Recommended Wireless 54g routers and pci/pcmcia cards

Rylan · n00b Joined: 08 May 2002 Posts: 41

I'm looking to get a wireless router and wireless network cards. I want something that works with stable, fully functioning drivers in linux ( no ndiswrapper stuff ). I also want 54Mbs speed at least, so that I can stream mutliple shows from my mythtv backend. I've searched the forums, as well as linuxquestions.org without much success for answers to my following questions.

1. Is there any support for 108Mbs wireless products in linux? I've seen products' specs that say Linux is supported, but given the state of 802.11g drivers in linux I was assuming that maybe they meant it worked in 802.11b or g mode, but not at full 108Mbs. This is the only question to which I've found no answer for anywhere.

2. I know a lot of people seem to like the WRT54G router, and it's what I'm leaning towards myself, but I wanted to know if anyone had any other router recommendations based on personal experience.

I'd like to have spi (stateful packet inspection) on my router, but I had one in the past that was so horribly slow that the web admin page for the router was horribly mangled because it was timing out while fetching certain parts of the page (and that was over 100Mb cat 5, straight from my computer to the router!). Has spi gotten better since then, or is anyone use a router that has spi and doesn't have problems?

3. Which 802.11g cards ( both pci and pcmcia ) *just work* in linux. I don't mind grabbing my own source or patching the kernel, but I really want to stay away from the ndiswrapper cards, or any that have such alpha drivers that it's problematic to even get the driver to compile consistently.

tomek32 · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 30 May 2004 Posts: 139

My friend got his dlink 802.11g router and pcmcia card working in gentoo. I'll get him to post here his setup info.

Rylan · n00b Joined: 08 May 2002 Posts: 41

At 54Mbs? I'd like to know the exact model numbers and revision if possible. Does the card or router have any 'quirks'?

neuron · Advocate Joined: 28 May 2002 Posts: 2371

excelent, I was looking for this kind of information too.

Rylan · n00b Joined: 08 May 2002 Posts: 41

bump to give it some daytime exposure (in the US).

py-ro · Veteran Joined: 24 Sep 2002 Posts: 1734 Location: Velbert

www.prism54.org

I'm using Netgear WG511 54Mbps PCMCIA

Works like a charm.

Zyne · Guru Joined: 08 Jun 2004 Posts: 334

I'm currently using my Linksys WMP54G in linux..
My router is a WRT54G, so they're both at 54 mbitps

here's a little output when I do iwconfig:

Rylan · n00b Joined: 08 May 2002 Posts: 41

Thanks py-ro. I browsed through that site, but I wasn't sure exactly how mature the drivers were for some of them. I saw some supported by madwifi drivers for example, but the madwifi faq and mailing lists left me doubting how "easily" those drivers worked with various kernel versions. As an example of what I mean, I have a haupagge pvr250 card, and the ivtv driver works, but I've had issues with it working fully (lirc specifically) with various 2.6 kernels. I can get my tv card to work perfectly under 2.4.26 vanilla though.

I asked on this forum because I wanted to know people's personal experiences. Such as whether or not your Netgear WG511 card needed the kernel patched? If so, have you had problems compiling the driver on newer kernels, or does it not matter at all? How's the reception with that card compared to others you might have used? Are there other versions of the card that use a different chipset, and if so how would I know from looking at the box (as in the Dlink 650 series and their 3 different chipsets with varying degrees of support)?

Zyne: Thank you for your response, it's what I was looking for when I asked. I didn't realize exactly why everyone cared that the WRT54G was hackable, but I like it more now that I know what I could make it do.

Thanks for telling me what card you use too, but I specifically stated that I wanted to stay away from cards that use the ndiswrapper.

Anyone have any idea about 108Mbs in Linux?

Zyne · Guru Joined: 08 Jun 2004 Posts: 334

-PeterW-

D-Link DWL-650 Rev B. Gentoo Setup Guide For Novice Users

After spending endless hours to get my wireless card to work it turns out that the task was much simpler than first anticipated. During this learning curve I gather tremendous amount of knowledge, and yes, you will have to learn to re-compile your own kernel. But no worries; this document should solve your problems.

Compatibility:
Testing has been done with kernel version 2.6.6 from development-sources on a Gentoo distribution. You may encounter differences dealing with other distributions.

Hardware Specifications:
Toshiba Laptop Satellite 1900 Series (00FS) [PS190C-OOFS]

Notes:
If you are a novice user you may have to learn how to compile the kernel. Do not be discouraged by this, there are many resources on the world wide web; forums and chats. Everyone has their favorites but my favorite HOWTO regarding building a kernel is written by Digital Hermit. You can find his article at: http://www.digitalhermit.com/linux/Kernel-Build-HOWTO.html

Step 1: Acquire the latest MADWIFI code.
To see the latest information about the project go to: http://sourceforge.net/projects/madwifi/

Open up a konsole window and login with a root account. (For this operation it is not required; however we will be re-building the kernel soon enough)

neuron · Advocate Joined: 28 May 2002 Posts: 2371

[quote="Zyne"]

Rylan · n00b Joined: 08 May 2002 Posts: 41

Thanks for the guide PeterW.

neuron: I didn't write that, Zyne did. I do know that due to protocol overhead, interference, and distance that 54g speeds really only perform at about 3-4MB/s under optimal conditions.
Here's some benchmarks run under linux http://prism54.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=226&sid=c924732d376510520d231c3427446158

neuron · Advocate Joined: 28 May 2002 Posts: 2371

serendipity · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 69

According to the D-Link website, their DWL-G520 108Mbps PCI card (and others) work under Linux. Be sure to check what revision, because they do not all appear to use the same chipset.

Skraut · Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 8:28 pm Post subject:

I've got a rev c D-Link DWL-G650. Works fine, no real complaints, except madwifi was a bit grouchy in the beginning. Once I got the right set of options turned on/off in the kernel everything's been fine.

I have to use it despite this laptop having a built in broadcom chip. The southbridge on this laptop didn't like ndiswrapper, and when I would play a sound, the wireless would disconnect.

I've heard of people getting the double speed on the G650 under linux, but understand, you have to have a D-Link router to take advantage of it.

I haven't tried the feature because I have a Linksys WRT54G and a WAP54G both with hacked linux bioses with boosted gain to cover my large acre yard. For me range is more important than speed.

sphakka · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 24 Jun 2003 Posts: 79

Netgear is your solution, man, except for the cost;)

I surf with a WG511 pcmcia card and a DG834G ADSL router at half speed (24-36MBps) within 2-3 rooms in my house, and full speed in the same room with the access point. All fine with 2.4.x-gentoo and 2.6.x-gentoo kernelz,*BUT* beware of 2.6.7-win4lin (system reboot/freeze troubles, don't know exactly what's the reason). Support in 2.6.x is ok and fully functional at boot, while in 2.4.x I need some manual interventions...
Only observed some unexpected disconnessions probably due to overheating of my damned notebook:(

I heard a lot good about 3Com products too: both 3Com and Netgear have the highest success percent rate at www.prism54.org.

c-u

^s

neryo · Posted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 7:17 pm Post subject:

Hi,
thanks to all for the informations about madwife... i have installed this driver, version 0.1_pre20050224 ~x86 from the portage and i have tested using my DWL-G650 AirPlus 108Mbit!!!
And it works fine.. only one problem.. it works only on 54Mbit/s not 108Mbit/s... i have tried to set the rate with iwconfig but not change!