How to make INTEX 3.5G (aka 普创E003) Wireless USB Modem work on Ubuntu?

Solution 1:

Step 1

Before plugging in your modem, check the entries in your /dev directory.

ls /dev

You'll find an entry named sr0 if you have an Optical Disk drive(CD, DVD, Blu-Ray, etc.). If you have no optical drive (as in the case of NetBooks and newer machines), then the dongle's storage will appear as sr0, and IntexModem binary'll work for you. If that's the case, you don't need to follow these steps. Else, plug in your modem, wait a few seconds and then repeat the ls /dev command to look again in /dev directory.

Step 2

Inside /dev directory, you'll find a new entry /sr1 along with previous /sr0. This is a Read Only partition present on your modem, which must be ejected everytime you plug in the dongle, for switching the modem from removable storage state to modem state.

eject /sr1

In case you had no optical drive, you'll have to run eject /sr0 instead. Wait a few seconds and then check your Modem's USB ID:

lsusb

If everything worked as expected, it'd have turned to 20a6:1105 from the previous ID 20a6:f00e.

Step 3

Now you have to load the kernel module to make this device recognised as a USB modem:

sudo modprobe usbserial vendor=0x20a6 product=0x1105

Now that you have succesfully loaded the module, the modem will be residing at /dev/ttyUSB0, /dev/ttyUSB1, /dev/ttyUSB2. To check, do:

ls /dev | grep ttyUSB

If nothing turns out, then wait. It can take anywhere from 30 seconds to a whole minute. Once you are sure there are these ttyUSB entries in your /dev, just use your default connection client to connect. For example in Ubuntu, the Network Manager or the connection icon on top panel.

Background/History:

IntexModem binary didn't work for me and showed strange behaviors such as ejecting the Optical Drive. So I contacted the author of the IntexModem binary - Prateek "GunJack" Sharma, who explained to me how the binary works. It's his reply I formulated as this answer.

Newer usb-modeswitch versions contain 20a6:1105 and 20a6:f00e config files by default and so you don't need to do the above steps to get it working. As a result, if you're running a recent Ubuntu release, the modem'll work 'out of box' without any extra configuration.