T-Mobile Broadband on Ubuntu 9.04

I've been running Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty Jackalope) as my main operating system for a few weeks now. Linux distributions are often criticised for their lack of compatibility with common hardware devices, so I'll be trying out various bits of kit that come across my desk to test Ubuntu's support for them.

First in line is a T-Mobile mobile broadband dongle - a Huawei E170 to be precise. I've previously blogged about mobile broadband under Linux, using a Huawei E160 provided by Virgin Mobile with Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron). This time, getting online was even easier.

As soon as we plugged in our dongle, a wizard popped up to guide us through the setup process. We clicked Forward to continue. As illustrated in the screenshot below, we were presented with what appears to be a complete list of UK mobile broadband providers and services. All we had to do was select ours, T-Mobile, and confirm our selection on the next screen.



A notification briefly popped up to tell us that our new network configuration had been successful. If your mobile broadband connection isn't enabled by default, just click on the networking icon on the taskbar at the upper right of the desktop - it looks like two black screens, one in front of the other. (No, we're not sure what that's supposed to illustrate either.) Select the radio button marked T-Mobile (see below for screenshot). You should now be online.



Incidentally, if you have another net connection (such as a wired Ethernet link) set as your default, your system will still favour that one unless it's disconnected, even if you've enabled your mobile broadband connection.

We didn't need to manually enter any information about our provider, but for anyone setting up their connection by hand, here's the relevant information for T-Mobile broadband in the UK.

Number: *99#
Username: User
Password: mms
APN: general.t-mobile.uk

As you might have gathered, we're very fond of the Gnome NetworkManager that comes ready installed on Jaunty. You should be able to install it on most Linux distributions without too much hassle. Source code is available at its project site here and it's available as a package for many distros. KDE users should also check out the KNetworkManager front end.