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I have been having an issue that's been bugging me and causing a few disruptions in my workflow on 16.04 on my ASUS x550la.

When clicking the wifi icon in the toolbar, no networks are displayed for quite a while. Sometimes I may go up to 5 minutes and still no network connection. Also trying to add a hidden network does not help. It still will not connect immediately. I find that this most frequently and severely happens when logging on from standby, although I have still experienced the issue even when I have been using the computer for quite some time. I would also like to note that 16.04 is not the only version that has given me this issue. I had the same problem on a different Lenovo laptop running 14 or so.

sudo lshw -class network

returns the following when connected:

description: Wireless interface
   product: Wireless 7260
   vendor: Intel Corporation
   physical id: 0
   bus info: pci@0000:03:00.0
   logical name: wlp3s0
   version: 73
   serial: xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
   width: 64 bits
   clock: 33MHz
   capabilities: pm msi pciexpress bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless
   configuration: broadcast=yes driver=iwlwifi driverversion=4.4.0-31-generic firmware=16.242414.0 ip=104.39.109.23 latency=0 link=yes multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11abgn
   resources: irq:46 memory:f7c00000-f7c01fff

Also, running

sudo iwlist scan

seemed to allow me to connect almost immediately after I ran the command, so It may be just an issue where my wireless card is not actively scanning for networks. But I have not been able to recreate the issue to try this method again as of yet.

In any case, I would like to know what I can do to give me some better control over how quickly I can connect to a known network. Even if iwlist scan is my best option.

Thank you for your time.

1 Answer 1

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First, I suggest that you upgrade the firmware; from the terminal:

wget http://mirrors.kernel.org/ubuntu/pool/main/l/linux-firmware/linux-firmware_1.161_all.deb
sudo dpkg -i linux*.deb

Then set your regulatory domain explicitly. Check yours:

sudo iw reg get

If you get 00, that is a one-size-maybe-fits-all setting. Find yours here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-1_alpha-2 Then set it temporarily:

sudo iw reg set IS

Of course, substitute your country code if not Iceland. Set it permanently:

gksudo gedit /etc/default/crda

Use nano or kate or leafpad if you don't have the text editor gedit.

Change the last line to read:

REGDOMAIN=IS

Proofread carefully, save and close the text editor.

Reboot and let us know if connectivity is improved.

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  • Ran commands and rebooted. Wifi connection was immediate upon boot. Hopefully, the effects will last. If not, I will return. Thank you!
    – B-Dawg
    Oct 6, 2016 at 15:56
  • This also worked for me, you just saved me hours of waiting for my WiFi to connect, now it connects instantly! But doesn't linux firmware upgrade with normal software (system) updates? I regularly apply all the updates, why is it necessary to upgrade firmware manually like this?
    – kovinet
    Jan 25, 2018 at 8:37
  • 1
    @kovinet It isn't necessary unless you installed an older Ubuntu version (including an older linux-firmware package) on a computer with newer hardware for which the firmware will often only be found in the very latest linux-firmware package.
    – chili555
    Jan 25, 2018 at 14:10
  • So in my case I have motherboard from 2012 and Ubuntu 16.04 which is from 2016 updating firmware was probably not a necessary part? I suppose iw reg set did the trick then...
    – kovinet
    Jan 25, 2018 at 22:15
  • @kovinet It's hard to say. Frankly, I generally just roll all of the probable fixes into one post and, most often, it works.
    – chili555
    Jan 25, 2018 at 22:34

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