[Sussex] Re: Advice on pcmcia wireless card please

[paul]

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>    1. Moot Attendance List (Sussex)
>    2. Re: SFLC Files First Ever U.S. GPL Violation Lawsuit
>       (Andrew Guard)
>    3. Advice on pcmcia wireless card please (Philip G)
>    4. Re: SFLC Files First Ever U.S. GPL Violation Lawsuit
>       (Steve 'Dobbo' Dobson)
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> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
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> Message: 3
> Date: Tue, 25 Sep 2007 21:26:38 +0100
> From: Philip G <phil at lxnet.fsnet.co.uk>
> Subject: [Sussex] Advice on pcmcia wireless card please
> To: sussex at mailman.lug.org.uk
> Message-ID: <200709252126.38405.phil at lxnet.fsnet.co.uk>
> Content-Type: text/plain;  charset="us-ascii"
>
> Please note I have posted a duplicate of the following on the Brighton linux 
> users group as well.  Also appologies if you receive this twice.
>
>
> Hello all.
>
> I'm in a bit of a pickle as I urgently need a perfectly / fully working pcmcia 
> wireless card but don't know which one to buy, or where I can buy it.  I am 
> assuming a prism 2.5 based one but which make and model can be garanteed to 
> be this chipset; if in deed this will fulfill the following criteria:-
>
> -- must work completely with kismet, including signal strength readings
> -- must work with network manager; as many of you know a few cards drivers are 
> not nm happy yet.
> -- must survive suspend resume.
> -- must have open source driver.
> -- Ideally work with a range of kernels but most importantly with more current 
> ones, ie Gutsy Gibbon (currently at 2.6.22 plus).
> -- Ideally have the facility to plug in an external aerial.
> -- ideally 802.11g capable or better.
>
> Thanks.
>
>
> I am also in the position to advise windows users which wireless divices they 
> should buy, these will probably be mainly usb for desktop machines to access 
> a community shared wireless internet access system.  As I would like their 
> way to linux to be as smooth as possible it would be nice if I had advised 
> them / supplied them with ones that would actually work if they get around to 
> trying linux out, rather than my previous advise / supplies causing a show 
> stopper on their linux potential.  These cards would simply have to get them 
> on the network, nothing fancy, though an external aerial to aid reception 
> might be required in some settings.
>
> Thank you all for your time and expertise, any comments what so ever would be 
> greatly appreciated, my experience with linux (my sole OS for a good number 
> of years) wireless drivers has been frustrating.
>
> Thanks again
>
>   
Hi,

You mention the idea of getting a Prism 2.5 chipset based card, but then 
go on to state 802.11g as a requirement.
The Prism 2.5 chipset is actually 802.11b only.
If you do require a Prism 2.5 based card, with external antenna and 
Kismet support, the Senao 2511CD Plus Ext2 is probably the card for you. 
It's a high power (200mw) card, with good sensitivity and 2x external 
MMCX type antenna sockets. This card has *no* built-in antenna.
When searching for this card, avoid what appears to be the same model, 
but appended with the name "Mercury" as this one has a Prism 3 chipset 
and isn't favourably comparable at all! Beware, they look identical!

If you really want to stick with Prism based chipsets, then the PrismGT 
chipset may be of interest as that's b/g, although you'll be hard pushed 
to find one with an external antenna adapter socket. I think there was a 
variant called Indigo, too.
If you do go this way, you also need to be aware of (and steer clear of) 
the soft-mac variants, due to poor driver/feature support. Probably best 
avoided if unsure.

However, I would strongly recommend looking for something with b/g (or 
perhaps even a/b/g) Atheros based chipset. These mostly have very strong 
Linux support, in the form of the madwifi drivers.
If you specifically require good sensitivity, etc, for wireless 
surveying (or even just messing around with Kismet) I would recommend 
the a/b/g Atheros based Cisco Aironet AIR-CB21AG-A-K9.
If you really need an external antenna option, I'd always recommend the 
b/g Atheros based Proxim 8470-WD
(Not to be confused with much earlier Lucent Orinoco 11b cards! Good 
cards, built-in Linux support for years, but "b" only.) 
<http://backtrack.offensive-security.com/index.php?title=HCL:Wireless#Cisco_Aironet_AIR-CB21AG-A-K9>

Here's a good "madwifi supported" card list: 
http://madwifi.org/wiki/Compatibility

Otherwise, if you just want a lower priced alternative, there are now 
many more "supported" USB chipsets available these days. For instance, 
the ZyDas ZD1211 is a very popular USB based chip, used in many brands. 
Again, these days USB wifi devices with external antenna connections are 
becoming quite common-place, too. They are a reasonably good, lower 
priced alternative, if your requirements aren't too demanding.

Here's a great wifi card compatibility list, for the No1 pen-testers 
livecd "BackTrack" (shameless plug ;o) )
http://backtrack.offensive-security.com/index.php?title=HCL:Wireless
Whilst this list is indeed intended to be specific to this distro, it 
will still serve very well to give a fairly comprehensive guide to Linux 
supported wireless cards in general, whilst maintaining a bias towards 
compatibility with Linux based wireless tools, which you stipulate in 
your criteria (kismet, etc)
The list presents cards not only by chipset, but also by specific 
make/model of cards that at least have good Linux driver availability.

Hope this is of some help to you!?

Paul M.

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