Atheros 5xxx
From Gentoo Linux Wiki
Contents |
[edit] Introduction
The Atheros 5xxx is a wireless chipset usually found in laptops. There are three ways of getting your wireless card working:
- ath5k is a completely FOSS wireless driver for Atheros WLAN based chipsets
- ath9k is a completely FOSS wireless driver for Atheros IEEE 802.11n WLAN based chipsets.
- MadWifi supports proprietary code (via HAL) but covers more chipsets and also supports the "master" mode (needed for building an access point).
- ndiswrapper will use NDIS drivers for Microsoft Windows; They do not support packet injection and "master" mode.
[edit] Driver Support
Please add your devices below. The subsystem id and numeric pci id can be found using "lspci -nn".
| PCI ID | Subsystem PCI ID | Device name | Madwifi | ath5k | ath9k | ndiswrapper (64bit) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 168c:0013 | 168c:2051 | AR5212 802.11abg NIC | yes | yes | Not tested | Not tested |
| 168c:1014 | 1014:058a | IBM ThinkPad 11a/b/g Wireless LAN Mini Express Adapter (AR5BXB6) | yes | yes (2.6.26-gentoo) | Not tested | Not tested |
| 168c:001a | 1113:ee24 | Atheros Communications, Inc. AR5005G 802.11abg NIC (rev 01) | yes | yes (2.6.26-gentoo-r1) | Not tested | Not tested |
| 168c:001c | 168c:1026 | AR242x 802.11abg Wireless PCI Express Adapter (rev 01) | madwifi-hal | yes (2.6.27) | Not tested | No |
| 168c:001c | 168c:3067 | AR5006EG 802.11 b/g Wireless PCI Express Adapter (rev 01) | madwifi-hal | yes (2.6.27) | Not tested | Works with xp64 5.3.0.56 |
| 168c:002a | 1a3b:1067 | ASUS notebook X51L with Atheros 9280 WiFi b/g/n (rev 01) | Not tested | no | yes (2.6.27) | Not tested |
| 168c:001c | 144f:7128 | Atheros Communications, Inc. AR242x 802.11abg Wireless PCI Express Adapter (rev 01) | Not tested | Testing (2.6.28-gentoo), yes (vanilla-sources-2.6.28.9) | Not tested | Not tested |
[edit] Kernel Options (All installs)
If you intend to use the ath5k driver (Atheros 5xxx wireless cards support), you should configure your Kernel with the following options:
| Linux Kernel Configuration: Required Kernel Options (2.6.25) |
Networking --->
Wireless --->
<*> Generic IEEE 802.11 Networking Stack (mac80211)
Device Drivers --->
[*] Network device support --->
Wireless LAN --->
[*] Wireless LAN (IEEE 802.11)
<M> Atheros 5xxx wireless cards support
|
[edit] ath5k kernel driver
The ath5k kernel module (shown unselected in the kernel configuration above) supports many Atheros chipsets. It is currently under heavy development, written by the developers and is intended to replace MadWifi.
[edit] MadWifi
The MadWifi drivers provide support for a wide range of Atheros devices, including some of the 5xxx range. Certain others can be supported with an updated development version as detailed below.
[edit] MadWifi Hal (Formerly AR242x Patch)
Some Atheros devices currently require an updated version of MadWifi to make them work. This version is the madwifi-hal branch. See also MadWifi ticket #1192.
You can download this ebuild from AllenJB's Overlay (as net-wireless/madwifi-hal). To resolve the dependency on madwifi-ng-tools by wpa_supplicant, add "net-wireless/madwifi-ng-tools-9999" to /etc/portage/profile/package.provided (create the file and directories if they do not already exist).
Note: When emerging this package, you will be asked to accept the SSL certificate for MadWifi's source repository. To continue and not be asked again, press 'p' (accept permanently).
Please note that as this package uses the most recent development code, it cannot always be guaranteed to work. If it does not work, please try the snapshot package below.
[edit] ndiswrapper
If the Windows drivers from the card manufacturer don't work with ndiswrapper, try searching the ndiswrapper wiki (Hint: Try searching for the PCI ID).
