Issues Regarding Unbranded USB Bluetooth Adapter

[LeFae024]

Hello, all. I’m having some trouble with a Bluetooth adapter I bought off of Amazon recently. Works fine on Win 11 and 10, but any distro running anything before kernel 4.19 refuses to even recognize it as a proper controller.
The command sudo bluetoothctl doesn’t help much; every time I run it, I get:

Agent registered
[bluetooth]# show
No default controller available
[bluetooth]# 

rfkill list shows

0: phy0: Wireless LAN
	Soft blocked: no
	Hard blocked: no
1: hci0: Bluetooth
	Soft blocked: no
	Hard blocked: no

This is what I get when running sudo lspci -v (at least, my Bluetooth adapter’s output):

03:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation Centrino Advanced-N 6205 [Taylor Peak] (rev 34)
	Subsystem: Intel Corporation Centrino Advanced-N 6205 (802.11a/b/g/n)
	Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 31
	Memory at f1c00000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=8K]
	Capabilities: [c8] Power Management version 3
	Capabilities: [d0] MSI: Enable+ Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+
	Capabilities: [e0] Express Endpoint, MSI 00
	Capabilities: [100] Advanced Error Reporting
	Capabilities: [140] Device Serial Number 6c-88-14-ff-ff-e1-df-34
	Kernel driver in use: iwlwifi
	Kernel modules: iwlwifi

Please let me know if I can provide more information, I’d love to get to the bottom of this and hopefully find a fix!

[andreas85]

What about a recent LTS kernel like 5.10 or even 5.15 ?

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[LeFae024]

Here is my inxi output, apologies for not reading the System Information guide earlier.

