5 replies to this topic

[Pharoh]

I just got a oldish laptop (pIII 450) and i decided to install kubuntu on it. Everything is working great on it but i went to use my flash drive on it to transfer some files as it has no network adapter and the usb port appears to not be working...

So just to be sure that this wasn't a hardware problem i installed Win 2000 on it. The port seemed to work fine. I have had Linux installed on a few other computers and never had this problem. I'm not a complete noob to linux but i would appreciate any pointers in the right direction. I have already googled it to no avail...

Thanks in advance for any help

[regicide666]

You said it "appears to not be working" what have you tried to see that it is not working? Check your logs and dmesg. Check lsusb. Check lspci.

[Pharoh]

Ok thanks, i'll check those. I had only checked the system log. I haven't gotten to reinstall kubuntu after checking the USB port in windows. I'll post my findings sometime tomorrow...

[Pharoh]

Ok, so when i check lspci the USB Controler shows up:
00:05.2 USB Controler: Intel Corporation 82371AB/EB/MB PIIX4 USB (rev 01)

And then when i use lsusb I get this:
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000

The last thing that I have done so far is use lsusb -v
and after a point it says that it can't get hub descriptor: Operation not permitted
it also says cannot read device status for the same reason. Then the command quits.

So do you have any ideas?
Thanks again
Pharoh

[mungewell]

And then when i use lsusb I get this:
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000

This is the root hub of the system, it appears that you don't have any USB devices connected.

after a point it says that it can't get hub descriptor: Operation not permitted

When you run the command as a 'mere' user you don't have permission for all the information. Run the command with 'sudo lssub' (it will ask for your password) and there will be no error.

Try something simple like a mouse or keyboard (these are HID devices and almost certainly supported).

Things like wireless dongles, may show up in 'lsusb' as just numbers which generally means they aren't supported.

Good luck,
Mungewell.

[Pharoh]

Mungewell, thanks for the idea of the mouse... why didn't I think of trying a different device on the port? The USB mouse that I have works fine with Kubuntu and registers in lsusb. This leads me to believe that my flashdrive is simply incompatible, U3 incompatibility maybe? I never liked U3 anyway... So it looks like I have no way of getting any files or connecting to the net until I can buy a wireless card... that is unless theres a way to hook a rj11 jack up to a ethernet rj45 network. Time to do some googleing i suppose.