Activating the wireless on your Dell Latitude D630 is fairly easy. For whatever reason its not supported in the default generic kernel, but all it takes is adding a few lines to a config file. A added the following lines to the /boot/loader.conf:

if_wpi_load=”YES”

wlan_load=”YES”

wlan_amrr_load=”YES”

firmware_load=”YES”

wpifw_load=”YES”

legal.intel_wpi.license_ack=1

These steps are also outlined in the wpi man page (man wpi). It tells you exactly the lines that need to go into the /boot/loader.conf. So, if you ever happen to forget again, at least that much of the instructions are on your machine (assuming you have man pages installed.)

At this point you should be able to reboot and be able to use your wireless. I use the following commands to activate and connect to an access point:

ifconfig wpi0 up

ifconfig wpi0 list scan

ifconfig wpi0 ssid [broadcast ID]

dhclient wpi0

I’ve had good luck with the wireless so far, outside of a few times when the device seems to have just switched itself off. In those cases I simply repeat the above steps after issuing a “ifconfig wpi0 down”.