Getting your Huawei modem working with Mac OS X Mountain Lion and Lion

Jul 22

Getting your Huawei modem working with Mac OS X Mountain Lion and Lion

Category: 64bit,apple,guides,macosx,tips

You know the part before the upgrade where they tell you to check all of your applications before you upgrade? Well, last night I decided that it would be a great idea to upgrade my Mac from Snow Leopard to Lion. Turns out that perhaps wasn’t so great an idea after all when my Huawei USB 3G modem dongle decided that it wasn’t going to work since it wasn’t relevant for the new 64-bit only kernel. Oops, I should have checked first. But it isn’t a complete disaster!

Update: This appears to also work with Mountain Lion as well according to some comments at the bottom. It may not work for everyone but it does appear to work for some.

After frantically using Google to find a new driver to install and digging around the Huawei site trying to find a replacement driver I was getting to the point of doing some modifications to the com.apple.boot.plist file and restart my Mac with the i386 kernel instead of the x86-64 one that appears to now be the default.

In my many searches for a Mac OS X Lion compatible driver, I managed to find the following from mobile provider “3” in UK. The link, http://ask3.three.co.uk/mbbdocs/drivers/apple_drivers.html, contains a link to “dongle drivers” for “Huawei dongles” that work for Mac OS X Lion (10.7). Sounds like a winner!

So I download the zip file and it extracts out to leave me with a “3Connect Installer”. Not quite what I want however all is not lost. You see applications on Mac OS X are actually folders in disguise commonly referred to as either “bundles” or “packages”. So right click on the “3Connect Installer” and select “Show Package Contents”. This opens up a view with only “Contents” listed, foiled? Don’t worry, double click into that directory and then into the “Resources” directory. Here we find a “mobilemanager.mpkg” file. Now “mpkg” is a package which means it has more goodies in it.

So we right click on this and select “Show Package Contents” again. We’ve got our “Contents” folder and inside that we want to go to the “Packages” folder. In there two packages exist: “mobile_manager_application.pkg” and “huawei_universal_425_05.pkg”. Now if you’re like me, everything is setup already – you just need the driver. So I skipped the mobile manager application and just double clicked on the “huawei_universal_425_05.pkg” file and installed it.

After installing the Huawei Universal package, the next time I plugged in my Huawei E160 into my Mac it was detected and worked perfectly fine.

So if you’ve just upgraded to Lion (now Mountain Lion too) and are trying to work out how to get your Huawei modem working properly with it, these instructions worked for me and I’m using it to write this post.

Update: It looks like *99# works rather universally as a telephone number for getting the modem to work. On Mountain Lion this is what the Network Preferences screen looks like:

Update 2: From Simon Hilton in the comments: If you are on Orange UK, you can download the dongle software for E160, E1752, E173, E367 & MF636 that will work with Mountain Lion from here: http://help.orange.co.uk/orangeuk/support/personal/475051

579 comments

579 Comments so far

MIke July 23rd, 2011 5:37 am

thanks for your post. It sounds helpful for me.
Olivier July 23rd, 2011 8:12 am

You are making my day!!! Fantastic. I don’t know how you found it but I also spent hours looking and finally saw your post. Thanks a million!
JC July 23rd, 2011 8:45 am

Thanks for this – saved me a lot of time. After initial frustration, had the dongle up and running very quickly after installing the download
SD July 24th, 2011 5:03 am

Thank you! RJust what the tech doctor wanted.
Glenn July 24th, 2011 6:49 pm

I’m so pleased I found your answer Sam! I had helped my Dad upgrade to Lion just yesterday. He has to bring his iMac to my place and use my Internet access for software updates, since his Mobile Broadband access via his HUAWEI dongle and Optus always fails downloading files larger than 10MB (or thereabouts). Anyway, after the install, his Mac wouldn’t recognise the HUAWEI dongle, like others have found, but fortunately, the new HUAWEI drivers worked straight away. Needless to say, we’re both very happy with this fix. Thanks again Sam.
pasamio July 24th, 2011 7:07 pm

Great to hear it has helped for so many people. It was less than obvious for me so I figured to document it somewhere that people searching could find it easily.

I don’t have much of an issue with downloading large files on my Optus Wireless Broadband (prepaid) in a technical sense though it is rather expensive to pull down such a large file. I went to work to download it (yay for a fast university connection) which worked well but ran into the problem of getting my home internet connection working.
Geoff July 24th, 2011 11:03 pm

Many thanks for this. I found that Lion had a problem with the driver as the connection manager utility wasn’t reporting the network settings and allowing me to switch from 3G to 2G. After using the E160 with a Windows guest in VMWare fusion I as able to find this article, the download the linked driver and drop it to my mac side, extracted the driver package ran it and it worked instantly. You’ve probably saved me hours of hunting for the driver package, so thanks very much!
Anonymous July 25th, 2011 6:12 am

[…] […]
Piero July 25th, 2011 8:15 am

Grazie mille, mi hai salvato!!! 😉 Thank you, you saved me!!!!
latworx July 25th, 2011 12:11 pm

Freaking good! Really help. Thx
Mark July 25th, 2011 6:10 pm

Thank- you for this. I have been trying to get my USB working all day and even spent 1 hr on the phone with my sim provider and had no luck. Your post was the last one I looked at on the internet before giving up. Easy install and now it works. Great work.
patrick July 25th, 2011 9:52 pm

Works! Thanks a million!
Charlie July 25th, 2011 9:56 pm

amazing. you should be employed by O2!

