may be a different key on your machine) and then look for the wireless settings
and ensure they are set correctly.
== This solution helped 71 people ==
Same happened to me, simply resolved with:
rfkill unblock all
rfkill list all showed some devices on soft block.
== This solution helped 10 people ==
if you just want to reactivate your wifi...
sudo rfkill unblock wifi
== This solution helped 20 people ==
There are two types of radio kill switches: 'hard' (or physical) and 'soft'
(software). The rfkill list command will tell you whether either (or both) of
these are set for any connected radio devices.
If your wireless card shows "Hard blocked: yes", then a physical switch on your
laptop case is turned off. Turn it on.
If your card shows "Soft blocked: yes", then you can turn it back on by running
rfkill unblock ＜ID＞ where is replaced by the number from the rfkill list
command.
There is a bug in network-manager, where if you disabled wifi by right-clicking
on the applet and un-checking "Enable Wireless", then the menu option becomes
grayed out and can no longer be re-enabled. This persists after rebooting. It
looks like NM is soft-blocking the wireless card when you disable it (which is
a reasonable thing to do), but then graying out the menu item because it is
soft-blocked (which is not a reasonable thing to do).
== This solution helped 5 people ==
Try this $ sudo rfkill unblock all
Also hit the key on your keyboard that switches your wifi on and off.
Another method that usually 100% effective is to simply connect your cable wire
to your laptop for a few minutes then unplug it. Reboot and your wifi should be
working.
Also as mentioned above network manager is buggy.
I like to use WICD because it is a simple and easy to use network manager. Its
a very good alternative to network manager in Ubuntu and it seems to always
work when Network Manager doesn't. To install it just open up the terminal.
To download and install WICD
sudo apt-get install wicd-gtk
And now you need to uninstall NetworkManager:
sudo apt-get remove --purge network-manager-gnome network-manager
Now you can find WICD in your menu Start WICD, find the network you want to use
and enter the information needed, password, encryption, etcetera and choose
Automatically Connect to this network. You should be good to go!
WICD may also be available in Ubuntu Update Manager so you can look there first
but it is important to uninstall Network Manager completely to prevent
conflicts!!
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