Lenovo error 1802

• Yes, I have run into this…. and each specific Lenovo, only supports the cards that were originally included with the Laptop (in the slot where the wifi is installed).  This means that you need to get a card that Lenovo approved for your particular model. Frustrating and ridiculous.  I am sure they did this to reduce tech support issues.

  
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• 

  I’ve also run into this when trying to use a Lenovo-sourced WWAN card in my Thinkpad X120e. If its not explicitly allowed by the BIOS it will not work. For this work machine, I was not willing to use a hacked BIOS to get the card to work.

  
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• This sounds like a good reason not to buy Lenovo!

  
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• 

  Yeah well I got this message on my personal machine…an X1 carbon from Lenovo.  Only I never replaced any hardware on the machine at all.  I ran the Lenovo system update and apparatnly it blacklisted the card that came with the machine.  Unreal.  Bricked my laptop.  

  
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• 

  Ugh! Contact them and tell them you need a fix ASAP.

  We have X1’s. I hope we arent next!

  
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You haven’t gotten frustrated enough with your Lenovo if you haven’t come across this weird error. So I have this Lenovo ThinkPad E49 that I bought recently.

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So I realized that I could not connect to any wireless connection. This seemed very easy for me to solve since I was familiar with all the troubleshooting steps of the Wi-Fi adaptor.

So started troubleshooting to discover the possible failures, downloaded new wireless drivers, reset the computer but all didn’t work. So I remembered about the BIOS setup. It definitely has something to do with the failure(thinking in mind as it almost the last resort ).

I jumped into my BIOS settings and landed on the network settings, just to realize that the wireless LAN radios and wireless access port were turned off. Who did this! Well, it all didn’t matter, what mattered is that I had discovered the problem and so I turned on the wireless radios, saved settings, and rebooted.

Now here is the big problem. On booting, all that the screen showed was: 1802: Unauthorized network card is plugged in – power off and remove the card. I realized I had to reverse all the settings I had made, so I rebooted in order to access the BIOS setup and reverse the settings.

As if the error alone was not enough, the BIOS setup could not load with the error displayed, and this is where the problem became bigger. So after some research, I discovered the cause and the solutions to the problem.

Even though Lenovo takes the second largest market share. This error is most common with Lenovo ThinkPad laptops.

During the booting process, the BIOS software performs the power-on self-test (POST) which checks if the hardware components of the system are working as expected. This includes checking the keyboard, RAM, Hard disk, and all the other components.

Unfortunately, The Lenovo BIOS only accepts hardware manufactured by them and so it can not boot with an unauthorized adaptor plugged in. This is accomplished by checking the network card PCI-ID with the white-list in the BIOS. Yes, even after buying your own laptop, Lenovo still governs it with their rules. Not cool.

How to fix the error

A wireless card is a small chip located on the motherboard that gives a computer wireless capabilities.

Removing the wireless card

This the safest and simplest fix for the error. You can then remove and replace the wireless card with the authorized one purchased from Lenovo or you can just remove it and use the computer without it in case you don’t want to spend extra money.

With the wireless card removed, the computer boots and works normally but without the wireless capabilities. This is better than having the error on screen all day.

How to remove the remove the wireless card

Open the back of the computer. Since various computers have different designs, I can’t be specific on the exact location of your wireless card. You can google for your specific model and get the exact location.

Locate the wireless network card and remove it. Replace it with a new one in case you’ve purchased it already. Then finally boot the computer with the error gone.

You can optionally boot normally while the unauthorized network card is plugged in but disabled through the BIOS. Turn off the using the following steps.

Since the BIOS setup can not be accessed with the error in place, you will need to first unplug the wireless card.

Boot the computer and open the BIOS setup and pressing the appropriate key, in most cases F1, F2, or Enter keys.

From the BIOS menu, click on the Config tab to open the configuration settings.

Click on Network and turn off the Wireless LAN radios.

We still need to disable the wireless port access.

Click on the Security tab from the main menu and click on I/O port access.

Disable the Wireless LAN from the list ports.

save the settings and exit.

At this point, you can plug back the wireless card and boot normally but note that this won’t make the card work, the computer will just work normally without wireless capabilities.

