rfkill hard block my wireless when I switch it off/on

[Soec]

Hi all,

First of all, I'm pretty new with Ubuntu, but before post it here I've searched in a lot of forums about my problem and I found some information, but in any case I could fix my laptop...

Second, sorry about my English...

Third, my system: My laptop is an ASUS X50R with an Atheros AR5001 wireless card. Running Ubuntu 11.04.

Fourth, my problem: Everything works ok when I launch my laptop normally. But if I switch off my wireless connection, I can't switch it on again because is hardware blocked by rfkill.

It doesn't matter the way of switching it off and on again:
- Function key + F2
- sudo ifconfig wlan0 down & sudo ifconfig wlan0 up
- switch it off in the network menu (after switch it off it says that it is switched off by a physical switch, but it is false because my laptop doesn't have any physical wireless switch. I think that it says this just because it's hardware blocked).

In these cases, before switch the wireless off everything is ok:

mypc:~$ rfkill list
0: phy0: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: no

When I switch off the wireless I have different results: Using fn+F2 Software blocked = yes, in other ways it says no. Hard block is always off.

mypc:~$ rfkill list
 0: phy0: Wireless LAN
     Soft blocked: yes/no
     Hard blocked: no

But when I try to switch it on again my heart breaks when I read:

mypc:~$ rfkill list
0: phy0: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: yes

That's my lshw -C network. Showing it disabled (because it's a hardware block? )

mypc:~$ sudo lshw -C network
  *-network DISABLED      
       description: Wireless interface
       product: AR5001 Wireless Network Adapter
       vendor: Atheros Communications Inc.
       physical id: 0
       bus info: pci@0000:02:00.0
       logical name: wlan0
       version: 01
       serial: 00:15:af:2b:9f:33
       width: 64 bits
       clock: 33MHz
       capabilities: pm msi pciexpress msix bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless
       configuration: broadcast=yes driver=ath5k  driverversion=2.6.38-8-generic firmware=N/A latency=0 link=no  multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11bg
       resources: irq:16 memory:fa9f0000-fa9fffff
  *-network
       description: Ethernet interface
       product: L2 Fast Ethernet
       vendor: Atheros Communications
       physical id: 0
       bus info: pci@0000:06:00.0
       logical name: eth0
       version: a0
       serial: 00:1d:60:a4:0a:3c
       capacity: 100Mbit/s
       width: 64 bits
       clock: 33MHz
       capabilities: pm msi pciexpress vpd bus_master cap_list rom  ethernet physical tp 10bt 10bt-fd 100bt 100bt-fd autonegotiation
       configuration: autonegotiation=on broadcast=yes driver=atl2  driverversion=2.2.3 firmware=L2 latency=0 link=no multicast=yes  port=twisted pair
       resources: irq:40 memory:feac0000-feafffff memory:feaa0000-feabffff

I've tried different solutions but no one fix it:

1- sudo rfkill unblock all
2- rmmod ath5k && modprobe ath5k
3- rm /dev/rfkill
4- sudo iwconfig wlan0 txpower auto
5- Check BIOS: wireless is always on. I think that's why when I reboot my laptop it works properly until I try to switch it off/on the wireless again. It looks like if BIOS option were turned off when I switched it off in Ubuntu... I just try to guess, because I don't really know...

I can use my wireless normally if I don't change the configuration, but precisely I changed to ubuntu to play with the different configs...

Some ideas? Thank you.

[Soec]

One more thing, it's interesting that the wireless only work again if I shut down and start the laptop again. It doesn't happen with a reboot....

[TBABill]

What happens if it shows hard blocked and you switch it to the on position, then open a terminal and

sudo modprobe ath5k

and then wait about 1 minute?

[Soec]

What happens if it shows hard blocked and you switch it to the on position, then open a terminal and

sudo modprobe ath5k

and then wait about 1 minute?

Thank you for your reply, but anything happens... it is still hard blocked.

mipc:~$ rfkill list
**normal situation
0: phy0: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: yes

**DISABLE VIA FN+F2
mipc:~$ rfkill list
0: phy0: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: yes
    Hard blocked: yes

**ENABLE VIA FN+F2
mipc:~$ rfkill list
0: phy0: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: yes

mipc:~$ sudo modprobe ath5k
[sudo] password for mipc: 
mipc:~$ rfkill list
0: phy0: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: yes

In fact, once I disable the wireless I can't enable it ON again, because it's hard blocked as I said. I've tried to switch it ON with Fn+F2 but it only changes the software block, not hardware.

If I try with:

mipc:~$ sudo ifconfig wlan0 up
[sudo] password for mipc: 
SIOCSIFFLAGS: Operation not possible due to RF-kill

Sorry for my English, I don't know if it is correct, but when I say switch wireless ON/OFF, I mean enable/disable it with Fn+F2 or trying ifconfig wlan0 up. Because I don't have a Physical switch with ON/OFF position.

Thanks.

[Soec]

Sorry, I forgot to show the ERROR line in my dmesg:

[   89.388774] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): wlan0: link is not ready

[TBABill]

Do you only have Ubuntu on the machine? I'm curious if the behavior is the same in Windows.

[Soec]

Do you only have Ubuntu on the machine? I'm curious if the behavior is the same in Windows.

Yes, only Ubuntu. I installed it deleting Windows.

[TBABill]

Could just be a bug. Only way to know is to try another distro or Ubuntu version and see if it stays the same behavior or changes.

[Soec]

Yes, only Ubuntu. I installed it deleting Windows.

But a few weeks ago in windows it worked correctly.

I am still searching and trying.

With this (changing acer-wmi to ath5k)it doesn't work.

I am starting to be hopeless, because a lot of people have a problem that it looks the same, but all of them can fix it just unblocking rfkill, removing the acer module or switching his physical switch on

Could just be a bug. Only way to know is to try another distro or Ubuntu version and see if it stays the same behavior or changes.

There is a non-destructive way to do this?

[TBABill]

Looks like you are not alone according to https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...ux/+bug/478036

However, your problem is a bit different because it's good till you manually set the switch to off, then can't get it to resume.

I had posted to sudo modprobe ath5k, but the last post in the bug report says the user was able to get theirs going on Natty by, when it happens, doing

sudo rmmod -f ath5k

and then following that with

sudo rfkill unblock all

and then

sudo modprobe ath5k