Thanks very much.
Mark Roberts July 25th, 2011 11:17 pm

Fantastic post. Couldn’t find a single thing to help but am now using O2 modem to post this.

Thanks you
Ivan July 26th, 2011 6:34 am

You saved my time and nerves. Thank you very much my friend!
dermot July 26th, 2011 8:52 am

thanks so much for this.
Piotr July 26th, 2011 5:58 pm

You just made my day 🙂
kup July 26th, 2011 6:17 pm

Thanks a lot!
Alvin July 26th, 2011 6:20 pm

wooooow. awesome. thanks!
Pixelbase July 27th, 2011 3:32 am

Wow! Its working!!!
Many thanks!!!!

Regards from Poland.
Lukas
Jan Chrillesen July 27th, 2011 4:07 pm

Thank you very much for this posting. I can confirm that it works with my Huawei E182E dongle on Lion.
Pete July 27th, 2011 4:29 pm

Thanks man, saved my day!
Kat July 27th, 2011 4:54 pm

Hi there, firstly thanks so much for your helpful guide — I followed it to a tee and while it installed perfectly, when I plugged my 3 dongle in and tried to connect, a pop-up said “this application is missing required preference files. Please run the application set-up before running the control panel.”

I attempted to run the set-up assistant again, but an error message saying “an internal error has occurred during configuration (5364).” Does anyone have any clues to what I should do next?
Kat July 27th, 2011 5:00 pm

Actually, scratch my last comment — I got it working by downloading the Huawei drivers here http://ask3.three.co.uk/mbbdocs/drivers/apple_drivers.html and simply clicking “3 Connect Installer” and running through the set-up again. Sometimes the easiest solutions actually — gasp! — work 😉 Thanks for the help.
Kevin July 27th, 2011 6:59 pm

Excellent work! That’s saved me a load of time. Thanks very much.
florian July 27th, 2011 7:19 pm

Thank you, great manual!
Emanuel July 27th, 2011 7:33 pm

Thanks a lot! It’s working fine 🙂
d0m1n1c July 27th, 2011 10:58 pm

Thank you sir. Works pretty well even in Manila, Philippines. Great great help.
Modem Huawei E160 di Mac OS X Lion 10.7 » Basing Bae! July 28th, 2011 1:41 am

[…] punya gooling, nemulah gw website ini yang isinya adalah problem yang sama yang gw temuin. Disana ada solusinya. Jika ditulis ulang […]
Stuart Black July 28th, 2011 3:41 am

Thanks ever so much for this – much appreciated. Posted using my UK Vodafone modem.

Stuart
Daniel July 28th, 2011 4:57 am

huawei 156g works perfectly! thanks!!
Niklas B July 28th, 2011 4:41 pm

Awesome, works great!
Fasgorn July 28th, 2011 6:15 pm

Works fantastic on Huawei E1752 (Orange Connection Manager – Poland)
Steve July 28th, 2011 7:31 pm

Thanks sir. It saves my life with my Huawei E1553.
Masterlui July 29th, 2011 12:40 am

My modem HUAWEI E1556 conected to Comcel 3G @ Colombia works perfectly with your solution, Thanks for posting!!
Leandro Rasteiro July 29th, 2011 12:28 pm

Thank you! You saved me! I installed OS X Lion and my Huawei did not work. I was frustrated, but you saved my day. From Rio de Janeiro.
Rob Snijders July 29th, 2011 6:14 pm

Thanks for you effort. It works!
Naizi July 29th, 2011 6:57 pm

Thanks Alot Man this post was VERY VERY helpfull i upgraded to OSX LION but couldnt use my modem, and the 3 application was a pain too ,
thanks alot for the post
tim shendruk July 30th, 2011 4:20 pm

thanks for sharing. it works great.
Tim July 30th, 2011 8:41 pm

Thanks! worked for me.. 🙂
Sergio July 31st, 2011 12:40 pm

Thanks. after 2 ours loking for a solution I finally found yours. And it WORKS ! Operator Comcel – Colombia – Huawei E160
Mek July 31st, 2011 8:37 pm

thank’s, also worked with my E180 Modem.
Great!!!
David July 31st, 2011 11:46 pm

Thanks Sam your solution works fine! Apple helpline were helpless, suggested I go back to Leopard or wait for new 64 bit Huawei dongle…. but no need. Excellent thanks again.
Scott August 1st, 2011 12:01 am

Hey – thanks for this – My downloaded files does not extract and I get the following error “Unable to expand” Error 2: No Such file or directory”

Anyone have any ideas?

Cheers

Scott
Rob J August 1st, 2011 3:57 am

Many thanks for this post, i too suffered with the Lion upgrade problem using a UK Orange sim/dongle. After following this procedures it now works perfectly. many thanks again.
SG August 1st, 2011 11:42 am

Thanks! It works.
– SG, Starhub
pasamio August 2nd, 2011 10:43 am

I’d suggest trying to re-download the file and check the file size is more than a few KB. It sounds like you had a corrupt download which is why it is having issues.
ohhanssen August 3rd, 2011 3:16 am

Great stuff. Finally worked with my Telenor Broadband and Huawei e1752 !

Thanks.
JH August 3rd, 2011 10:15 am

Hi Sam,
It also works fine for my Huawei USB E1750!
I also spent hours looking and finally saw your post. Thanks a million!
Niels Leidecker August 4th, 2011 2:27 am

Dear you (couldn’t find your name),

THANKS SOOOO MUCH.

This is what blogging is all about.You just saved my day.

Niels