WIFI Toys

I've given up on the idea of a PCI 802.11g card for the Linux server. Driver issues are too annoying and an 802.11g bridge isn't much more expensive anyway. So now the problem becomes finding a good bridge. The Netgear WGE 101 seems like it might do the trick. At around $95 it is also one of the cheaper ones.
The WET54G is the Linksys bridge. Reviews are not very flattering and it is more expensive.
The WGA54G is the Linksys game adapter which doesn't have anything to do with games, of course. It just means it is a single-port bridge and it is a bit cheaper than the WET54G. But unless it was much cheaper than the Netgear I think I'd still prefer the Netgear.
Another option would be to pick up another WRT54G since it can be hacked into acting as a bridge if you turn on WDS support.
And finally there is the D-Link DWL-G810. I have not had good luck with D-Link gear in the past and it also looks rather ugly. Anybody out there have one of these?

Posted by Rasmus

I picked up a cheap Netgear WG511 the other day. Got it for $35, probably because they have recently released the WG511T which uses the Atheros super-G chipset. The older WG511 uses the Prism Duette chipset which isn't officially supported on Linux by anybody. I say officially, because some code has snuck out and there is a new site out there devoted to it. Have a look at http://prism54.org/. I haven't tried that driver yet, but I will update this when I do. [Update - Feb.18/2004] I am now using the driver from prism54.org compiled into my 2.6.3 kernel on my Thinkpad and it works nicely.

For now I wanted to give the Linuxant Driverloader a whirl to see if I could use the native Windows XP drivers directly on my Thinkpad with a very recent 2.4.22 kernel. It worked amazingly well. See the extended entry for the step-by-step screenshots.

Of course, the whole point of going with 802.11g over 802.11b is to go faster. I haven't done any real performance tests yet with this Windows driver running on Linux. Hopefully I will get some time to test it against the native driver soon.

Continue reading "802.11g Netgear WG511 and Linux"

Posted by Rasmus

Buffalo WLI-PCI-G54 uses the Broadcom chipset and has a cool-looking external antenna. At this point I think the only hope of getting this to work with Linux would be through Linuxant's driverloader.
D-Link DWL-G520 uses the Atheros 5002 chipset. Should work with the madwifi driver, or with the Linuxant driverloader. It also claims to support 108 Mbps Extreme-G.
Netgear WG311 uses the Intersil Prism GT chipset which has no native Linux driver that I know of. But the Linuxant driverloader says it supports it.
Linksys WMP54G uses the Broadcom chipset and should work with the Linuxant driverloader.
The Linksys WMP55AG is an a/b/g card whereas all the previous were just b/g. This one uses the Atheros 5212a chipset and should work with both the madwifi driver and the Linuxant driverloader. This one is actually just a PCI card with a mini-PCI adapter on it with a mini-PCI card plugged into it.
D-Link DWL-AG520 uses an Atheros chipset and should be supported by both the madwifi and the Linuxant driverloader. Like the Buffalo, it has a nice beefy external antenna.
Netgear WAG311 like the other a/b/g cards is Atheros-based so it should work with both the madwifi and the Linuxant driverloader.
It probably would be a good idea to get an Atheros Super A-G based board so I can go 108Mbps when the drivers support it and when I get a gateway that can go that fast. I don't think my Broadcom-based WRT54G is going to be able to support Super-G. I think the Linksys, D-Link and Netgear a/b/g cards are all based on the same Atheros chipset, so the only deciding factor is likely to be price between these. If anybody has one of these and can inject a bit more data it would be appreciated. I will update and bump this up as I learn more.

Posted by Rasmus