O2 Mobile Broadband with Ubuntu 8.04

[Jsturdy]

Hi there,

I am an absolute novice when it comes to Ubuntu. My girlfriend recently purchased a Dell notebook with version 8.04 and network manager 0.7. I'm not very clued up on laptops and mobile broadband so your help is very much appreciated.

Is there any commands I can try to find the problem?


I plug the dongle in (E160) and the system knows the dongle is present, the blue flashing light is appearing on the dongle so there is coverage but it just won't connect.
A wizard appears with the following

New Mobile Broadband connection setup.

I select UK followed by O2 (pre-pay)the summary appears and comes up with service provider and name etc..

Now the configuration is set up i click on properties and the information of the dongle comes up.

Tells me the model, version, driver, data device, imsi number and IMEI number.

I try to connect it just seems to be consistently trying to connect but never succeeding.

Have i done something wrong?

No error messages, basically it tries to connect and the icon does a moving symbol. If I hover over I get ALT text saying it's dialling and names my device but never connects. I checked that I topped up successfully because the woman at O2 said �15 was put on and I have a month's worth of net time.

I'm getting really frustrated now.

If you do not understand what I'm saying, I will try and simplify as much as I can.

Do I need to put any settings in myself? Very stressed newbie.

Cheers everyone in advance any answers would be much appreciated..

[ChuckFickens]

it sets it up with the wrong settings.... give this a go,

Edit the connection settings and change the APN to m-bb.o2.co.uk the number it dials to *99# or *99***1#

the username is o2bb and the password is password.

[Jsturdy]

Thanks, I�ve tried the exact settings but still no joy.

Do you know if i need to change any other settings in network manager?

Thanks for your quick response.

[ChuckFickens]

silly question here, you do have a signal where you are don't you?

[Jsturdy]

Yep, I tried it on my windows based PC in the exact same location and no problems.

Thanks again.

[ChuckFickens]

i'm finding conflicting results with regards to what the APN should be set to, are you able to find out what the settings are on the windows computer and enter the same ones on the ubuntu one?

[Jsturdy]

Done all that and it just seems to be ever trying to connect but never manages to do so.

I hate giving up but I reckon I�m onto a losing bet here. Thanks anyway. Much appreciated.

[ChuckFickens]

hold up, before you give up, i've just spotted you are using 8.04

the network manager in versions 8.10 or 9.04 has got far better support for 3G dongles.

you can not upgrade directly to 9.04 though, you have to upgrade to 8.10 and then to 9.04 if you want (but just upgrading to 8.10 will get you the updated NM)

http://www.howtoforge.com/how-to-upgrade-ubunt u-8.04-to-ubuntu-8.10-desktop-and-server

[ChuckFickens]

also try with the setting I gave above, but with the user name o2web instead of o2bb