No Network Access on ASUS Zenbook UX303LA

KrunchTime · posted: 2015-02-13 09:12

I recently installed antiX 13 (Stable repos) on my new ASUS Zenbook UX303LA. Unfortunately, I'm not able to get network access at all. I'm wondering if it has something to do with airplane mode defaulting to on when I boot into antiX. The F2 key lights up which indicates that airplane mode is enabled.

The normal key combo of FN+F2 doesn't work and I've tried sudo rfkill unblock all to no avail.

I'm also not able to connect via an ethernet cable. The UX303LA doesn't have a normal ethernet port. You have to use a USB ethernet adapter, which I have, but it doesn't seem to work.

Without network access, I'm kind of stuck in no man's land at the moment.

fatmac · posted: 2015-02-13 09:45

Maybe try bringing up/down the interface itself in a terminal(?).

(sudo ifup/ifdown wlan0)

dolphin_oracle · posted: 2015-02-13 13:23

can you post an INXI -F report for that zenbook? or lspci?

That laptop from what I'm reading should have an intel wireless chipset, which ought to work. I would bet the USB dongle uses a broadcom chip, which probably won't work but we might be able to make work with the info. You may need to check lsusb with the device plugged in to see it.

KrunchTime · posted: 2015-02-13 23:11

@fatmac: Thank you. I'll give that a try.

@dolphin_oracle: I'll try that and provide the output. However, I did generate specs using three different utilities under Windows 8.1. Since the airplane mode is enabled, the wireless will not work. That's the purpose of airplane mode.

I believe ethernet is software driven, so I'm not sure if ethernet will work under Linux. It's possible that the machine was designed to use ethernet only under Windows. Remember the WinFax days? In any case, none of the system reports I generated under Windows 8.1 lists a separate NIC card and the instructions for using ethernet in the ASUS user manual mention doing it under Windows.

The following output from
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url was:"http://www.piriform.com"
linktext was:"Speccy"
====================================
seems to reinforce my hunch about software driven ethernet functionality:

WinInet Info
-- LAN Connection
-- Local system uses a local area network to connect to the Internet
-- Local system has RAS to connect to the Internet

Following is the adapter list generated from Speccy:

Bluetooth Device (Personal Area Network)
-- Connection Name Bluetooth Network Connection
-- DHCP enabled Yes

Intel(R) Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260
-- Connection Name Wi-Fi
-- NetBIOS over TCPIP Yes
-- DHCP enabled Yes

One final thing, under network interfaces in HardInfo, the only item listed is Io or lo.

KrunchTime · posted: 2015-02-13 23:28

dolphin_oracle wrote:I would bet the USB dongle uses a broadcom chip, which probably won't work but we might be able to make work with the info. You may need to check lsusb with the device plugged in to see it.

You just might be right. From the output generated from
========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"http://www.gtopala.com"
linktext was:"System Information for Windows (SIW)"
====================================
:

b06bdrv -- Broadcom NetXtreme II VBD -- 7.4.14.0 -- Kernel Driver -- Stopped Demand Start C:\Windows\System32\drivers\bxvbda.sys -- Broadcom NetXtreme II GigE VBD / Broadcom NetXtreme II GigE

KrunchTime · posted: 2015-02-14 00:04

OK...results of sudo ifup wlan0:"Ignoring unknown interface wlan0=wlan0"

Output of inxi -F:

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CPU:       Dual core Intel Core i5-4210U CPU (-HT-MCP-) cache: 3072 KB 
           Clock Speeds: 1: 768.00 MHz 2: 768.00 MHz 3: 768.00 MHz 4: 768.00 MHz
           CPU Flags: abm acpi aes aperfmperf apic arat arch_perfmon avx avx2 bmi1 bmi2 bts clflush 
           cmov constant_tsc cx16 cx8 de ds_cpl dtes64 dtherm dts eagerfpu epb ept erms est f16c 
           flexpriority fma fpu fsgsbase fxsr ht ida invpcid lahf_lm lm mca mce mmx monitor movbe 
           msr mtrr nonstop_tsc nopl nx pae pat pbe pcid pclmulqdq pdcm pdpe1gb pebs pge pln pni 
           popcnt pse pse36 pts rdrand rdtscp rep_good sep smep ss sse sse2 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 syscall 
           tm tm2 tpr_shadow tsc tsc_deadline_timer vme vmx vnmi vpid xsave xsaveopt xtopology xtpr

Output of lspci:

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00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Haswell-ULT DRAM Controller (rev 0b)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Haswell-ULT Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 0b)
00:03.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation Device 0a0c (rev 0b)
00:04.0 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Device 0a03 (rev 0b)
00:14.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP USB xHCI HC (rev 04)
00:16.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP HECI #0 (rev 04)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP HD Audio Controller (rev 04)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP PCI Express Root Port 1 (rev e4)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP PCI Express Root Port 4 (rev e4)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP LPC Controller (rev 04)
00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP SATA Controller 1 [AHCI mode] (rev 04)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP SMBus Controller (rev 04)
00:1f.6 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Lynx Point-LP Thermal (rev 04)
02:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation Device 08b1 (rev 6b)

BitJam · posted: 2015-02-14 00:07

Look at this
========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=187242"
linktext was:"thread on running Arch Linux on the Asus Zenbook UX303LA"
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. It links to at least one other similar thread. The original poster said wireless worked OOTB. Maybe you can disable airplane mode in the BIOS settings. The biggest sticking point was the touchpad not working but that has been fixed in the 3.18 Linux kernel (which is available on antiX).