Using a modded BIOS to fix the error

Modding a BIOS system involves enhancing the original BIOS in order to support additional previously unsupported hardware components.
This a risky procedure and I do not recommend anyone to use it. This is because a simple mistake can make a system completely unbootable.

However, in case it’s necessary to use this procedure, a skilled person should be employed to perform the operation.

Conclusion

I hope with the above, you were able to get rid of the error.

Of all the laptops I’ve worked on, IBM ThinkPads are by far the easiest to disassemble and fix. They’re also pretty tough machines, as they survive substantially more damage than most of the Dell laptops I’ve seen. If I were a full time Windows user (and I’m not, despite the recent number of PC related posts), I would probably consider purchasing a ThinkPad. If it weren’t for one tiny problem… Most newer ThinkPad models have a Mini-PCI slot and antennae, ready to be equipped with a standard wireless card. Mini-PCI may be unfamiliar to Mac users reading this blog, just as it was to me several months ago. Think of Mini-PCI as an AirPort Extreme connector, but standardized such that any manufacturer can create a compatible communications card. While the slot is standardized, IBM insists on crippling it via software to only accept “IBM brand” wireless cards – which are really just OEM cards made by Philips and others. Upon booting a machine with a non-IBM card installed, the following POST error will be displayed:

1802: Unauthorized network card is plugged in
Power off and remove the miniPCI network card.

What a sneaky way to lock people into buying an expensive wireless card, when others can be bought for much much lower prices. (I suppose I can’t complain, though, as AirPort Extreme is even more proprietary. Although, I’ve never had the need to use a different wireless card in my PowerBook – I just bought the “whole widget” from Apple and that was that.) Luckily for ThinkPad owners, there exists a small fix for this “1802” error: a DOS program which will flip a single bit in the CMOS and allow use of any Mini-PCI wireless card. The program, no-1802.com by Tisheng Chen, can be found here. To make running this program easier for myself and others, I’ve prepared a bootable CD ISO and floppy disk image.

• Download the CD ISO
• Download the Floppy Image

Both files will require unzipping before use (use the free 7-Zip or WinZip). Once unzipped, the CD version can be burned with Disk Utility or Toast on the Mac, or ImgBurn or Nero on the PC. The floppy disk version can be written with Floppy Image for Windows, or dd if=no1802.img of=/dev/fd0 in a Unix environment. The floppy image is a bit-for-bit copy of what I actually had on disk, and the CD version boots and loads the very same floppy into RAM, using a highly customized Ultimate Boot CD. Hopefully this will allow ThinkPad owners to use any wireless cards, and not just those offered by IBM.

5/17/06 Update: I’m glad to see that people are having success with my pre-made wireless card fix. A list of some of the models affected by IBM’s decision can be found here, thanks to Matthew Garrett. He also has few pages with useful technical details on this topic, as well.

8/30/06 Update: For future reference: IBM “high rate” wireless+56K modem combo cards with FRUs 12P3637, 12P3863, 26P8472 and 91P7661 require separate modem drivers (that aren’t part of the “high rate” package). The cards are made by Actiontec, but the the modem portion is made by Agere/Lucent, and the drivers can be found in IBM’s list of downloads for the R32.

9/10/06 Update: This page was linked to at ThinkWiki, where you’ll find even more information on the 1802 error.

Confirmed Working

• A31, A31 2652-Q3U, A31 2652-1U6
• A31p, A31p 2653-CU5, A31p 2653-R3U
• G40 2384-EHU
• R40 2682-HU2, R40 2682-K2G, R40 2681, R40 2896-GZU
• R50 1830-48G
• R50e 1834-BZG
• R51
• T30, T30 2637
• T40, T40 2373, T40 2373-8CU, T40 2373-94G, T40 2374-GG2, T40 2374-DG1
• T41, T41 2374-7JG
• T42, T42 2373-BX9
• T42p
• X24
• X30
• X31, X31 2672-U31
• X40

Confirmed Not Working

• R32
• R60
• T60
• Z60t
• X41 2525-6NH
• Lenovo x100e
• Lenovo x120e