3g Mobile Connect Card Automatically Detected on Ubuntu

My 3g mobile connect card I got from Mobily was detected automatically on Ubuntu, which is version 8.10. The connect card is Huawei e170. The first couple of times I tried connecting it didn’t work. When I checked the settings I found that everything was empty except the “Number” which was *99# and the “APN” was “web2”.

I thought I remembered that the APN was “web1”, so I changed that and it worked. Then I configured it to automatically connect. So as soon as I connect the USB 3g mobile stick it detects it and connects right away.

Using it on Ubuntu is a breeze compared to using it on my XP partition. First the detection of the USB device is slow, then I have to start the Huawei software, then it queries the USB device to check network status, which can take about 10 seconds. Then if everything is ok, I have to click on “Connect”.

Btw, when I checked the configuration settings for the software I got from Mobily, it turns out that “web1” is for postpaid accounts and “web2” is the setting for prepaid accounts. I have a postpaid account.

This can be considered as negative mark on the Ubuntu HSPA driver. It should have given the choice of both prepaid and postpaid, then know the right APN for each. Where it only asked to use Mobily or STC.