Mailing List Archive

On Saturday 04 September 2004 08:21 pm, Grant wrote:
> I'm about to buy a Dell Inspiron 1000 laptop that will be running
> Gentoo. They offer a PCMCIA wireless card like this:
>
> Dell Wireless 1300 (b/g)

Dell 5150 with 1350 wireless works very well, with ndiswrapper.


> and my wireless router choices are like this:
>
> Dell Truemobile 2300 (b/g)
> Linksys Wireless G (b/g)

Linksys wireless router

> I wouldn't think I need to be too careful in my router choice
> (although suggestions are very welcome), but I've read that I need to
> be careful with my wireless card choice. How would the one above do
> with Gentoo?

The Dell wireless is broadcom and the ndiswrapper works well at least for
mine.

Mike

--
Michael W. Holdeman

Powered by Gentoo Linux www.gentoo.org 2004.0
Kernel 2.6.7-win4lin-r3
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Wireless thanks to ndiswrapper

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On Sat, 4 Sep 2004, Grant wrote:

> I'm about to buy a Dell Inspiron 1000 laptop that will be running
> Gentoo. They offer a PCMCIA wireless card like this:
>
> Dell Wireless 1300 (b/g)
>
> and my wireless router choices are like this:
>
> Dell Truemobile 2300 (b/g)
> Linksys Wireless G (b/g)

Do you already have a cable/DSL router? If so, then you might want to
consider buying a wireless bridge instead of a router (why maintain two
routers when a single router + wireless bridge will do?). Netgear make a
wireless bridge that does both 802.11b and 802.11g.


--
Aj.
Sys. Admin / Developer

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On Sat, 4 Sep 2004 21:55:35 -0400 (EDT), Ajai Khattri <ajai@bway.net> wrote:
> On Sat, 4 Sep 2004, Grant wrote:
>
> > I'm about to buy a Dell Inspiron 1000 laptop that will be running
> > Gentoo. They offer a PCMCIA wireless card like this:
> >
> > Dell Wireless 1300 (b/g)
> >
> > and my wireless router choices are like this:
> >
> > Dell Truemobile 2300 (b/g)
> > Linksys Wireless G (b/g)
>
> Do you already have a cable/DSL router? If so, then you might want to
> consider buying a wireless bridge instead of a router (why maintain two
> routers when a single router + wireless bridge will do?). Netgear make a
> wireless bridge that does both 802.11b and 802.11g.
>

It's got to be simpler to maintain one device instead of two though.
One of the wireless routers above is only like $70. I wouldn't think
a wireless bridge could be too much cheaper.

My current router does have a firewall built in though. Should I use
a router firewall like that, set up a dedicated machine as a firewall,
or just use software firewalls?

- Grant

> --
> Aj.
> Sys. Admin / Developer

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Hi,

The Dell Wireless 1300 used the Broadcom wireless chip which currently
does'nt have any support under linux. Look here for a large list of Wlan
cards and their chipsets:
http://www.linux-wlan.org/docs/wlan_adapters.html.gz

And the following chipsets would likely work with linux: Prism GT,
Prism2/2.5/3, Atmel, TI (but not recomded because the project to support
such cards is very expermintal right now), Atheros, Orinoco, and
probably several others.

Alex S.

Grant wrote:

>I'm about to buy a Dell Inspiron 1000 laptop that will be running
>Gentoo. They offer a PCMCIA wireless card like this:
>
>Dell Wireless 1300 (b/g)
>
>and my wireless router choices are like this:
>
>Dell Truemobile 2300 (b/g)
>Linksys Wireless G (b/g)
>
>I wouldn't think I need to be too careful in my router choice
>(although suggestions are very welcome), but I've read that I need to
>be careful with my wireless card choice. How would the one above do
>with Gentoo?
>
>Also, I've read that when 802.11i comes out, newer g equipment will be
>able to utilize it. Is that true?
>
>- Grant
>
>--
>gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
>
>
>
>


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On Sat, 4 Sep 2004, Grant wrote:

> It's got to be simpler to maintain one device instead of two though.
> One of the wireless routers above is only like $70. I wouldn't think
> a wireless bridge could be too much cheaper.

In my setup, the DSL modem also contains the router so replacing it with a
wireless router was not an option. (Not all DSL circuits are the same
apparently, and buying chipset-compatible DSL equipment ended up being
more expensive than buying a simple bridge). It was much easier to
just add a bridge for my wireless computers. The bridge is completely
transparent and provides MAC-based access control to my home LAN.

