what drivers do I need to support ubuntu os 14.04 on a dell laptop inspiron E1705 model.

Most of the drivers are built into the kernel and should work without intervention. It's impossible to tell what hardware you have without a listing from lspci and lsusb. Review sites don't give enough detail as to what network, audio, etc. chips you have.

I have a Dell Inspiron E1705 also. I use a wired connection. With Ubuntu 12.04 and Xubuntu 12.04 dual boot, no problems. If you are wireless you will need a Broadcom Corporation BCM4401-BO 100Base-TX (rev 2) driver. Hope this helps. This is what my laptop has, but check yours using terminal command lspci, from Daniel's answer.

The following procedure applies to all supported releases of Ubuntu that are NOT End of Life (EOL) in the following table:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases

Please first connect your network card to the wireless router using an ethernet cable (also known as a LAN cable) and apply all updates.

In order to gather essential troubleshooting information about your wireless card, please follow this procedure:

Step 1

In the Ubuntu Terminal console , make sure that unlimited scrolling is enabled:

click on Edit > Profiles > "Default" profile > Scrolling. Choose "Unlimited" as scrolling option. Click Close and Close again.

If you are using the Gnome interface, open the Terminal console via "Applications->Accessories->Terminal"

If you are using the Unity interface (default graphical user interface in Ubuntu), use the 'search' function on the dash. Or you can click on the 'More Apps' button, click on the 'See more results' by the installed section, and find it in that list of applications. A third way, available after you click on the 'More Apps' button, is to go to the search bar, and see that the far right end of it says 'All Applications'. You then click on that, and you'll see the full list. Then you can go to Accessories > Terminal after that.

So the methods in Unity are:

Press CTRL-ALT-T key combination.

Dash > Search for Terminal

Dash > More Apps > 'See More Results' > Terminal

Dash > More Apps > Accessories > Terminal

Step 2

Please copy-paste the following diagnostic command from the

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WirelessTroubleshootingProcedure

website using a web browser (like Google Chromium or Mozilla Firefox) into the Linux Terminal. The command STARTS with the word sudo and ENDS with the word lsmod. So please copy-paste the ENTIRE diagnostic command below from the web browser into a Terminal, press <enter>, then enter password when sudo asks for password, then press enter again.

Tip: If you have a wheel mouse or 3 button mouse you do not need to type commands into the Terminal. Highlight the diagnostic command written on the page. Move your cursor anywhere in the Terminal and press the wheel or middle button. Automatic Copy and paste! No spelling mistakes! No Typos! No other errors!

sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install hwinfo grep rfkill; sudo lshw -C network; rfkill list; sudo iwlist scan | egrep -i 'chan|ssid'; cat /etc/network/interfaces; cat /etc/lsb-release; lspci -nnk | grep -iA2 net; lsusb; nmcli nm status; sudo lshw -short; uname -a; sudo updatedb; dmesg | egrep '02:00|80211|acx|at76|ath|b43|bcm|brcm|CX|eth|ipw|ireless|irmware|isl|lbtf|orinoco|ndiswrapper|NPE|ound|p54|prism|rror|rtl|RTL|rt2|RT2|rt3|RT3|rt5|RT5|rt6|RT6|rt7|RT7|usb|witch|wl';sudo dmidecode|egrep 'anufact|roduct|erial|elease'; iwconfig; cat /etc/modprobe.d/* | egrep '80211|acx|at76|ath|b43|bcm|brcm|CX|eth|ipw|irmware|isl|lbtf|orinoco|ndiswrapper|NPE|p54|prism|rtl|rt2|rt3|rt6|rt7|wmi|witch|wl'; cat /var/lib/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.state; sudo hwinfo --netcard ; ps -aux|egrep 'wpa|icd|etwork'; netstat -rn ; cat /etc/resolv.conf; ls -lia /boot; grep tmpfs /etc/fstab; ubuntu-support-status; sudo lsmod

Step 3

Please do NOT attempt to send any attachment(s). Please copy/paste the full terminal output at this location: https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/252578

The troubleshooters at Launchpad need to see the full Terminal output from running the above diagnostic command.

Step 4

Please also specify the name of the wireless access point that you are trying to connect to (not the model/make of your router).

Step 5

Please also clarify if you installed Ubuntu to the harddisk and are running from a harddisk install OR if you are only testing Ubuntu in a Live CD session.