Hi. I have an HP G60-249WM laptop, and am currently using squeeze for better wireless support. (The latest kernel from backports might also work; but after trying that, I can say it doesn't play well with the non-free nvidia driver, which I also need.)
After "upgrading" to squeeze, and updating my firewall rules, the wireless was working at first. But while browsing the web a couple days ago, network-manager repeatedly prompted me for my wireless password, and would not accept the correct one. Then I tried unchecking "Enable Wireless", hoping to re-check it later, but it went gray (disabled)! After asking some questions and being given suggestions on #debian, and searching the web (with my wired connection) for answers, I installed the lshw and rfkill packages and found the following: # lshw -C network *-network description: Ethernet interface ... *-network DISABLED description: Wireless interface product: AR5001 Wireless Network Adapter vendor: Atheros Communications Inc. physical id: 0 bus info: p...@0000:07:00.0 logical name: wlan0 version: 01 serial: [MAC address] width: 64 bits clock: 33MHz capabilities: pm msi pciexpress msix bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless configuration: broadcast=yes driver=ath5k latency=0 multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11bg resources: irq:23 memory:c2000000-c200ffff # rfkill list 0: phy0: Wireless LAN Soft blocked: no Hard blocked: yes If I have read the top Google result for rfkill [1] correctly, this means that the problem cannot be fixed by *any* software, and is thus a hardware issue. Is that right? Assuming it is hardware, I have noticed that there is a button with a little wireless logo LED. Before I "upgraded" to squeeze, it was always amber-colored. Afterward, it was usually blue, but blinked between both colors while I was browsing the web. Now it is always blue. I have tried pushing this button once, briefly; several times, quickly; and holding it down for 30 seconds. I have also tried every Fn-FXX key combo from F1 to F12, and some combinations of these with the wireless button. No change. I have also tried the Ubuntu LiveCD; it seems to have the same problem. And I've tried removing network-manager, manual configuration and ifdown/modprobe/ifup, and the alternative manager wicd. None worked. For additional reference, here's the information provided by ifconfig -a and iwconfig: # ifconfig -a ... wlan0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr [MAC address] BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:0 (0.0 B) TX bytes:0 (0.0 B) # iwconfig ... wlan0 IEEE 802.11bg ESSID:off/any Mode:Managed Access Point: Not-Associated Tx-Power=off Retry long limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off Encryption key:off Power Management:off So, is my wireless card fried? Or what other information is needed to know? [1] http://www.mjmwired.net/kernel/Documentation/rfkill.txt -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/1277873845.3799.227.ca...@pack.gateway.2wire.net