[Gllug] Madwifi drivers

[Russell Howe]

On Tue, Apr 12, 2005 at 01:59:44AM +0100, Mike Brodbelt wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Is anyone here experienced with the madwifi drivers? I've got an Atheros
> 5212 based mini PCI wireless card.

I have two. One's a miniPCI in a Soekris box, and the other's a PCI card
(although I suspect that inside the metal box is simply a miniPCI socket
with a miniPCI card in it). Both machines are running Debian sarge
(testing).

Getting them working didn't prove too difficult. My configuration's as
follows:

The PCI card, in a K6-500, using madwifi from sometime around Feb, I
think. Kernel is 2.6.10.

0000:00:09.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications, Inc. AR5212 802.11abg NIC (rev 01)
        Subsystem: Atheros Communications, Inc.: Unknown device 2027
        Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 168, IRQ 10
        Memory at ed000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]

Bootup log:

ath_hal: module license 'Proprietary' taints kernel.
ath_hal: 0.9.12.14 (AR5210, AR5211, AR5212)
wlan: 0.8.4.5 (EXPERIMENTAL)
ath_rate_onoe: 1.0
ath_pci: 0.9.4.12 (EXPERIMENTAL)
ath0: 11b rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps
ath0: 11g rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps
24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: mac 5.6 phy 4.1 radio 1.7
ath0: 802.11 address: 00:02:6f:21:7b:bf
ath0: Use hw queue 0 for WME_AC_BE traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 1 for WME_AC_BK traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 2 for WME_AC_VI traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 3 for WME_AC_VO traffic
ath0: Atheros 5212: mem=0xed000000, irq=10

/etc/network/interfaces:

auto ath0
# WLAN
iface ath0 inet static
        address 192.168.254.2
        netmask 255.255.255.0
        broadcast 192.168.254.255
        gateway 192.168.254.1
        pre-up /sbin/modprobe ath_pci
        pre-up /sbin/iwpriv ath0 mode 3
        pre-up /sbin/iwconfig ath0 essid "no127" mode managed rate 54Mb freq 2.447G key <secret-ish> enc on

Then, for the miniPCI card in the Soekris, which is also running as an
accesspoint (kernel is 2.6.11.6 with madwifi downloaded last weekend):

0000:00:0e.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications, Inc. AR5212 802.11abg NIC (rev 01)
        Subsystem: Unknown device 17ab:8331
        Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 168, IRQ 5
        Memory at a0020000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]

Bootup log:

ath_hal: module license 'Proprietary' taints kernel.
ath_hal: 0.9.14.9 (AR5210, AR5211, AR5212, RF5111, RF5112, RF2413)
wlan: 0.8.4.5 (EXPERIMENTAL)
ath_rate_onoe: 1.0
ath_pci: 0.9.4.12 (EXPERIMENTAL)
ath0: 11a rates: 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps 24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: 11b rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps
ath0: 11g rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps
24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
ath0: mac 5.6 phy 4.1 5ghz radio 1.7 2ghz radio 2.3
ath0: 802.11 address: 00:05:4e:45:f1:11
ath0: Use hw queue 0 for WME_AC_BE traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 1 for WME_AC_BK traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 2 for WME_AC_VI traffic
ath0: Use hw queue 3 for WME_AC_VO traffic
ath0: Atheros 5212: mem=0xa0020000, irq=5

/etc/network/interfaces:

auto ath0
iface ath0 inet static
        address 192.168.254.1
        netmask 255.255.255.0
        broadcast 192.168.254.255
        pre-up /sbin/iwpriv ath0 mode 3
        pre-up /sbin/iwconfig ath0 essid "no127" mode master rate 54Mb freq 2.447G key <secret-ish> enc on

Note that I'm using WEP (just until I bother configuring IPsec - then
I'll run the wlan without any encryption)

The cards have been working OK, although I do sometimes get pauses in
connectivity (anything from a few seconds to a minute or so) and the
speed is appalling. I haven't bothered debugging it yet - as long as it
works for IRC, mail and SSH, I don't mind too much for now.

I think it might just be that the Soekris is a little underpowered for
the job, and the wifi card leaves a lot of work to be done in software
by the driver. The module is over 150Kbytes, so there's a fair chunk of
code in there...

-- 
Russell Howe       | Why be just another cog in the machine,
rhowe at siksai.co.uk | when you can be the spanner in the works?
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