Wireless light constantly blinking on Compaq Presario CQ60 laptop

[James2k]

I have a Compaq Presario CQ60 laptop and have one of those wireless light indicators. For me the light glows orange when the wireless is OFF and blue when the wireless is ON. In Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic) the light was always orange, even if the Wireless was on, but my wireless worked right out of the box so I was grateful for that, but since upgrading to Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid) I've noticed that my wireless light alternates between orange and blue frequently and sometimes flashes madly when wireless activity is occurring.

I was wondering if there is a fix for this as it can get quite annoying, the light sometimes stays blue for a while but will ultimately keep going back to orange and vice-versa, my friend who also has a Compaq Presario CQ61 (Revised model of mine) has his wireless light constantly blinking orange and blue no matter what.

The wireless itself works fine, I can connect to any wireless connection and use it without having to install anything else, so it does work out of the box, which again, I'm grateful for.

The wireless adapter is a Atheros AR5001 Wireless network adapter. Do I need to install additional packages or drivers to get the wireless adapter to work properly?

Hope someone can help me!

Thanks,

[Paulo Carvalho]

Hi there funny, I am looking for the same solution!

[btmitchell]

Same problem also (although I'm using a CQ61)..

[Iron_maiden_forever]

To fix this bug I did as per this advice:

root@ubuntu-laptop:/# echo none > /sys/class/leds/ath9k-phy0\:\:rx/trigger
root@ubuntu-laptop:/# echo none > /sys/class/leds/ath9k-phy0\:\:tx/trigger

*you should be root to do this. If you don't know your root password, set one ('sudo passwd root').

'ls' /sys/class/leds/ to change the above commands accordingly.

@ubuntu-laptop:~$ ls /sys/class/leds/
ath9k-phy0::assoc/ ath9k-phy0::rx/ hp::hddprotect/
ath9k-phy0::radio/ ath9k-phy0::tx/ mmc0::/

Also, you will save it in a script so you don't have to repeat the commands every time your computer restarts:

@ubuntu-laptop:/$ sudo gedit /etc/network/if-up.d/wlan-no-blink

Put this in your script (remember to change 'ath9k-phy*x' if necessary; eg. 'iwl-phy*X'):

#!/bin/sh
if [ "$IFACE" = "wlan0" ]; then
for dir in /sys/class/leds/ath9k-phy*x; do
echo none > $dir/trigger
done
fi

Now make it executable:
@ubuntu-laptop:/$ sudo chmod a+x /etc/network/if-up.d/wlan-no-blink

Done!

[gonzalioz]

Hi,

I have a compaq presario CQ61 and having the same problem. I tried to perform the steps in the post above, but I don't really understand what to do.

I copy pasted the first command and get this:

taco@taco-laptop:~$ root@ubuntu-laptop:/# echo none > /sys/class/leds/ath9k-phy0\:\:rx/trigger
bash: /sys/class/leds/ath9k-phy0::rx/trigger: Permission denied
taco@taco-laptop:~$

I am sorry, but can somebody explain it to me again in simple english and for a 4 year old .

Thanks a lot in advance!

[James2k]

Thanks for the fix, however I have since moved to the madwifi atheros drivers for packet injection support on my card. The wireless light just stays orange when the madwifi driver is in use, which isn't a major issue for me.

For people using the standard ath5k and ath9k drivers though, the above solution works great.

[James2k]

I've switched back to the ath5k driver for better support. I'll go through the fix for anyone having difficulty:

First of all you will need to be root to run these commands so open up a terminal window and type:

sudo -s

Type in your password to drop to root@ubuntu.

First off all you will need to find if your system is using the Atheros 5k or 9k driver. So you can run the following commands in the terminal we've opened to find out:

echo none > /sys/class/leds/ath9k-phy0\:\:rx/trigger
echo none > /sys/class/leds/ath5k-phy0\:\:tx/trigger

For Compaq CQ60's the driver is ath5k however executing both of these commands, you will find one will execute with no errors and one will execute with the directory not found error. Whatever one executes silently is the ath driver in use. In my case, the ath5k driver.

Upon executing the command that is relative to your ath driver you should find the wireless light changes and now doesn't blink when network activity is occurring.

However, the change we have done will not be saved permanently, we have to create a script to make sure the wireless light doesn't blink on each reboot of the machine.

Run the following command in terminal:

gedit /etc/network/if-up.d/wlan-no-blink

And now add the following into the blank text file:

#!/bin/sh
if [ "$IFACE" = "wlan0" ]; then
    for dir in /sys/class/leds/ath5k-phy*x; do
        echo none > $dir/trigger
    done
fi

This example is for the ath5k driver, if you are using the ath9k driver, make sure you change number 5 to 9

Now you have the script, save and close gedit. Now in the terminal window, run the following command:

chmod a+x /etc/network/if-up.d/wlan-no-blink

Now upon each reboot your wireless light change will be saved.

Thanks again Iron_maiden_forever for posting the fix and gonzalioz, hopefully I've helped you understand the process a bit better.

[marcopolo1981]

I have a CQ60, and have the same 'problem'. Only I never thought it was a problem, as it only flashes when data is being transferred. When idle, it stays blue. The way I saw it, it was letting me know that data was being transferred. Does it actually have a negative effect when it does this?

[James2k]

You are correct the wireless light blinks when data is being transferred. I found this an annoyance more than an actual problem. But like I said for Compaq Presario CQ61 users, the wireless light constantly blinks every second regardless (Well it did for my friend), so that's why I wanted to disable mine blinking.

[chaceos]

I have the same problem except I'm using an HP Pavillion dv6000. For the record, after installation of Ubuntu 10.4 everything goes well and I'm very happy.
Anyway this blinking wasn't happening in windows xp and this is the only reason I realize this might be a problem. Like said above it only blinks when data is transfering.
My questions:
Atheros 5k or Atheros 9k is a wireless driver?
What if my pavillion dv6000 has none of them?
Is there another way to be sure?
and if I have another driver how is the correction of the script above??

Thanks very much guys(meaning girls2)! Keep doing good!

P.S. Not very good English, Very noob.