Bricked laptop

Long story short I was trying to disable the internal wifi adapter, and use an USB wifi adapter. So after a couple of days of searching, I found instructions to edit the following: /etc/network/interfaces.

So I changed it to: iface lo inet loopback
iface wlan0 inet manual

And restarted the laptop, it gets to the Zorin symbol, then below the Z, it says: waiting for network configeration. That changes to: Continue booting with network completely configured. Then it just sits there, it never continues booting. I tried booting in safe mode, couldn't change it. Tried booting with the live cd, couldn't do anything.

Is there anyway to boot around this issue, or correct the issue, without reinstalling?

Secondary question, How can I disable the internal adapter and leave the usb working. Everything I found that turns off internal, turns off the usb also.

Boot with a live CD.
Open terminal and run

Code:

gksudo nautilus

The nautilus will open with administrative rights.
Navigate to the file /etc/network/interfaces. BUT the file on your drive, NOT the file on your live usb. You can see that when opening your nautilus file manager, on the list on the left - you must choose the correct drive and then navigate to /etc/network/interfaces.
Open the file and make the changes you want. Save and exit. Then reboot without the live USB.

To disable the internal adapter you could just blacklist the module.
Why do you want to do that? Your laptop cannot connect using the internal adapter?

madvinegar wrote:To disable the internal adapter you could just blacklist the module.
Why do you want to do that? Your laptop cannot connect using the internal adapter?

Yes, the internal has quit working completely. So when I plug in the usb, it's showing two adapters trying to connect to the same network, so it is contentiously connecting, and disconnecting.

Thank you so much, I've learned a little about Linux, but just enough to be dangerous. Usually when I need to do something, I Google it, on a different pc, then with both sitting side by side, try to follow directions, sometimes it doesn't work out right. I wish I had time to sit down a couple of days and just study things.

I booted the Live CD, made the corrections, double checked against the CD folder. Everything is correct, but when I try to boot up, again gets to the page with the big Z, under that is says, "Waiting for Network Connections", it then says "Booting without full network configuration...", but never advances past that. How can I make such a mess, by adding three little words, and then after removing those same three words, and it still won't work?

Do you have a wireless on/off switch on your laptop? If yes, set it to off and try to boot.

Otherwise, boot again using the live usb, open terminal and post back here the results of the following commands, so as to see what your wireless card is:

lspci -nn
lsusb
sudo lshw -c network
sudo rfkill list all

Hi,

on some PC's (Laptops/Notebooks) there is an option in BIOS to turn WiFi off or on at boot, simply switch it off in BIOS if you can!.

There should also be a combo switch with something like the "FN" key and "F2" (F2 on my Laptop!) to switch it off/on.

Regards Wolfman

madvinegar wrote:Do you have a wireless on/off switch on your laptop? If yes, set it to off and try to boot.

Otherwise, boot again using the live usb, open terminal and post back here the results of the following commands, so as to see what your wireless card is:

lspci -nn
lsusb
sudo lshw -c network
sudo rfkill list all

I do have the "FN F2" combination, I didn't do that to start with because that also turns off the USB adapter also. After turning wifi off, and rebooting still the same thing, here's the results leaving off the Wired ethernet other than just to mention it. Also you will notice that the wireless adapters are both the same brand, which is unusual.

lspci -nn 02:00.0 Network Controller [0280]: Ralink Corp. RT5390 Wireless 802.11n 1T/1R PCIe [1814:5390]


lsusb Bus 002 Device 003: ID 148f:5370 Ralink Technology, Corp. RT5370 Wireless Adapter


sudo lshw -c network * network
description: Wireless interface
product RT5390 Wireless 802.11n 1T/1R PCIe
Vendor Ralink Corp
physical id: 0
bus info: pci@0000:02:00.0
logical name: wlan0
version: 00
serial: 08:ed:b9:6a:0f
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHZ
capabilities: pm mse pciexpress bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless
configuration: broadcast=yes driver=rt2800pci driverversion=3.8.0-23-generic firmware=0.34 latency=0 link=no multicast=yes wireless=
IEEE 802.11bgn
resources: irq:17 memory:de800000-de80ffff

*-network
description: Wireless interface
Physical id: 1
bus info: usb@2:1.2
logical name: wlan1
serial: 7c:dd:90:12:d2:f2
capabilities: ethernet physical wireless
configeration: broadcast=yes driver=rt2800usb driverversion=3.8.0-23-generic firmware=0.29 link=no multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11bgn
*-network
description: Ethernet interface
pysical id: 0
logical name: eth0

sudo rfkill list all
0: asus-wlan: Wireless LAN
Soft blocked: yes
Hard blocked: no
1: phy0: Wireless LAN
Soft blocked: yes
hard blocked: yes
2: phy1 Wireless LAN
Soft blocked: yes
Hard blocked: no


OK, so I rebooted again this time pressing alt-ctrl-F1 at splashscreen. First thing I noticed is that "configuring virtual network devices"-failed (which I don't have any virtual network devices). Then it does the "waiting for network configuration" & "waiting up to 60 more seconds for network configuration", "booting without full network configuration..." all three pass then continues on to:

Skipping profile in /etc/apparmoor.d/disable usr.bin.firefox ok
skipping profile in /et/apparmor.d/disable: usr/sbin.rsyslogd ok
*Starting AppArmor profiles
speech-dispatcher disabled; edit /etc/default/speech-dispatcher ok
saned disabled; edit etc/default/saned
*Starting Adaptive readdahead daemon preload ok
* Checking battery state... ok

That is where it stops. How does fiddling with the wlan, stop boot after checking battery state, when starting network was ok?

Hi,

try running "DPKG" per this guide, a network cable is required:

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=2247

The quick version, start in recovery mode; select "Network" then "DPKG" and restart when finished with Ctrl + Alt +Del.
Let us know if this helps.

Regards Wolfman

The contents of my interfaces file are the following:

Code:

# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

# The primary network interface
allow-hotplug eth0
#NetworkManager#iface eth0 inet dhcp

Can you please boot up again using the live usb and check that your file is the same?
Even better, copy the /etc/network/interfaces file of the live USB and replace the one on your hard disk.
You have to use the gksudo nautilus trick as I explained before.

Your wireless card module is rt2800pci and your usb wireless module is rt2800pci.
In theory we can just blacklist the rt2800pci to get it out of the way.