POSSIBLY USEFUL TO OTHERS: USB HSDPA Modem With Ubuntu Linux

I got one of these 3.5G HSDPA USB modems from our local telco the other day. Theoretically should give me 7.2Mbps download speeds - all wireless!

www.dst-group.com/dstcom/index.htm

It's really neat and worked great with my Windows XP and 2003 Server machines. Caused a few problems on my work laptop (special flavour of Windows 2000 Prof') - got a blue screen of death every now and then. When it came to getting it going on my Ubuntu Hardy laptop it was a bit of a challenge. I noticed that quite a few people on Ubuntu Forums were having similar issues with these type of modems so I thought I'd share my experiences here.

Basically this device is known as a "flip flop" USB device i.e. it is both a GSM Serial Modem and an auto-mounting CD-ROM flash disk. Under Windows this is great because the first time you plug it into your machine it mounts as an auto-run CD-ROM and asks you to install the drivers. After you've followed the really simple instructions the auto-mount CD-ROM and flash disk functionality is disabled for the device and it now acts as a USB modem... off you go and start surfing!

Under Linux however the device is recognised as a flash disk and then doesn't go any further to init the modem. Fortunately Ubuntu Hardy already came with the drivers for this type of modem - and the manufacturers have a debian-based driver anyway... I just needed to get Linux to ignore it as a USB flash disk and instead see it as a GSM modem.

I've included my detailed notes on how to do this as an attachment. NOTE: that I need to do more stuff to get this working as I want but this is a great. Heres a quick overview:

1. Disable flash disk mounting by turning off HAL (hardware abstraction layer). (sudo /etc/init.d/hal stop)
2. Plug in modem and recognise now as a serial modem.
3. Set up pppconfig. (sudo pppconfig).
4. Connect to service. (pon [Connection Name]).
5. Start surfing.

Of course the disadvantage here is that you disable HAL and therefore once you are surfing you cannot mount other devices, check your battery status, use the CD-ROM etc. There is a way to get around this but haven't got it working yet... I'll post back when I've got it going.

Here are my detailed notes.

PTAX 0.2
- Over