System:
  Kernel: 5.16.5-1-MANJARO x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 11.1.0
    parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-5.16-x86_64
    root=UUID=52b26ac7-53a5-4f0a-a7f2-3ed39f12f027 rw quiet apparmor=1
    security=apparmor udev.log_priority=3
  Desktop: Cinnamon 5.2.7 tk: GTK 3.24.31 vt: 7 dm: LightDM 1.30.0
    Distro: Manjaro Linux base: Arch Linux
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: LENOVO product: 234248U v: ThinkPad T430
    serial: <filter> Chassis: type: 10 serial: <filter>
  Mobo: LENOVO model: 234248U v: Win8 Pro DPK TPG serial: <filter>
    UEFI: LENOVO v: G1ETC2WW (2.82 ) date: 08/07/2019
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT0 charge: 57.5 Wh (100.0%) condition: 57.5/93.2 Wh (61.7%)
    volts: 12.8 min: 11.1 model: SANYO 45N1007 type: Li-ion serial: <filter>
    status: Not charging
Memory:
  RAM: total: 15.45 GiB used: 2.69 GiB (17.4%)
  Array-1: capacity: 16 GiB slots: 2 EC: None max-module-size: 8 GiB
    note: est.
  Device-1: ChannelA-DIMM0 size: 8 GiB speed: 1600 MT/s type: DDR3
    detail: synchronous bus-width: 64 bits total: 64 bits manufacturer: Samsung
    part-no: M471B1G73BH0-CK0 serial: <filter>
  Device-2: ChannelB-DIMM0 size: 8 GiB speed: 1600 MT/s type: DDR3
    detail: synchronous bus-width: 64 bits total: 64 bits manufacturer: Samsung
    part-no: M471B1G73BH0-CK0 serial: <filter>
CPU:
  Info: model: Intel Core i5-3320M socket: rPGA988B (U3E1) note: check
    bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Ivy Bridge family: 6 model-id: 0x3A (58)
    stepping: 9 microcode: 0x21
  Topology: cpus: 1x cores: 2 tpc: 2 threads: 4 smt: enabled cache:
    L1: 128 KiB desc: d-2x32 KiB; i-2x32 KiB L2: 512 KiB desc: 2x256 KiB
    L3: 3 MiB desc: 1x3 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 1341 high: 1714 min/max: 1200/3300 base/boost: 2600/2600
    scaling: driver: intel_cpufreq governor: schedutil volts: 0.9 V
    ext-clock: 100 MHz cores: 1: 1197 2: 1714 3: 1223 4: 1230 bogomips: 20760
  Flags: acpi aes aperfmperf apic arat arch_perfmon avx bts clflush cmov
    constant_tsc cpuid cpuid_fault cx16 cx8 de ds_cpl dtes64 dtherm dts epb ept
    erms est f16c flexpriority flush_l1d fpu fsgsbase fxsr ht ibpb ibrs ida
    lahf_lm lm mca mce md_clear mmx monitor msr mtrr nonstop_tsc nopl nx pae
    pat pbe pcid pclmulqdq pdcm pebs pge pln pni popcnt pse pse36 pti pts
    rdrand rdtscp rep_good sep smep smx ss ssbd sse sse2 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3
    stibp syscall tm tm2 tpr_shadow tsc tsc_deadline_timer vme vmx vnmi vpid
    x2apic xsave xsaveopt xtopology xtpr
  Vulnerabilities:
  Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: VMX disabled
  Type: l1tf
    mitigation: PTE Inversion; VMX: conditional cache flushes, SMT vulnerable
  Type: mds mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT vulnerable
  Type: meltdown mitigation: PTI
  Type: spec_store_bypass
    mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl
  Type: spectre_v1
    mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization
  Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Full generic retpoline, IBPB: conditional,
    IBRS_FW, STIBP: conditional, RSB filling
  Type: srbds status: Vulnerable: No microcode
  Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel 3rd Gen Core processor Graphics vendor: Lenovo driver: i915
    v: kernel bus-ID: 00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:0166 class-ID: 0300
  Device-2: Acer Integrated Camera type: USB driver: uvcvideo
    bus-ID: 1-1.6:4 chip-ID: 5986:02d5 class-ID: 0e02
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.21.1.3 driver: loaded: modesetting
    alternate: fbdev,vesa display-ID: :0 screens: 1
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1366x768 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 361x203mm (14.2x8.0")
    s-diag: 414mm (16.3")
  Monitor-1: LVDS-1 res: 1366x768 hz: 60 dpi: 112
    size: 309x173mm (12.2x6.8") diag: 354mm (13.9")
  Message: Unable to show advanced data. Required tool glxinfo missing.
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel 7 Series/C216 Family High Definition Audio vendor: Lenovo
    driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:1b.0 chip-ID: 8086:1e20
    class-ID: 0403
  Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.16.5-1-MANJARO running: yes
  Sound Server-2: JACK v: 1.9.20 running: no