> My current router does have a firewall built in though. Should I use
> a router firewall like that, set up a dedicated machine as a firewall,
> or just use software firewalls?

If you are comfortable with using the router's firewall then stick with
it. Some routers have horrible interfaces though. Also, if you have more
complex requirements (maybe you are providing acess to a neighbor or a
wireless public access point) where a three-legged firewall is needed then
an old PC with three NICs running a software firewall gives you more
flexibility.


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Sys. Admin / Developer

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IBM Thinkpads with the Prism chipset are good..
The best AP I've ever bought and used has to be the Minitar unit..
they're dirt cheap, good strong signal, very small footprint and they
run linux. :-)

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It should be kept in mind that there's a newish iteration of the Prism
chipset that doesn't work with the prism54 driver, you need
ndiswrapper or the like to use it.

I'd also like to state that I've been misled twice by chipset lists,
because the companies involved changed the chipset. (One was Xterasys,
who moved from prism to a TI ACX-111, the other is SMC, who uses the
(I think) Prism GT v2. Neither of these new chipsets are natively
supported.)

Good luck, and keep in mind that, if all else fails, ndiswrapper is
actually pretty good.

On Mon, 6 Sep 2004 05:37:51 +0800, Senectus . <senectus@gmail.com> wrote:
> IBM Thinkpads with the Prism chipset are good..
> The best AP I've ever bought and used has to be the Minitar unit..
> they're dirt cheap, good strong signal, very small footprint and they
> run linux. :-)
>
>
>
> --
> gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
>
>

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On Sep 5, 2004, at 1:21 am, Grant wrote:

> I'm about to buy a Dell Inspiron 1000 laptop that will be running
> Gentoo. They offer a PCMCIA wireless card like this:
>
> Dell Wireless 1300 (b/g)

I like the way Apple build an aerial into their laptops, and the card
is fitted completely internally, but I don't think the Dell do things
this way. I think they Dell adaptors are just a PCMCIA card with an
aerial block poking out the side, so you don't have to feel welded to
the Dell card if it doesn't meet your needs.

I am currently building a Linux wireless base-station / router, and
looked a little into wireless cards. The Linux drivers for the Prism
chipsets seemed to me to be the most mature, and since I wanted support
for 54g and master mode I think I found that only Prism cards would do.

You might find it worth checking out <http://prism54.org/> and in
particular <http://prism54.org/supported_cards.php> &
<http://tinyurl.com/4d9zo>.

I found that, using the card I chose, wireless LAN basically worked
with a handful of commands. I documented it here
<http://gentoo-wiki.com/
HOWTO_Building_a_Wireless_Access_Point_With_Gentoo>.

I hope you find this useful,

Stroller.


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On Sunday 05 September 2004 07:08 pm, Stroller wrote:
> On Sep 5, 2004, at 1:21 am, Grant wrote:
> > I'm about to buy a Dell Inspiron 1000 laptop that will be running
> > Gentoo. They offer a PCMCIA wireless card like this:
> >
> > Dell Wireless 1300 (b/g)
>
> I like the way Apple build an aerial into their laptops, and the card
> is fitted completely internally, but I don't think the Dell do things
> this way. I think they Dell adaptors are just a PCMCIA card with an
> aerial block poking out the side, so you don't have to feel welded to
> the Dell card if it doesn't meet your needs.
>
> I am currently building a Linux wireless base-station / router, and
> looked a little into wireless cards. The Linux drivers for the Prism
> chipsets seemed to me to be the most mature, and since I wanted support
> for 54g and master mode I think I found that only Prism cards would do.
>
> You might find it worth checking out <http://prism54.org/> and in
> particular <http://prism54.org/supported_cards.php> &
> <http://tinyurl.com/4d9zo>.
>
> I found that, using the card I chose, wireless LAN basically worked
> with a handful of commands. I documented it here
> <http://gentoo-wiki.com/
> HOWTO_Building_a_Wireless_Access_Point_With_Gentoo>.
>

My 5150 has a Broadcom 440 minipci internal pci card with built in ant. that
is integrated into the screen frame.

Mike

--
Michael W. Holdeman

Powered by Gentoo Linux www.gentoo.org 2004.0
Kernel 2.6.7-win4lin-r3
Windows apps thanks to Win4Lin 5.1.16 netraverse.com
Wireless thanks to ndiswrapper

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