I found out accidentally that my Tata Photon E1552/E1800 does not work as a modem on Mint 13 if connected to USB 3.0 port, but works wonderfully when connected via a USB 2.0 port on the same machine.
In fact, when connected to the USB 3.0 port on the motherboard, it is detected as a 12d1:1446, and refuses to switchover as a modem. When plugged into a USB 2.0 port on the same motherboard, it is seen as a 12d1:140b, and the network manager automatically takes it up as a modem.
I tested it on another machine running XUbuntu and it gave the same results. Works like a charm on the USB 2.0 port, but not on USB 3.0.
Yes! This is one of the problems I have been facing and here is a possible solution. Looking at your lsusb
output, I find the following:
Bus 002 Device 004: ID 19d2:1405 ZTE WCDMA Technologies MSM
This indicates that the Vendor ID is 0x19d2
and the Product ID is 0x1405
. I would advise you the following steps:
(1) Create a bash
script as follows. This bash script is to be run, everytime you would like to use your mobile modem CDMA connection. Let us suppose that the name of the bash
script is `myModem.sh. Do this by typing:
sudo nano ~/myModem.sh
Type in the following lines here:
#!/bin/bash
sudo /sbin/modprobe usbserial vendor=0x19d2 product=0x1405
Save your script and exit from nano
. Type:
sudo chmod +x ~/myModem.sh
(2) Run the following commands:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get install wvdial
sudo apt-get install usb-modeswitch usb-modeswitch-data
(4) Type the following:
sudo nano /etc/udev/rules.d/90-zte.rules
and type in the following line (it is a single line and no carriage returns please):
SUBSYSTEM=="block",SUBSYSTEM=="scsi",ATTRS{model}=="USB Storage 1405",ACTION=="add",RUN+="/sbin/modprobe usbserial vendor=0x19d2 product=0x1405"
Save the file and exit from nano
.
(5) Now run your bash script from your home directory:
sudo ~/myModem.sh
(6) Now we have to configure wvdial
.
sudo wvdialconf /etc/wvdial.conf
This will detect the modem and create a configuration file.
(7) Edit the configuration file to adjust the setting according to your country/service provider. Especially change the dialing phone number, username and password. Do this by typing
sudo nano /etc/wvdial.conf
Remove the semicolons before the phone, username and password. The semicolons tell wvdial that these lines are commented. Save your file and exit from nano
.
(8) Now create your connection. Make sure you check the Connect Automatically option.
I hope this will set your modem working.
Best Answer
Ubuntu generally supports mobile broadband USB dongles. So let's start with:
How it should work
The dongle gets detected
You get the following window that asks for the SIMs PIN. Enter your PIN, check Automatically unlock this device and click Unlock.
If you've made it this far, you know that your dongle is supported.
Create a new Mobile Broadband connection
Select New Mobile Brodband connection... from the network indicator.
This will bring up the mobile broadband setup wizard.
Follow the instructions and choose settings according to your country and provider/carrier. Mine looks like this:
Done
That's basically it, you should have a working Internet connection in a few seconds when you hit the Continue button.
Troubleshooting - The easy part
The SIM card is blocked
Put the SIM in another device like a phone and enter the PUK when asked for. If that somehow does not work, you will need to call your providers/carriers customer support hotline.
Installing the Windows driver on Windows
Rumor has it that this works for some devices and has to be performed only once when the device is completely new and hasn't been used before. This is only needed to change the mode of the dongle. (See explanation about
usb-modeswitch
below.)Troubleshooting - The difficult part
Remember, you don't have to go through very time consuming and probably frustrating troubleshooting. If your WiFi already works, buy a mobile Wi-Fi hotspot.
The dongle doesn't get detected
If you don't get the window shown in step 1, then it might be that the SIM card is blocked (see paragraph above), not properly inserted (e.g. upside down) or the dongle itself is not detected due to
usb-modeswitch
issues.The thing with USB modes on these devices is, to first present the dongle as a read only storage device with an (outdated) driver that you could install and then change the mode so that the device can be used as it was intended. However you almost never need to install these drivers. The situation in most cases is, that Linux already has a driver, but somehow cannot activate the mobile broadband modem part of the dongle.
The following links might be helpful for further troubleshooting:
Determining which device you are using
You should also find out which dongle you have (as you can see in the example it's not always quite obvious and the
lsusb
output may also not be accurate), search for it online and provide maker and model name along with to Ubuntu version you are using when you ask a new question, thus helping everyone finding questions already asked and corresponding answers.There are only a few manufacturers of these dongles, namely Huawei and ZTE, but a lot of carriers re-brand them. Here is how it looks on mine:
It's a Huawei K5320. (A very old device. This is not meant to be a recommendation.)