  Sound Server-3: PulseAudio v: 15.0 running: yes
  Sound Server-4: PipeWire v: 0.3.45 running: yes
Network:
  Device-1: Intel 82579LM Gigabit Network vendor: Lenovo driver: e1000e
    v: kernel port: 6080 bus-ID: 00:19.0 chip-ID: 8086:1502 class-ID: 0200
  IF: enp0s25 state: down mac: <filter>
  Device-2: Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6205 [Taylor Peak] driver: iwlwifi
    v: kernel bus-ID: 03:00.0 chip-ID: 8086:0085 class-ID: 0280
  IF: wlp3s0 state: up mac: <filter>
  IP v4: <filter> type: dynamic noprefixroute scope: global
    broadcast: <filter>
  IP v6: <filter> type: dynamic noprefixroute scope: global
  IP v6: <filter> type: dynamic noprefixroute scope: global
  IP v6: <filter> type: noprefixroute scope: link
  WAN IP: <filter>
Bluetooth:
  Device-1: Cambridge Silicon Radio Bluetooth Dongle (HCI mode) type: USB
    driver: btusb v: 0.8 bus-ID: 3-1:3 chip-ID: 0a12:0001 class-ID: e001
  Report: bt-adapter ID: hci0 rfk-id: 1 state: up address: N/A
Logical:
  Message: No logical block device data found.
RAID:
  Message: No RAID data found.
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 698.65 GiB used: 129.75 GiB (18.6%)
  SMART Message: Required tool smartctl not installed. Check --recommends
  ID-1: /dev/sda maj-min: 8:0 vendor: Samsung model: SSD 860 EVO 250GB
    size: 232.89 GiB block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s
    type: SSD serial: <filter> rev: 3B6Q scheme: GPT
  ID-2: /dev/sdb maj-min: 8:16 vendor: HGST (Hitachi) model: HTS725050A7E630
    size: 465.76 GiB block-size: physical: 4096 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s
    type: HDD rpm: 7200 serial: <filter> rev: B550 scheme: GPT
  Message: No optical or floppy data found.
Partition:
  ID-1: / raw-size: 30 GiB size: 29.37 GiB (97.87%) used: 14.11 GiB (48.1%)
    fs: ext4 block-size: 4096 B dev: /dev/sda2 maj-min: 8:2 label: N/A
    uuid: 52b26ac7-53a5-4f0a-a7f2-3ed39f12f027
  ID-2: /boot/efi raw-size: 512 MiB size: 511 MiB (99.80%)
    used: 96.1 MiB (18.8%) fs: vfat block-size: 512 B dev: /dev/sda1
    maj-min: 8:1 label: NO_LABEL uuid: 00D4-085B
  ID-3: /home raw-size: 202.28 GiB size: 198.05 GiB (97.91%)
    used: 115.54 GiB (58.3%) fs: ext4 block-size: 4096 B dev: /dev/sda3
    maj-min: 8:3 label: N/A uuid: 99833a3d-4052-4bf0-a179-16b4ac43fb4e
Swap:
  Alert: No swap data was found.
Unmounted:
  ID-1: /dev/sda4 maj-min: 8:4 size: 100 MiB fs: N/A label: N/A uuid: N/A
  ID-2: /dev/sdb1 maj-min: 8:17 size: 16 MiB fs: N/A label: N/A uuid: N/A
  ID-3: /dev/sdb2 maj-min: 8:18 size: 465.75 GiB fs: ntfs label: N/A
    uuid: D6FE8DE9FE8DC1EB
USB:
  Hub-1: 1-0:1 info: Full speed or root hub ports: 3 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s
    chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900
  Hub-2: 1-1:2 info: Intel Integrated Rate Matching Hub ports: 6 rev: 2.0
    speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 8087:0024 class-ID: 0900
  Device-1: 1-1.6:4 info: Acer Integrated Camera type: Video
    driver: uvcvideo interfaces: 2 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s power: 200mA
    chip-ID: 5986:02d5 class-ID: 0e02
  Hub-3: 2-0:1 info: Full speed or root hub ports: 3 rev: 2.0
    speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900
  Hub-4: 2-1:2 info: Intel Integrated Rate Matching Hub ports: 8 rev: 2.0
    speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 8087:0024 class-ID: 0900
  Hub-5: 3-0:1 info: Hi-speed hub with single TT ports: 4 rev: 2.0
    speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900
  Device-1: 3-1:3 info: Cambridge Silicon Radio Bluetooth Dongle (HCI mode)
    type: Bluetooth driver: btusb interfaces: 2 rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s
    power: 100mA chip-ID: 0a12:0001 class-ID: e001
  Device-2: 3-2:2 info: 2.4G Wireless Mouse type: Mouse
    driver: hid-generic,usbhid interfaces: 1 rev: 1.1 speed: 12 Mb/s
    power: 100mA chip-ID: 3938:1191 class-ID: 0301
  Hub-6: 4-0:1 info: Super-speed hub ports: 4 rev: 3.0 speed: 5 Gb/s
    chip-ID: 1d6b:0003 class-ID: 0900
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 52.0 C mobo: N/A
  Fan Speeds (RPM): fan-1: 3754
Info:
  Processes: 229 Uptime: 2h 21m wakeups: 1 Init: systemd v: 250
  tool: systemctl Compilers: gcc: 11.1.0 clang: 13.0.0 Packages: pacman: 1468
  lib: 467 flatpak: 0 Shell: Bash (su) v: 5.1.16 running-in: gnome-terminal
  inxi: 3.3.12

