[SOLVED] Wifi not listing networks when outside of home,Thinkpad X250

ruenoak · 2021-02-20 23:38:04

Hi all, I have a strange one here.
Recently purchased a Thinkpad X250, quickly replaced the SSD and installed Devuan of course.

It works perfectly well except one strange issue with the Wifi.
I went out this morning to do a bit of work on my laptop at a local cafe, enabled my wifi hotspot on my phone and was surprised to see in Wicd that no networks available to connect too not my mobile hotspot or any other network in range. Checking my phone there were plenty of wifi networks in range.

At home the wifi works perfectly well Wicd lists my wifi network plus any others that are in range, it also list and connects to my mobile hotspot as well.

Not sure why out of the house the wifi doesn't seem to work?

My old laptop, a Sony Vaio with Devuan installed never had this issue.

Thanks
ruenoak

Last edited by ruenoak (2021-02-22 20:57:10)

dice · 2021-02-21 00:40:53

that is strange behaviour. Maybe you accidently hit the wifi button on or near the keyboard. I know on my laptop i have a kill switch button that is sensitive and it softblocks the wifi, ive accidently hit it in the past and not known then thought i had software issues when in fact it was PEBKAC.

what does rfkill say?

# rfkill list

Last edited by dice (2021-02-21 00:42:57)

ruenoak · 2021-02-21 02:05:59

dice wrote:

that is strange behaviour. Maybe you accidently hit the wifi button on or near the keyboard. I know on my laptop i have a kill switch button that is sensitive and it softblocks the wifi, ive accidently hit it in the past and not known then thought i had software issues when in fact it was PEBKAC.
what does rfkill say?
# rfkill list

Thanks dice ,yes that is what I initially thought was happening, I was somehow disabling the wifi.

Update:
I have managed to get the wifi working while out and about but not sure what I did or what the original cause of the problem was.
1. At home I configured my laptop to connect to my mobile hotspot.
2. Went out again and turned on laptop - opened Wicd and no networks available as before.
3. Enabled my mobile hotspot and refreshed Wicd and there was my mobile hotspot and about 10 other nearby wifi networks showing.

So it seems for some unknown reason I needed a configured network to be in range for Wicd to initiate the detection of other networks.
I disabled the hotspot and rebooted the machine again, then refreshed Wicd with the hotspot disable and it found various networks in range, enabled the hotspot and it found that too.
So I think I will say its working now and solved, with a caveat that it seem to be an anomaly with this laptop, as I have had Devuan and other distributions on various laptops in the past and have never come across this issue before.

Thanks
ruenoak

The officially official Devuan Forum!

#1 2021-02-20 23:38:04

[SOLVED] Wifi not listing networks when outside of home,Thinkpad X250

#2 2021-02-21 00:40:53

Re: [SOLVED] Wifi not listing networks when outside of home,Thinkpad X250

#3 2021-02-21 02:05:59

Re: [SOLVED] Wifi not listing networks when outside of home,Thinkpad X250

Board footer