[plug] WiFi card question

[Chris Griffin]

Hi Adrian,

many thanks for the response. From what you have indicated I would
have thought the Prism2/2.5/3 the most likley but you left it out of
your summary, did I miss something?
Given you say "Full feature set (AP and client, WPA/WPA2/802.11X
authenticator and supplicant)".
Oh, I just noticed "* 802.11b only (AFAIK)", bother.
Any idea of just what to buy, where to get it and how much?

Regards,
Chris G

On 7/6/06, Adrian Woodley <Adrian at screamingroot.org> wrote:
> Chris,
>
> Thats a bit of a hard choice. For WPA support it pretty much comes down
> to three chipsets:
>
> IPW2100/2200
> * Intel chipset.
> * 802.11a/g
> * Good Linux support with out-of-tree kernel drivers.
> * Works well with wpa-supplicant.
> * Monitor mode.
> * Laptop only.
>
> Prism2/2.5/3
> * Hostap driver.
> * Full feature set (AP and client, WPA/WPA2/802.11X authenticator and
> supplicant)
> * Monitor mode.
> * 802.11b only (AFAIK)
> * In in-tree kernel support.
> * Not to be confused with Prism54g chipset.
>
> Atheros
> * 802.11a/g
> * Monitor mode.
> * Supported by Madwifi drivers.
> * Madwifi-ng has different API to standard Linux Wifi Extensions - needs
> to be carefully matched to wpa-supplicant version.
>
> So really, for 54g stuff you've got a choice between Atheros/Madwifi and
> IPW2100/2200, and even then IPW2100/2200 is only supported in laptops
> (mini-pci/pccard) AFAIK.
>
> I've had varying success with madwifi, using both the original and "-ng"
> versions. On the whole I've found its stability to be lacking and
> generally not as good as the Intel chipset.
>
> All that said, there are big changes going on in the Linux Wifi stack
> and all this will be changing soon. Software MAC will be intergrated
> into most drivers, meaning more chipsets will support WPA/WPA2. This
> will also mean a unified Wifi Extensions, so systems like wpa-supplicant
> and hostapd will be easier to maintain.
>
> Adrian
>
> On Wed, 2006-07-05 at 15:11 +0800, Chris Griffin wrote:
> > Sorry, I guess I assumed that if I was buying new I would go for
> > 802.11g. Mainly wanted to get away from WEP due to inherent security
> > issues.
> >
> >
> > On 7/5/06, garry <garbuck at westnet.com.au> wrote:
> > >
> > > Might be useful if you say which spec card you want to buy.
> > >
> > > I still use the Enterasys 802.11b cards, with Mandriva 2k6 they just work.
> > >
> > > HTH
> > >
> > > Garry
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Chris Griffin wrote:
> > >
> > > > Greetings all,
> > > >
> > > > In light of the fact that such things change at such a rapid rate, I
> > > > am looking at upgrading my WiFi cards and of course it is mandatory
> > > > that they work flawlessly with Linux (I run, mostly, Fedora). Could
> > > > someone please give me some clues as to what to get that, hopefully,
> > > > will work out of the box?
> > > >
> > > > Regards,
> > > > Chris Griffin
> > > > _______________________________________________
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> > > >
> > >
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> > > PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
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> > >
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> > http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
> > Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au
>
> _______________________________________________
> PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
> http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
> Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au
>