Also, here’s the output of sudo dmesg | grep usb; I see that may be important.

[    0.206662] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbfs
[    0.206662] usbcore: registered new interface driver hub
[    0.206662] usbcore: registered new device driver usb
[    0.328526] usb usb1: New USB device found, idVendor=1d6b, idProduct=0002, bcdDevice= 5.16
[    0.328531] usb usb1: New USB device strings: Mfr=3, Product=2, SerialNumber=1
[    0.328534] usb usb1: Product: EHCI Host Controller
[    0.328537] usb usb1: Manufacturer: Linux 5.16.5-1-MANJARO ehci_hcd
[    0.328539] usb usb1: SerialNumber: 0000:00:1a.0
[    0.348523] usb usb2: New USB device found, idVendor=1d6b, idProduct=0002, bcdDevice= 5.16
[    0.348528] usb usb2: New USB device strings: Mfr=3, Product=2, SerialNumber=1
[    0.348531] usb usb2: Product: EHCI Host Controller
[    0.348533] usb usb2: Manufacturer: Linux 5.16.5-1-MANJARO ehci_hcd
[    0.348536] usb usb2: SerialNumber: 0000:00:1d.0
[    0.349067] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbserial_generic
[    0.349073] usbserial: USB Serial support registered for generic
[    0.578518] usb 1-1: new high-speed USB device number 2 using ehci-pci
[    0.598514] usb 2-1: new high-speed USB device number 2 using ehci-pci
[    0.725625] usb 1-1: New USB device found, idVendor=8087, idProduct=0024, bcdDevice= 0.00
[    0.725638] usb 1-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=0, Product=0, SerialNumber=0
[    0.752589] usb 2-1: New USB device found, idVendor=8087, idProduct=0024, bcdDevice= 0.00
[    0.752595] usb 2-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=0, Product=0, SerialNumber=0
[    1.005186] usb 1-1.2: new full-speed USB device number 3 using ehci-pci
[    1.105319] usb 1-1.2: New USB device found, idVendor=0a12, idProduct=0001, bcdDevice=25.20
[    1.105324] usb 1-1.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=0, Product=2, SerialNumber=0
[    1.105326] usb 1-1.2: Product: CSR8510 A10
[    1.181862] usb 1-1.6: new high-speed USB device number 4 using ehci-pci
[    1.286934] usb 1-1.6: New USB device found, idVendor=5986, idProduct=02d5, bcdDevice=10.11
[    1.286948] usb 1-1.6: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=0
[    1.286952] usb 1-1.6: Product: Integrated Camera
[    1.286955] usb 1-1.6: Manufacturer: Ricoh Company Ltd.
[    1.689406] usb usb3: New USB device found, idVendor=1d6b, idProduct=0002, bcdDevice= 5.16
[    1.689410] usb usb3: New USB device strings: Mfr=3, Product=2, SerialNumber=1
[    1.689412] usb usb3: Product: xHCI Host Controller
[    1.689414] usb usb3: Manufacturer: Linux 5.16.5-1-MANJARO xhci-hcd
[    1.689416] usb usb3: SerialNumber: 0000:00:14.0
[    1.696417] usb usb4: New USB device found, idVendor=1d6b, idProduct=0003, bcdDevice= 5.16
[    1.696421] usb usb4: New USB device strings: Mfr=3, Product=2, SerialNumber=1
[    1.696423] usb usb4: Product: xHCI Host Controller
[    1.696425] usb usb4: Manufacturer: Linux 5.16.5-1-MANJARO xhci-hcd
[    1.696427] usb usb4: SerialNumber: 0000:00:14.0
[    1.945198] usb 3-2: new full-speed USB device number 2 using xhci_hcd
[    2.088075] usb 3-2: New USB device found, idVendor=3938, idProduct=1191, bcdDevice= 3.11
[    2.088088] usb 3-2: New USB device strings: Mfr=0, Product=1, SerialNumber=0
[    2.088093] usb 3-2: Product: 2.4G Wireless Mouse
[    2.104515] input: 2.4G Wireless Mouse as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:14.0/usb3/3-2/3-2:1.0/0003:3938:1191.0001/input/input5
[    2.104756] input: 2.4G Wireless Mouse as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:14.0/usb3/3-2/3-2:1.0/0003:3938:1191.0001/input/input6
[    2.104909] hid-generic 0003:3938:1191.0001: input,hiddev96,hidraw0: USB HID v1.10 Mouse [2.4G Wireless Mouse] on usb-0000:00:14.0-2/input0
[    2.104948] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbhid
[    2.104949] usbhid: USB HID core driver
[    2.107890] usb 1-1.2: USB disconnect, device number 3
[    6.089301] usb 1-1.6: Found UVC 1.00 device Integrated Camera (5986:02d5)
[    6.095638] input: Integrated Camera: Integrated C as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1a.0/usb1/1-1/1-1.6/1-1.6:1.0/input/input18
[    6.095734] usbcore: registered new interface driver uvcvideo
[  891.380953] usb 3-1: new full-speed USB device number 3 using xhci_hcd
[  891.523829] usb 3-1: New USB device found, idVendor=0a12, idProduct=0001, bcdDevice=25.20
[  891.523844] usb 3-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=0, Product=2, SerialNumber=0
[  891.523849] usb 3-1: Product: CSR8510 A10
[  892.196874] usbcore: registered new interface driver btusb

