@gpatel-fr thanks for digging into this. So, right, it's supposed to use ncm and not rndis, but usb-moded should handle tethering with that . The file you tried to cat is restricted to root access, but even with sudo, it's not accessible, and that probably explains why the configuration script fails, falling back to charging only. Maybe the fp5 is missing the corresponding kernel module now, while it had it back in August? I created a ticket.

I still don't know how to make the sdcard appear directly on my desktop computer when I connect my phone, but I have a workaround : symlink the sdcard mount point in the /home/phablet directory ( = "internal storage" on the desktop computer). This is easily done using the terminal (or adb shell). Find the exact mount point of the sdcard using the command mount; it is something like /media/phablet/XXXX-YYYY. Then enter ln -s /media/phablet/XXXX-YYYY ~/sdcard