Acer Aspire One and Vodafone Mobile Broadband

After much googling (an official verb yet?) and hacking around last night I finally got my Acer Aspire One and the Vodafone Broadband USB dongle to play nicely together. In the end it was pretty simple but I went around the houses looking for the solution and had to learn a little bit about Linux along the way. So I thought I’d post a clear, condensed guide here.

This is based on the Huawei E172 but think it should work for the other dongle models. It assumes you are using the Linpus Linux OS that comes with the Acer Aspire One and are online via another means -e.g. Wi-Fi.

Step 1: Download the version 2.0 beta 3 driver from here: https://forge.betavine.net/frs/?group_id=12&release;_id=116 . Save it in your ‘Downloads’ folder.

Step 2: Open up the ‘My Files’ application and browse to the ‘Downloads’ folder.

Step 3: From the menu in ‘My Files’, select ‘File’, then ‘Terminal’.

Step 4: This will open up a text-driven screen. Enter ‘su’ and hit enter, then type in the password you set when you configured the machine. This will give you administrator privileges to install the software.

Step 5: Enter the following to run the software: sh vodafone-mobile-connect-card-driver-for-linux-2.0.beta3-ALL-i386-installer.run

Step 6: The software will now run. In the terminal screen you will be asked to enter the names of any users who will be able to use the software. Simply type in ‘user’.

Step 7: When the installation is complete, insert the USB dongle and reboot the machine.

Step 8: When the machine has restarted, go back to the ‘My Files’ and click ‘File’, ‘Terminal’ again. In the Terminal screen enter the following: sh vodafone-mobile-connect-card-driver-for-linux

Step 9: This will launch the software program after a couple of seconds. Select ‘Tools’, ‘Profiles’, ‘New Profile’. Give the profile a name — I chose ‘Voda’ but you can call it what you like. Enter ‘web’ for both Username and Password and ‘Internet’ for the APN host. Click ‘OK’ at the bottom right (you may need to click the arrow at the bottom left to be able to see the ‘OK’ button).

Step 10: Reboot the machine once more, leaving the dongle plugged in. Nearly there.

Step 11: When the machine comes back up, go again to the ‘My Files’ app and launch the Terminal from the ‘File’ menu. Again, enter: sh vodafone-mobile-connect-card-driver-for-linux

Step 12: The software will run again and you should now be able to click ‘Connect’ at the top left hand corner. Fingers crossed, it should now connect you to the Internet.

Extra tips: Don’t worry if you get a few error messages. Keep trying and as long as you are in range of a signal it will generally connect on the second or third attempt. If you get an error about ‘DNS’, disconnect and reconnect. Once you have started typing a filename in the terminal, hit ‘Tab’ and it will complete automatically. Press the up and down keys to cycle through previously typed commands. I’m sure you can add icons to the desktop but I haven’t tried yet since I will have to give this dongle back to Vodafone eventually. :-(