If you are upgrading your HP/Compaq 6715b to Debian Jessie, and suddenly Wifi stops working because the PCI device is gone, install the "rfkill" package:
# lspci | tail -2 02:04.1 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller (rev 02) 10:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetLink BCM5787M Gigabit Ethernet PCI Express (rev 02) # rfkill list 1 1: hp-wifi: Wireless LAN Soft blocked: yes Hard blocked: no # rfkill unblock wifi # rfkill list 1 1: hp-wifi: Wireless LAN Soft blocked: no Hard blocked: no # lspci | tail -2 10:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetLink BCM5787M Gigabit Ethernet PCI Express (rev 02) 30:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4311 802.11a/b/g (rev 02)
Reports on the internet say that the same could be done by going into the BIOS and selecting "Reset to default" - this makes the Wifi LED active until about udev is started on the next boot.
To be done: figure out how to automate this.