xref: /netbsd-src/share/man/man4/atw.4 (revision e5548b402ae4c44fb816de42c7bba9581ce23ef5)
1.\"     $NetBSD: atw.4,v 1.10 2005/06/23 12:47:38 peter Exp $
2.\"
3.\" Copyright (c) 2003
4.\"	David Young <dyoung@NetBSD.org>. All rights reserved.
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30.\"	$Id: atw.4,v 1.10 2005/06/23 12:47:38 peter Exp $
31.\"
32.Dd June 5, 2004
33.Dt ATW 4
34.Os
35.Sh NAME
36.Nm atw
37.Nd ADMtek ADM8211 802.11 wireless network driver
38.Sh SYNOPSIS
39.Cd "atw* at cardbus? function ?"
40.Cd "atw* at pci? dev ? function ?"
41.Sh DESCRIPTION
42The
43.Nm
44driver supports PCI/CardBus 802.11b wireless adapters based on the
45ADMtek ADM8211.
46.Pp
47The ADM8211 is a bus-mastering 802.11 Media Access Controller (MAC)
48which is derived from ADMtek's Tulip clones (see
49.Xr tlp 4 ) .
50It supports contention-free traffic (with an 802.11 Point Coordinator),
5164/128-bit WEP encryption, and 802.11 power-saving.
52The ADM8211 integrates an RF3000 baseband processor (BBP) by RF
53Microdevices.
54.Pp
55In a typical application, the ADM8211 is coupled with an RF front-end
56by RFMD and a Silicon Laboratories Si4126 RF/IF synthesizer.
57.Pp
58With the ADM8211, the division of labor between the host and NIC
59is different than with firmware-based NICs such as
60.Xr an 4 ,
61.Xr awi 4 ,
62and
63.Xr wi 4 .
64The ADM8211 is still responsible for real-time 802.11 functions
65such as sending ACK/RTS/CTS/ATIM frames, sending beacons, and
66answering CF polls from the access point, but the host takes
67responsibility for providing 802.11 functions such as scanning,
68association, and authentication.
69The host is also responsible for programming both the BBP and the
70RF/IF synthesizer.
71.Pp
72.Nm
73contains incomplete support for the ADM8211's WEP encryption/decryption
74engine.
75.Nm
76does not yet support hardware WEP decryption, however, it will use
77the ADM8211's crypto engine to encrypt transmitted frames.
78Documentation from ADMtek claims that, in addition to the 4 128-bit
79shared WEP keys, the ADM8211 will store WEP key pairs for up to 20
80peers.
81The documentation provides no details, hence
82.Nm
83does not support the 20 key-pairs.
84.Pp
85The ADM8211 operates in 802.11 infrastructure mode (with an access
86point) and in 802.11 ad hoc mode (without an access point) at 1,
872, 5.5, and 11Mbps.
88ADMtek says that the ADM8211 cannot operate as an access point.
89.Pp
90The operating mode is selected using the
91.Xr ifconfig 8
92utility.
93For more information on configuring this device, see
94.Xr ifconfig 8
95and
96.Xr ifmedia 4 .
97.Sh HARDWARE
98Cards supported by the
99.Nm
100driver include:
101.Pp
102.Bl -item -offset indent -compact
103.It
104D-Link DWL-650 Rev. ?? CardBus card
105.It
106D-Link DWL-520 Rev. C1 PCI card
107.It
108LanReady WP2000 PCI card
109.It
110TrendNet TEW-221PC CardBus card
111.It
112Xterasys XN2511B PCI card
113.It
114.El
115.Sh DIAGNOSTICS
116.Bl -diag
117.It "atw0: failed to tune channel %d"
118The driver failed to tune the radio to a new channel.
119The radio remains tuned to the old channel.
120.It "atw0: atw_si4136_write wrote %08x, SYNCTL still busy"
121The driver waited 100ms without seeing an indication that the
122ADM8211 had finished writing a register on the Si4126 RF/IF
123synthesizer.
124.It "atw0: device timeout"
125The ADM8211 failed to generate an interrupt to acknowledge a transmit
126command.
127.El
128.Sh SEE ALSO
129.Xr arp 4 ,
130.Xr cardbus 4 ,
131.Xr ifmedia 4 ,
132.Xr netintro 4 ,
133.Xr pci 4 ,
134.Xr ifconfig 8
135.Rs
136.%T ADMtek
137.%O http://www.admtek.com.tw
138.Re
139.Rs
140.%T Silicon Laboratories
141.%O http://www.silabs.com
142.Re
143.Rs
144.%T RF Microdevicdes
145.%O http://www.rfmd.com
146.Re
147.Sh HISTORY
148The
149.Nm
150device driver first appeared in
151.Nx 2.0 .
152.Sh AUTHORS
153.An -nosplit
154The
155.Nm
156driver was written by
157.An David Young
158.Aq dyoung@NetBSD.org .
159For features which the ADM8211 has in common with the DECchip 21x4x,
160code was liberally borrowed from
161.Xr tlp 4
162by
163.An Jason Thorpe
164.Aq thorpej@NetBSD.org .
165.Sh BUGS
166The author does not fully understand what processing the duration
167fields for the PLCP header and the 802.11 header undergo before
168they are applied to a transmitted frame.
169If the duration fields in transmitted frames are incorrect, the
170performance of your network may suffer.
171.Pp
172The driver does not provide rate control when the media type is
173set to autoselect.
174.Pp
175The driver lets you change to hostap mode, but it does not work
176and it probably never will.
177.Pp
178The driver will sometimes complain that it cannot re-tune the radio
179because the transmit process has not gone idle.
180The author is investigating.
181.Pp
182Many features are still missing, especially WEP decryption and
183802.11 power-saving.
184.Pp
185The ad hoc mode has not been rigorously tested.
186IBSSs with the same SSID may not coalesce, but this should not
187matter for most applications.
188.Pp
189The driver is untested in the ad-hoc demo mode of Lucent WaveLAN
190cards.
191.Pp
192The ADM8211 supports 802.11 power-saving, however,
193.Nm
194does not support it yet.
195For time-bounded service, the ADM8211 will interoperate with an
196access point which implements the 802.11 Point Coordination Function,
197however, this is also not supported.
198.Pp
199Combinations of an ADM8211 with either an Intersil or a Marvell RF
200front-end are not supported.
201