Arch even has
========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ASUS_Zenbook_UX303"
linktext was:"a page dedicated to the ASUS Zenbook UX303"
====================================
.

KrunchTime · posted: 2015-02-14 00:13

@BitJam: Thank you for your response. I've already checked BIOS settings, but there's nothing that I can find to enable/disable airplane mode. I'll take another look at the Arch info, but I did come across that when I researched the issue before posting here.

Touchpad does work, but not fully functional and is annoyingly interfering when typing. The touchpad is big, similar to a MacBook, and it's very easy to brush against it while typing. I may be able to resolve that, but that's an issue to resolve later. Right now, I want to get network access working.

One thing I haven't done is to see if ASUS has forums and have a look there if they do. However, I would think that something would have came up in the Google search results earlier today.

DeepDayze · posted: 2015-02-14 00:23

By any chance this Broadcom device requiring firmware?

KrunchTime · posted: 2015-02-14 00:31

@DeepDayze: I'm not sure. Windows 8.1 was using a Broadcom driver, but I didn't see any ethernet adapter listed in any of the three reports I generated under Windows. Output of lspci only references the Intel adapter, but doesn't specify the exact model.

rokytnji · posted: 2015-02-14 00:50

In the previous inxi report you gave a lower case

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inxi -f

instead of a higher case F. So to make sure we get this right this time how about

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inxi -zv7

Just for more info in this thread. When I use a lspoci report. I use the flags in it that give more info also.

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lspci -knn

and in case wifi is a internal usb like on my little touchscreen netbooks I use

"lsusb -v"
<snip>
wifi chip and driver report
<snip>

Now off to my meatball submarine dinner roll dinner the wife just plated for me.

BitJam · posted: 2015-02-14 01:38

A Google(rfkill"hard blocked") shows a lot of similar problems with ASUS laptops and some solutions. You should do an:

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rfkill list

to see if your wfi is hard blocked. If so then"rfkill unblock ..." won't help you.
========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2191382"
linktext was:"One solution"
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was to"Restore Default Settings" in the BIOS (after making notes or taking photos of the the current settings).

========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2181558"
linktext was:"Another solution"
====================================
was to use the boot parameter"asus_nb_wmi wapf=4".

So find out if you wireless is hard blocked. If so, then the solution probably lies outside of things you can do within Linux. If you still have Windows on the machine then you could try to boot into windows and make sure airplane mode is off when you shut down. One person found the BIOS setting under Advanced --> Onboard Device Configuration --> Onboard WLAN disabled/enabled, but that may not apply to your machine.

KrunchTime · posted: 2015-02-14 01:39

@rokytnji: Thank you for responding. I'll try what you've suggested and report the results back here. Save some of the sub for me...please! __{{emoticon}}__

@BitJam: I would be hesitant to reset the BIOS settings. I haven't changed much in there other than to set UEFI to Legacy/CSM mode. I also changed some things in an attempt to get wireless to work, but changed those things back because they didn't resolve the issue.

Windows is no longer on the machine as I plan to run it in a VM. However, I didn't mess with the airplane mode while using Windows and wireless worked fine under Windows 8.1.

I don't remember the onboard device configuration in my machine's BIOS, but I'll look again.

Forgot to post what I originally came here to post. Saw the following on the Arch Wiki regarding UX303 laptops:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet acpi_osi="

I tried entering that in the boot options in the menu during bootup, but that didn't work. antiX seems to use a different method of using GRUB, so I'm not seeing [backslash]etc[backslash]default[backslash]grub. Where would I place the above to work under antiX?

rokytnji · posted: 2015-02-14 02:24

So just

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 $ rfkill list
0: hci0: Bluetooth
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: no
1: phy0: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: no
2: samsung-wlan: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: no

to see if anything is turned off.

KrunchTime · posted: 2015-02-14 02:48

BitJam wrote:A Google(rfkill"hard blocked") shows a lot of similar problems with ASUS laptops and some solutions. You should do an:
Code: Select all
rfkill list
to see if your wfi is hard blocked. If so then"rfkill unblock ..." won't help you.
========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2191382"
linktext was:"One solution"
====================================
was to"Restore Default Settings" in the BIOS (after making notes or taking photos of the the current settings).

========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2181558"
linktext was:"Another solution"
====================================
was to use the boot parameter"asus_nb_wmi wapf=4".

So find out if you wireless is hard blocked. If so, then the solution probably lies outside of things you can do within Linux. If you still have Windows on the machine then you could try to boot into windows and make sure airplane mode is off when you shut down. One person found the BIOS setting under Advanced --> Onboard Device Configuration --> Onboard WLAN disabled/enabled, but that may not apply to your machine.

sudo rfkill list didn't show any hard or soft blocks.

asus_nb_wmi wapd=4, entered under boot options during bootup, didn't work. (edit: just checked the link and this is part of a command line command to enable wifi)

No Onboard Device Configuration in BIOS.