[gentoo-user] Atheros chip with airodump-ng

[gentoo-user] Atheros chip with airodump-ng

[Mick]

Hi All,

I have been experimenting with my wireless cardbus and cannot get it
to work with airodump-ng:

From lshw:

     *-network
          description: Wireless interface
          product: AR5212 802.11abg NIC
          vendor: Atheros Communications, Inc.
          physical id: 3
          bus info: pci@0000:04:00.0
          logical name: wifi0
          version: 01
          serial: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
          width: 32 bits
          clock: 33MHz
          capabilities: pm bus_master cap_list logical ethernet
physical wireless
          configuration: broadcast=yes driver=ath_pci ip=XX.XX.XXX.XXX
latency=168 maxlatency=28 mingnt=10 module=ath_pci multicast=yes
wireless=IEEE 802.11g

lspci -v gives:

04:00.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications, Inc. AR5212
802.11abg NIC (rev 01)
        Subsystem: PROXIM Inc Device 0a10
        Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 168, IRQ 11
        Memory at 44000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
        Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2
        Kernel driver in use: ath_pci
        Kernel modules: ath_pci

I am using net-wireless/madwifi-ng-0.9.4

When I run airmon-ng it shows my ath0 interface:

# airmon-ng


Interface       Chipset         Driver

wifi0           Atheros         madwifi-ng
ath0            Atheros         madwifi-ng VAP (parent: wifi0)

Running 'airmon-ng start wifi0' it creates a new VAP ath1 and puts it
in Monitor mode.  So far so good, but running airodump-ng shows no
data being captured.  Trying to stop ath0 (in case it interferes)
shuts down /etc/init.d/net.ath0, although I still get ath1 shown in
iwconfig.

Have I missed something basic here?  Do I need perhaps to add net.ath1
-> /etc/init.d/net.lo in the same way that I have done for ath0?
-- 
Regards,
Mick

Re: [gentoo-user] Atheros chip with airodump-ng

[Fred Elno]

> Hi All,
>
> I have been experimenting with my wireless cardbus and cannot get it
> to work with airodump-ng:
>
> From lshw:
>
>      *-network
>           description: Wireless interface
>           product: AR5212 802.11abg NIC
>           vendor: Atheros Communications, Inc.
>           physical id: 3
>           bus info: pci@0000:04:00.0
>           logical name: wifi0
>           version: 01
>           serial: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
>           width: 32 bits
>           clock: 33MHz
>           capabilities: pm bus_master cap_list logical ethernet
> physical wireless
>           configuration: broadcast=yes driver=ath_pci ip=XX.XX.XXX.XXX
> latency=168 maxlatency=28 mingnt=10 module=ath_pci multicast=yes
> wireless=IEEE 802.11g
>
> lspci -v gives:
>
> 04:00.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications, Inc. AR5212
> 802.11abg NIC (rev 01)
>         Subsystem: PROXIM Inc Device 0a10
>         Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 168, IRQ 11
>         Memory at 44000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
>         Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2
>         Kernel driver in use: ath_pci
>         Kernel modules: ath_pci
>
> I am using net-wireless/madwifi-ng-0.9.4
>
> When I run airmon-ng it shows my ath0 interface:
>
> # airmon-ng
>
>
> Interface       Chipset         Driver
>
> wifi0           Atheros         madwifi-ng
> ath0            Atheros         madwifi-ng VAP (parent: wifi0)
>
> Running 'airmon-ng start wifi0' it creates a new VAP ath1 and puts it
> in Monitor mode.  So far so good, but running airodump-ng shows no
> data being captured.  Trying to stop ath0 (in case it interferes)
> shuts down /etc/init.d/net.ath0, although I still get ath1 shown in
> iwconfig.
>
> Have I missed something basic here?  Do I need perhaps to add net.ath1
> -> /etc/init.d/net.lo in the same way that I have done for ath0?
> --
> Regards,
> Mick
>
>

Hi Mick,

I have te same thing when using kismet, after starting kismet if I use airmon-ng to look at my interfaces, I have this:

$ airmon-ng
wifi0           Atheros         madwifi-ng
ath0            Atheros         madwifi-ng VAP (parent: wifi0)
kis0            Atheros         madwifi-ng VAP (parent: wifi0)

Then if I want to shootdown kis0, I will use airmon-ng like this:

$ airmon-ng stop kis0

And kis0 will be destroyed.
So I think you can destroy any child of wifi0 by doing this with airmon-ng

For enabling monitor mode I do like you:

$ airmon-ng start wifi0

It will create a new child of wifi0, ath1 in my case.
Then starting 'airodump-ng ath1' will let me capture packet coming on ath1, if of course any AP are active in my
neighbourhood

To destroy ath1 you do like for destroying kis0

$ airmon-ng stop ath1

Hope it help


http://www.drakonix.fr

Re: [gentoo-user] Atheros chip with airodump-ng

[Mick]

2008/11/7 Fred Elno <raptor@drakonix.fr>:

> Then if I want to shootdown kis0, I will use airmon-ng like this:
>
> $ airmon-ng stop kis0
>
> And kis0 will be destroyed.
> So I think you can destroy any child of wifi0 by doing this with airmon-ng

The problem is that if I try to destroy the original logical interface
ath0 the physical interface is shutdown too.  /etc/init.d/net.ath0
status shows that the interface is stopped.

