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Thread: Dell Inspiron 8200: No wifi. Intel PRO 2915ABG

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Sep 2007
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    366

    Dell Inspiron 8200: No wifi. Intel PRO 2915ABG

    I have an old DSell Inspiron 8200 with Xubuntu 12.04 installed. Ethernet works fine, but there is no wifi. I have switched to wicd, but there is no change. Wicd says "no wireles networks found", even though it is sitting next to the router. Here's some info on my setup:

    *-network:1
    description: Wireless interface
    product: PRO/Wireless 2915ABG [Calexico2] Network Connection
    vendor: Intel Corporation
    physical id: 3
    bus info: pci@0000:02:03.0
    logical name: eth1
    version: 05
    serial: 00:16:6f:c3:8f:54
    width: 32 bits
    clock: 33MHz
    capabilities: pm bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless
    configuration: broadcast=yes driver=ipw2200 driverversion=1.2.2kmprq firmware=ABG:9.0.5.27 (Dec 12 2007) latency=32 link=no maxlatency=24 mingnt=3 multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11abg
    resources: irq:11 memory:f8ffe000-f8ffefff

    Looks like my driver should be "ipw2200" but "sudo lsmod | grep ipw" outputs precisly nothing.

    Heres the output from "ifconfig"

    eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:06:5b:bc:b2:32
    inet addr:192.168.1.10 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
    inet6 addr: fe80::206:5bff:febc:b232/64 Scope:Link
    UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
    RX packets:4188 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
    TX packets:3767 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
    collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
    RX bytes:4066947 (4.0 MB) TX bytes:576089 (576.0 KB)
    Interrupt:11 Base address:0x4c00

    lo Link encap:Local Loopback
    inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
    inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
    UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
    RX packets:4 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
    TX packets:4 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
    collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
    RX bytes:240 (240.0 B) TX bytes:240 (240.0 B)

    And "iwconfig"

    iwconfig
    lo no wireless extensions.

    eth0 no wireless extensions.

    From "lspci" there is

    02:00.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905C-TX/TX-M [Tornado] (rev 78)

    But no mention of wireless.
    Any help would be apreciated.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Aug 2011
    Location
    Berlin, Germany
    Beans
    7,963
    Distro
    Ubuntu Mate 20.04 Focal Fossa

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    Please show the outputs of
    Code:
    lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net
    rfkill list
    What about loading the driver by hand?
    Code:
    sudo modprobe -v ipw2200

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Sep 2007
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    366

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    lspci only shows the 3com tornado ethernet adapter, and "rfkill list" outputs nothing. modprobe installed ipw2200 and several other drivers sucessfully, but it has no effect. Could this be a hardware issue? I probably could get a new wireless adapter cheaply at my local FreeGeek.

  4. #4
    Join Date
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    Ubuntu Mate 20.04 Focal Fossa

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    Tried to reset the BIOS to default?

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Sep 2007
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    366

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    No efect.

  6. #6
    Join Date
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    Ubuntu Mate 20.04 Focal Fossa

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    Obviously the card is not recognized, check:
    Code:
    cat /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules
    Checked the slot?

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Sep 2007
    Beans
    366

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    That does show an eth1. I'll shorten things since the internet is down and I'm typing this on my phone.

    PCI device --- (ipw2200)
    Subsystem net
    Action add
    Drivers "?*"
    Attr(address) ---
    Attr(dev I'd) "0x0"
    Attr(type) 1
    Kernel "eth"
    Name eth1

    The dashes sub for lots of numbers and I didn't show the part for eth0

    Also I removed the card and replugged it with no effect.
    Last edited by itlarson; June 24th, 2013 at 05:56 PM.

  8. #8
    Join Date
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    Distro
    Ubuntu Mate 20.04 Focal Fossa

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    Check in the BIOS if the card is "on". Maybe the boot priority needs to be 1st wireless and 2nd the OS.

    Do you have a Live-CD/USB to check it there?

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Sep 2007
    Beans
    366

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    The inspiron 8200 is too old to have boot from Ethernet- or USB for that matter. Interestingly in the BIOS it shows the mini PCI device as enabled but unknown. An inspiron 8600 I have shows it's PCI card as enabled and describes it as wireless. They have almost the same BIOS.

    Sorry no live CD here, hopefully tonight.

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Jul 2012
    Beans
    322
    Distro
    Xubuntu 18.04 Bionic Beaver

    Re: no wifi on old dell laptop

    Is there a physical switch ?
    The best things in life are free, so what are we paying for?

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