6

The bluetooth is disabled on my Ubuntu (Dell vostro Desktop with bluetooth USB adapter).

I plugged the bluetooth USB adapter into another Ubuntu desktop (12.04) and it is recognized instantaneously.

I've installed blueman, bluez, bluetooth support package.

The bluetooth system settings shows the message "bluetooth is disabled" even after I turn it on. Bluetooth status is not shown in the menu bar even though I checked this option.

rfkill list says bluetooth isn't blocked.

lsusb says the dongle is connected.

Bluetooth manager doesn't work... all buttons are grey.

Removing gnome-bluetooth (as some users suggest) not only doesn't fix the problem but also removes ubuntu-desktop, causing my system settings to be missing among other consequences.

Bluetooth option is not shown in the BIOS. Do I need to install a driver maybe? Does it exist?

All I want is to be able to connect my Apple mouse and keyboard to the PC.

9
  • I have not, but I just did. How can I use it to try to solve the issue?
    – aguiar
    May 13, 2014 at 20:00
  • Sometimes the usb device may not identified as a bluetooth device mode. in such occations usb-modeswithch helps. but it works after restarts the computer.
    – user224082
    May 13, 2014 at 20:04
  • I restarted the computer. It doesn't help.
    – aguiar
    May 13, 2014 at 20:08
  • So, try with installing all the applications need for bluetooth devices by sudo apt-get --reinstall install bluez bluez-alsa bluez-audio bluez-btsco bluez-compat bluez-cups bluez-dbg bluez-gstreamer bluez-hcidump bluez-pcmcia-support bluez-tools bluez-utils python-bluez bluewho indicator-bluetooth libbluetooth-dev libgnome-bluetooth11 libbluetooth3 python-gobject python-dbus
    – user224082
    May 13, 2014 at 20:13
  • I installed everything and restarted the computer. Still doesn't work. Sorry.
    – aguiar
    May 13, 2014 at 20:22

5 Answers 5

7

Try this:

sudo hciconfig hci0 reset
1
  • 5
    Can't init device hci0: No such device (19) even though it most certainly does exist. hci0: Type: BR/EDR Bus: USB
    – Redsandro
    Feb 11, 2015 at 15:31
6

This solved the problem for me.

Terminal output for

rfkill list
0: hci0: Bluetooth
Soft blocked: no
Hard blocked: no
1: asus-wlan: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: no
2: asus-bluetooth: Bluetooth
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: no
3: phy0: Wireless LAN
    Soft blocked: no
    Hard blocked: no

After reading several other posts, I found this solution. Install gksu if not already installed.

sudo apt-get install gksu -y

Then edit /etc/rc.local and enter this line just before the "exit=0" entry.

gksudo gedit /etc/rc.local

In gedit before the last entry, which is "exit=0", enter:

rfkill unblock bluetooth

Then reboot and you should be able to turn on bluetooth, if not already enabled after reboot.

1
  • Installing gksu made my wifi go away, so if this happens, just uninstall and reboot. Jul 19, 2018 at 11:18
2

I just found a workaround for my Lenovo T400 running 14.04.2 LTS.

Scenario:

  • Bluetooth was working
  • I turned it off in settings panel.
  • Now, when I try to turn it on, It turns itself off again.
  • check 'rfkill list' and see that bluetooth is soft blocked.
  • type 'sudo rfkill unblock bluetooth'
  • check 'rfkill list' and see that bluetooth is still soft blocked.

Solution:

  • Use the hardware switch on the front of the laptop to turn off the radios and then turn them back on.
  • notice in control panel that bluetooth is now on.

You may have Fn-F8 or some such keyboard combination which may work for you.

This may not be the best solution but it gets me out of a bind for now.

1

I resolved this problem by running:

sudo chmod +x /usr/sbin/bluetoothd
sudo service bluetooth restart
0

I had the same problem this morning in my Ubuntu 17.04 whereby the bluetooth was disabled and even by turning on the bluetooth again, it doesn't seem to be doing anything. So i decided to go my grub menu during start up and chose advanced Ubuntu settings and then chose the recovery mode. In the recovery mode menu I repaired the damaged packages and enabled networking then i resumed the normal booting. All went well and my bluetooth was enabled just like that.

Hope it will help:)

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