[Mirdarthos]

@LeFae024

before kernel 4.19 refuses

Like @andreas85 asked, what happens kernel version 5.10 or 5.15? And please give us as much information as possible. Also, start:

sudo dmesg --follow

before plugging in the bluetooth adapter, plug it in, and once it’s stopped scrolling, stop it with Ctrl+C. Provide that output here, along with the rest of the information.

[LeFae024]

5.15 and 5.16 have the same issue, bluetoothctl refuses to acknowledge that there’s even an available adapter, and Blueman refuses to open. The system shows there’s a dongle plugged in, but doesn’t really let me do anything with it.

5.10 lets me open Blueman and mess around, but it’s a fight to even get my computer to scan for available Bluetooth devices, whether it’s in bluetoothctl or the GUI app. Out of sheer chance, I got it to display pairable devices once, but actually pairing anything seems impossible.

After a reboot, I’ll post the dmesg --follow log.

[cscs]

Hey there … I would say this option is at least worth checking:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Network_configuration/Wireless#Bluetooth_coexistence

[Mirdarthos]

Awesome.

Because after a bit of a look, it would seem the adapter’s driver is in the kernel.

[LeFae024]

I put the dmesg --follow output into Pastebin because I don’t know if anything before plugging the dongle in would be relevant or not.

Because after a bit of a look, it would seem the adapter’s driver is in the kernel.

I recognized that; I’m still kinda n00bish when it comes to parsing out terminal outputs, but it looks like a similar (if not the same) driver is installed on my Windows partition.

[LeFae024]

@Mirdarthos

And please give us as much information as possible

Apologies if I sound inept, but general statements like this confuse me. (I have ASD.) What information would be useful in solving this issue? I’m happy to provide, but I don’t want to give irrelevant info.

[Mirdarthos]

@LeFae024

Apologies if I sound inept, but general statements like this confuse me

No apologies needed and you’re not inept. If you haven’t done it before, you’ve got no way of knowing.

When we say more information, or as much information as possible, we mean generally exactly that. Diagnosing a problem with a computer is a lot like diagnosing the reason someone’s got a headache. There are many things that should be considered that can maybe be the cause of the problem.

That said, I don’t know what’s wrong. I don’t see anything. I’m obviously not qualified enough. At least not yet. The only thing I can recommend is trying to toggle it.

rfkill toggle 1

Note: I don’t know what this does or doesn’t do, or what the effect(s) would be, so I’m not responsible for that. It is all I can think of, however.

Edit:

From the man pages:

toggle id|type [...]
Enable or disable the corresponding device.

Exactly as I thought, so might be a good idea.

[LeFae024]

rfkill toggle [n] executes successfully, (as far as I know; there is no output) and the Bluetooth icon appears in my panel, but turning on the adapter via the GUI only results in the icon disappearing again.

Using sudo bluetoothctl doesn’t get me much further, either.
Output:

Agent registered
[bluetooth]# show
No default controller available
[bluetooth]# power on
No default controller available
[bluetooth]# 

[Mirdarthos]

That seems promising.

Unfortunately, nothing I can help solve, then. Apologies.

[LeFae024]

Your attempt is much appreciated.

[LeFae024]

Apparently, this is a known issue, and there is a patch I would be able to put into the kernel if I had that level of skill. On an unrelated Linux adventure, I’ve unsuccessfully attempted to follow a YouTube tutorial on compiling a kernel from the official site, and that’s without even adding a patch. Is there a tutorial or walkthrough anyone here recommends so that I can see if running a custom kernel would fix my problem?