Wireless on Lenovo X200, LM 19.1

[barddzen]

Hello,

I installed LM19.1 64-bit on an older laptop Lenovo X200 and all seems to be working fine except the wireless. Output from rfkill list is:

0: tpacpi_bluetooth_sw: Bluetooth
Soft blocked: no
Hard blocked: yes
1: phy0: Wireless LAN
Soft blocked: no
Hard blocked: yes

I've checked the BIOS and nothing is blocked there and the Fn+F5 to enable wireless doesn't get the light to turn on, nor does the Bluetooth (supposed to work for both). Other function key capabilities seem to work (brightness, monitor connections, etc).

I tried the sudo rfkill unblock all and the command didn't report any errors, but the wireless status didn't change either. When I check the networking panel, under Wifi it says "unavailable" but lets me toggle on/off ok, but no nearby wireless networks are listed.

lspci command gives me the following for Network Controller: Intel Corporation Ultimate N WiFi Link 5300

Ethernet works perfect, no issues there.

Any suggestions on where I go next with this? Appreciate any help.

[Moem]

There is most likely a wireless switch on the outside of the machine, and if there is, it's probably set to off. Look at the left side of the case, towards the front (the end closest to you). That's where it is on my X201.

[barddzen]

UGH! I feel so stupid! It was there the whole time!

Thank you, works perfectly.

[barddzen]

As a follow-up to this post, I've upgraded the 160GB HDD to a 250GB SSD, maxed out the RAM to 4GB and the X200 is a fully functional laptop again! The speed is perfectly acceptable and I can see the life of this device extended greatly.

I've dabbled with Linux over the years having been a 20+ year Mac person and lately my sites have been set to work with Linux more. This and a few other projects to experiment with the platform has been interesting, but very productive.

Thanks for the continued help!