[GLLUG] pci wireless adapter

[pdwald]

The binary HAL would taint the kernel since it is closed-source. I
don't believe that it is distributed within the kernel (if you
download the kernel from kernel.com). But  it may be included in any
distro or live-cd (such as knoppix) The madwifi itself is dual
licensed because of such HAL (thus the need of another project --
ath5k -- to create a new HAL from scratch). Having said that, I don't
seen any problem with the binary thing (it is more of a philosophical
and licensing issue). I believe that the HAL controls the range of
frequencies of the device's radio transmitter, etc.

On Fri, Apr 4, 2008 at 1:44 PM, Michael George <george at idealso.com> wrote:
> On Fri, April 4, 2008 1:14 pm, pdwald wrote:
>
> > You should look for any pci card that has the atheros chipsets. They
>  > seem to have very good support on Linux via the madwifi project (which
>  > has branched out to the ath5k because of the proprietary HAL --
>  > Hardware Abstractio Lawer -- used in the madwifi). All in all, it
>  > seems to works very well, and supports even advanced features/modes
>  > such as putting the wlan device into promiscuous mode.
>
>
> So if the madwifi driver uses a proprietary HAL, is it already included in
>  the Linux kernel?  And is it included in various LiveCD's?
>
>
>
> > On Fri, Apr 4, 2008 at 9:49 AM, Michael George <george at idealso.com> wrote:
>  >> Which PCI wireless NICs are quite reliable and almost-always-work with
>  >>  Linux?  I want to put a terminal in a part of the house where I don't
>  >> have
>  >>  wiring and one of the methods I want to try is a linux distro on CD or
>  >> USB
>  >>  that can just boot and point to my LTSP server.  So I need a NIC that
>  >> will
>  >>  be readily supported by a small distro and give decent throughput.
>  >>
>  >>  I always get great info and opinions from this group, so I'm picking
>  >> your
>  >>  brains again... :)
>  >>
>  >>  -Michael George
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>  >>
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>
>
>  -Michael George
>