Ubuntu – How to get an Atheros AR9287 working

11.04atherosnetworking

I'm running Windows 7 normally on my Acer laptop, and it works like a charm. However, whenever I boot up Ubuntu, the network card doesn't even seem to exist.

I've looked for hours for a solution, to no avail.

These are some specs of the chip:

Atheros Communications Inc. AR9287 Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01)

What steps do I have to take to get some kind of network connection? The networking was the one thing I liked about Ubuntu, however, this is kind of a turn-off.

I have tried running the "Additional Drivers" tool but it did not work.

Best Answer

Googling around - as you have found, some of the Atheros drivers in the 2.6.38 kernel are broken.

This website suggests the following workaround until the kernel is fixed:

sudo su
echo "options ath9k nohwcrypt=1" > /etc/modprobe.d/ath9.conf

Then reboot

Note - I've seen other websites that say that the file should be ath9k.conf. So if the above doesnt work, try

sudo su
echo "options ath9k nohwcrypt=1" > /etc/modprobe.d/ath9k.conf

Remove the ath9.conf / ath9k.conf file when a new kernel is released (assuming of course the new kernel fixes this issue).

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