RE: aklug Digest V3 #96

Very regrettably, wireless on linux doesn't 'just work'. That is one of
the (few) great throw-it-against-the-wall frustrations I regularly
experience with linux.

Altho some distros may work it better than others, I have yet to
discover one. Even mandrake doesn't do so good a job (although I
haven't tried it with Mandrake 10).

For 802.11b, the most common chipset is the prism-based chipsets (e.g.
linksys). Those have the most widespread support base in linux.

I've also worked with the cisco aironet, and
Orinoco/agere/whatever-they-are-this-week PCMCIA cards. They all work
with some finagling. Of them all, I prefer the agere/Orinoco cards.

Non-WEP setups are significantly (orders of magnitude) easier to get
working than WEP setups.

I have never succeeded in getting any Dlink PCI or PCMCIA cards to work
(those are prism based, so go figure)

Ditto for netgear USB 802.11b.

Multiple WEP setups (home, office, client, all different) have proven
impossible to make switching between them automatic, and the time
required to do it manually is a crapshoot...maybe it works first
time...maybe 30 minutes later it still doesn't work.

If I decide to get another, I'd probably get an agere card, or a linksys
card.

HTH,

Lee

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Date: Wed, 05 May 2004 21:24:49 -0800
From: Jim <jsw@wadell.org>
Subject: Wireless card

Can anyone recommend a linux-friendly (no wierd drivers, etc) wireless=20
card? Looking for something that "just works"

Jim
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Received on Fri May 7 07:03:35 2004