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What cards with an Aheros chipset have promiscuous mode?

post #1 of 9
3/14/07 at 1:16am
Thread Starter 
Possibly looking to get an Atheros chipset wireless card, but I want to know which ones have promiscuous mode.
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post #2 of 9
3/14/07 at 1:30am
What's "promiscuous mode"?
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post #3 of 9
3/14/07 at 1:43am
First time I've ever seen the term. Had to look it up. Promiscuous mode.
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post #4 of 9
3/14/07 at 1:51am
Its basically a 'packet sniffing' mode for wireless adapters, where - instead of sending only the packets that are addressed to a particular adapter to the CPU, it sends ALL network packets to it where they can be analyzed aka. sniffed out. Programs like Kismet and AirSnort can use this data to monitor traffic across the whole LAN.

As far as adapters that support it... only one comes right to mind. I know that the AR5005GS supports 'promiscuous mode', however at this time I haven't found any Windows platform drivers that enable it. If you want to do your 'sniffing' under Linux however, you can download the drivers from SourceForge's MadWIFI site and they will allow you to enable it.

Here is a link to a site you could potentially get the card from...

http://www.oxfordtec.com/us/p106/GIG...duct_info.html

Another site... little cheaper but shows out of stock...

http://www.monstronix.com/gnwiag02-p-81256.html

Anyway, looks like Linux is where the sniffer programs shine anyway, so you could always get this card and run a dual boot Linux/XP or Vista type setup and have the best of both worlds. In any situation, the Atheros card will blow away the performance of the stock network card in your 9300 anyway.
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post #5 of 9
3/14/07 at 6:52am
Hi
As far as I can remember this software may has PM driver for some atheros chips.
Cheers
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post #6 of 9
3/14/07 at 9:30am
Thread Starter 
Krayziepop, thanks for all the info. I do run a dual boot of XP and Ubuntu, so I'll have to look into those drivers.

Dragon_GC thanks for the link, I'll read into it and hopefully come up with something for my Windows partition as well.
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post #7 of 9
3/14/07 at 10:05am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Krayziepop
Its basically a 'packet sniffing' mode for wireless adapters, where - instead of sending only the packets that are addressed to a particular adapter to the CPU, it sends ALL network packets to it where they can be analyzed aka. sniffed out. Programs like Kismet and AirSnort can use this data to monitor traffic across the whole LAN.
I'm a novice with sort of thing, and I've downloaded a few freewares that claim to do these things. (Though I have no idea how to use them properly. )
Do I have to have a card with this "promiscuous mode" for these programs to function properly?
Programs like IP Scan, Netalyzer, Net Stumbler, Advanced LAN Scanner, d3tr221631BETA, IPTools, NetAdmin...
-I've downloaded all these in hopes that tyring to use them would help educate me on the subject.
(Didn't work very well.)
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post #8 of 9
3/14/07 at 2:50pm
Basically yes, PK. The chipset within the WLAN card needs to support the featureset and the driver you install must be able to enable the feature also. From the limited research I have done myself, Atheros chipsets are pound for pound the best to have in a wireless card and are also usually the more feature rich of the options out there. Of course, as I had said before, often times you will have a very difficult time finding Windows drivers that support packet sniffing modes and its much easier anyhow to just use a basic Linux distro to have excellent driver and program support. I am not really sure why Windows support is so slim, but at least the open source community is keeping up with it.

I use netstumbler on occasion myself, but usually only when I am tracking down an access point for a better signal. Even my Gigabyte WLAN card with the AR5006EGS chipset doesn't support the advanced features under Windows with the drivers I can use. If I boot via a Ubuntu disc though, I can pretty easily tap into the advanced functions of the card (includinig Signal-to-Noise Ratios)
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post #9 of 9
3/14/07 at 3:01pm
I have the Wistron CM9 with the Atheros chipset. I think it's the 5004? -Whatever it was just before they combined the two chips into one power-saving chip. I was contemplating upgrading, but I guess I just can't justify it if XP can't take advantage.
No particular reason for the upgrade...Springtime, fresh air, the need for new toys... That sort of thing.
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