WiFi disabled on Dell Vostro 5459 (Ubuntu 16.04)

Question

Dell Vostro 5459
BIOS version 1.1.3
Secure boot is off
Kernel version: Tried installing latest kernel too. Tried copy file intel corporation 3160 wireless to /lib/frameware

Output of sudo lshw -C network:

*-network DISABLED      
   description: Wireless interface
   product: Wireless 3165
   vendor: Intel Corporation
   physical id: 0
   bus info: pci@0000:02:00.0
   logical name: wlp2s0
   version: 79
   serial: e0:94:67:b4:d5:a2
   width: 64 bits
   clock: 33MHz
   capabilities: pm msi pciexpress bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless
   configuration: broadcast=yes driver=iwlwifi driverversion=4.15.11-041511-generic firmware=29.610311.0 latency=0 link=no multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11
   resources: irq:129 memory:d5100000-d5101fff
*-network
   description: Ethernet interface
   product: RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller
   vendor: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd.
   physical id: 0
   bus info: pci@0000:03:00.0
   logical name: enp3s0
   version: 10
   serial: 20:47:47:75:d2:4d
   size: 10Mbit/s
   capacity: 1Gbit/s
   width: 64 bits
   clock: 33MHz
   capabilities: pm msi pciexpress msix vpd bus_master cap_list ethernet physical tp mii 10bt 10bt-fd 100bt 100bt-fd 1000bt 1000bt-fd autonegotiation
   configuration: autonegotiation=on broadcast=yes driver=r8169 driverversion=2.3LK-NAPI duplex=half firmware=rtl8168g-3_0.0.1 04/23/13 latency=0 link=no multicast=yes port=MII speed=10Mbit/s
   resources: irq:124 ioport:d000(size=256) memory:d5004000-d5004fff memory:d5000000-d5003fff
*-network
   description: Ethernet interface
   physical id: 3
   logical name: enp0s20f0u3
   serial: 4e:1d:ca:50:7e:8e
   capabilities: ethernet physical
   configuration: broadcast=yes driver=rndis_host driverversion=22-Aug-2005 firmware=RNDIS device ip=192.168.1.156 link=yes multicast=yes

This question would be much improved if you would be so kind as to [edit] your post to include the output of rfkill list all or alternately a pastie to the output of the wireless info script found hereThank you for helping us help you! — Elder Geek, Mar 21 '18 at 18:04

L.S. · Answer 1 · 2018-03-22T12:51:59.977

3

To bring up a disabled adapter you can use the command:

sudo ifconfig wlp2s0 up

If it tells you, that it is blocked by rfkill you can see if something is blocked with the command

rfkill list

and unblock it with

rfkill unblock all

edited Mar 22 '18 at 12:51

answered Mar 21 '18 at 11:28

L.S.

320

1

SIOCSIFFLAGS: Operation not possible due to RF-kill – Raven Mar 21 '18 at 11:40
rfkill unblock all – L.S. Mar 21 '18 at 11:49
Find and switch the wireless switch, sometimes called Airplane Mode. – chili555 Mar 21 '18 at 12:47
1

This answer would be much improved if you were to go so far as to format your code and [edit] this comment into your answer. Thank you for your effort. Cheers! – Elder Geek Mar 21 '18 at 18:11
Airplane Mode is disabled too "use hardware switch to turn off" message is displayed below Airplane mode,updated to Ubuntu 17.10 – Raven Mar 21 '18 at 21:58
L.S It is not working ifconfig: command not found – Raven Mar 22 '18 at 15:13
during installation there was intel corporation wireless 3165 – Raven Mar 23 '18 at 10:59
phy0: Wireless LAN Soft blocked: no Hard blocked: yes – Raven Mar 23 '18 at 11:45
My problem was also Hard blocked: yes for my Wifi. Running man rfkill reveals that If the device is hard-blocked, e.g. via a hardware switch, it will remain unavailable though it is now soft-unblocked. After reading this I found a hardware switch for my Wifi that I had never seen on my 12 year old laptop. Seems I had flipped it and not noticed, and I didn't even know it was there! – Krøllebølle Jan 04 '19 at 13:49
This worked for me, once I added the command sudo dhclient wlp2s0 – user207863 Feb 14 '20 at 23:33
Or with the modern ip command instead: ip link set wlp2s0 up – Pablo Bianchi Jan 16 '21 at 23:30

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 29 '20 at 10:03

In my case none of the above worked for me. The solution for me was to press the button with the antenna symbol on my laptop. Usually a button on the top row where the function keys are.

Wifi is enabled by default, perhaps I accidentally hit that button (a dedicated button on my Dell inspiron 7000 without FN combo).

WiFi disabled on Dell Vostro 5459 (Ubuntu 16.04)

2 Answers2

Linked