> For enabling monitor mode I do like you:
>
> $ airmon-ng start wifi0
>
> It will create a new child of wifi0, ath1 in my case.
> Then starting 'airodump-ng ath1' will let me capture packet coming on ath1, if of course any AP are active in my
> neighbourhood

Unlike you I cannot get it to work.  It will not capture anything.
Airodump-ng shows an empty table.
-- 
Regards,
Mick

Re: [gentoo-user] Atheros chip with airodump-ng

[Simon]

> Airodump-ng shows an empty table.

I've seen the empty results also...  The problem seems to be intermittent.  But 
the location seems to be in relationship to the problem also; At home, I got 
blank results once out of a hundred scans I done... at my friend's place, I got 
only blank results out of a few scans.  My guess is something is confusing the 
atheros drivers (madwifi).

I discussed some time ago with some folks at madwifi and... the answer was 
basically that they need help.  The drivers are far from being alright, there 
are obvious issues that still needs to be addressed... the creation/destruction 
of interface wasn't working very well (this is like 3 months ago).

The conclusion was to move on to ath5k, the newer drivers for atheros wireless 
cards, I was told madwifi was to be obsolete soon.  Also, kernel 2.6.27 (iirc) 
includes ath5k.

Good luck!

Re: [gentoo-user] Atheros chip with airodump-ng

[Mick]

2008/11/13 Simon <turner25@gmail.com>:
>> Airodump-ng shows an empty table.

> I discussed some time ago with some folks at madwifi and... the answer was
> basically that they need help.  The drivers are far from being alright,
> there are obvious issues that still needs to be addressed... the
> creation/destruction of interface wasn't working very well (this is like 3
> months ago).

Still the case with mine.  Development of madwifi-ng has now
slowed/stopped I believe.

> The conclusion was to move on to ath5k, the newer drivers for atheros
> wireless cards, I was told madwifi was to be obsolete soon.  Also, kernel
> 2.6.27 (iirc) includes ath5k.

Yes, I've been thinking that I should now install the athk5, but I
wasn't sure if this is would perform better or worse than the
madwifi-ng drivers.  It seems like I should give it a spin.

Thanks!
-- 
Regards,
Mick

Re: [gentoo-user] Atheros chip with airodump-ng

[Stroller]

On 13 Nov 2008, at 19:32, Simon wrote:
> ...
> I discussed some time ago with some folks at madwifi and... the  
> answer was basically that they need help.  The drivers are far from  
> being alright, there are obvious issues that still needs to be  
> addressed... the creation/destruction of interface wasn't working  
> very well (this is like 3 months ago).
>
> The conclusion was to move on to ath5k, the newer drivers for  
> atheros wireless cards, I was told madwifi was to be obsolete soon.

I have an Allnet ALL0281 here which I haven't used in a while, but  
which I was VERY pleased with under madwifi.

Under madwifi (not sure if it was madwifi-ng or ye olde one that I  
used) it can be used in master mode with multiple virtual access- 
points. For example, one could have separate WEP & open networks on  
the same wireless card; these were presented as different interfaces  
(wifi0, wifi1, wifi...) so they could be firewalled appropriately.

This card is sitting here ready for when I rebuild the server (in my  
Copious Free Time, obviously).

Can anyone tell me if the ath5k drivers support virtual APs in this  
way? It is VERY useful.

Stroller.

Re: [gentoo-user] Atheros chip with airodump-ng

[Simon]

> Under madwifi (not sure if it was madwifi-ng or ye olde one that I used) 
> it can be used in master mode with multiple virtual access-points. For 
> example, one could have separate WEP & open networks on the same 
> wireless card; these were presented as different interfaces (wifi0, 
> wifi1, wifi...) so they could be firewalled appropriately.
> 
> This card is sitting here ready for when I rebuild the server (in my 
> Copious Free Time, obviously).
> 
> Can anyone tell me if the ath5k drivers support virtual APs in this way? 
> It is VERY useful.

Last time I checked, ath5k did not support master mode, but the managed mode is 
very good (or better than madwifi-ng) and they fixed a lot of concept problems 
dealing with the creation/destruction of virtual interfaces (or so I was told).

BTW, you can set multiple APs (wlan0, wlan1, etc) with madwifi-ng, but 
everything is locked by the hardware interface (wifi0)... or by everything, I 
mean all your virtual stuff will have to operate under the same radio frequency 
(set on the hardware, in wifi0).

Simon