Tim's Blog

I bought a MC950D 3G modem. It doesnt work out the box with ubuntu hardy - you need to create a wvdial configuration for it. After a lot of googling and assimilating various scripts, here is how I got it to work under Vodafone South Africa.

Edit you wvdial.conf to look like this:

[Dialer Defaults]

Phone = *99***1#
Modem = /dev/ttyUSB0
Username = ''
Password = ''
Dial Command = ATDT
Stupid Mode = yes

[Dialer reset]
Init1 = AT
[Dialer vodafone]
Phone = *99***1#
Baud = 460800
Modem Type = USB Modem
ISDN = 0
Init2 = ATZ
Init3 = ATQ0 V1 E1 S0=0&C1 &D2 +FCLASS=0
#tells us if the modem is expectin a sim pin or not
Init4 = AT+CPIN?
Init5 = AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","internet";

Now I can connect using wvdial:

[~] sudo wvdial vodafone
--> WvDial: Internet dialer version 1.60
--> Cannot get information for serial port.
--> Initializing modem. -->
Sending: ATZ ATZ OK
--> Sending: ATZ ATZ OK
--> Sending: ATQ0 V1 E1 S0=0&C1 &D2 +FCLASS=0 ATQ0 V1 E1 S0=0&C1 &D2 +FCLASS=0 OK
--> Sending: AT+CPIN? AT+CPIN? +CPIN: READY OK
--> Sending: AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","internet"; AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","internet"; OK
--> Modem initialized.
--> Sending: ATDT*99***1# -->
Waiting for carrier. ATDT*99***1# CONNECT HSDPA 7.2
--> Carrier detected. Starting PPP immediately.
--> Starting pppd at Fri Jul 11 07:12:51 2008
--> Pid of pppd: 6033
--> Using interface ppp0
--> local IP address 41.2.XXX.XX
--> remote IP address 10.64.64.64
--> primary DNS address 196.207.40.167
--> secondary DNS address 196.207.40.165

Hopefully this will save others the 8 hours of tweaking that it took me. I start the computer, press alt-F2, run wvdial in a tty and then press Alt-F7 to log in and work normally.