1.\"- 2.\" Copyright (c) 2002-2008 Sam Leffler, Errno Consulting 3.\" All rights reserved. 4.\"" 5.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 6.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 7.\" are met: 8.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 9.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer, 10.\" without modification. 11.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce at minimum a disclaimer 12.\" similar to the "NO WARRANTY" disclaimer below ("Disclaimer") and any 13.\" redistribution must be conditioned upon including a substantially 14.\" similar Disclaimer requirement for further binary redistribution. 15.\" 16.\" NO WARRANTY 17.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS 18.\" ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT 19.\" LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF NONINFRINGEMENT, MERCHANTIBILITY 20.\" AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL 21.\" THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, 22.\" OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF 23.\" SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS 24.\" INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER 25.\" IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) 26.\" ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF 27.\" THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. 28.\" 29.\" $FreeBSD$ 30.\"/ 31.Dd April 13, 2008 32.Dt ATH 4 33.Os 34.Sh NAME 35.Nm ath 36.Nd "Atheros IEEE 802.11 wireless network driver" 37.Sh SYNOPSIS 38To compile this driver into the kernel, 39place the following lines in your 40kernel configuration file: 41.Bd -ragged -offset indent 42.Cd "device ath" 43.Cd "device ath_hal" 44.Cd "device ath_rate_sample" 45.Cd "device wlan" 46.Ed 47.Pp 48Alternatively, to load the driver as a 49module at boot time, place the following line in 50.Xr loader.conf 5 : 51.Bd -literal -offset indent 52if_ath_load="YES" 53.Ed 54.Sh DESCRIPTION 55The 56.Nm 57driver provides support for wireless network adapters based on 58the Atheros AR5210, AR5211, and AR5212 programming APIs. 59These APIs are used by a wide variety of chips; most all chips with 60a PCI and/or CardBus interface are supported. 61Chip-specific support is provided by the Atheros Hardware Access Layer 62(HAL), that is packaged separately. 63.Pp 64Supported features include 802.11 and 802.3 frames, power management, BSS, 65IBSS, and host-based access point operation modes. 66All host/device interaction is via DMA. 67.Pp 68The 69.Nm 70driver encapsulates all IP and ARP traffic as 802.11 frames, however 71it can receive either 802.11 or 802.3 frames. 72Transmit speed and operating mode is selectable 73and depends on the specific chipset. 74AR5210-based devices support 802.11a operation with transmit speeds 75of 6 Mbps, 9 Mbps, 12 Mbps, 18 Mbps, 24 Mbps, 36 Mbps, 48 Mbps, and 54 Mbps. 76AR5211-based devices support 802.11a and 802.11b operation with transmit 77speeds as above for 802.11a operation and 781Mbps, 2Mbps, 5.5 Mbps and 11Mbps for 802.11b operation. 79AR5212-based devices support 802.11a, 802.11b, and 802.11g operation 80with transmit speeds appropriate to each. 81Most chips also support an Atheros Turbo Mode (TM) that operates in 82the 5Ghz frequency range with 2x the transmit speeds. 83Some chips also support Turbo mode in the 2.4Ghz range with 802.11g 84though this support is not presently available due to regulatory requirements. 85(Note that Turbo modes are, however, 86only interoperable with other Atheros-based devices.) 87The actual transmit speed used is dependent on signal quality and the 88.Dq "rate control" 89algorithm employed by the driver. 90All chips support WEP encryption. 91The AR5212 has hardware support for the AES-CCM, TKIP, and Michael cryptographic 92operations required for WPA. 93To enable encryption, use 94.Xr ifconfig 8 95as shown below. 96.Pp 97The driver supports 98.Cm station , 99.Cm adhoc , 100.Cm adhoc-demo , 101.Cm hostap , 102.Cm wds , 103and 104.Cm monitor 105mode operation. 106Multiple 107.Cm hostap 108virtual interfaces may be configured for simultaneous 109use on cards that use a 5212 part. 110When multiple interfaces are configured each may have a separate 111mac address that is formed by setting the U/L bits in the mac 112address assigned to the underlying device. 113Any number of 114.Cm wds 115virtual interfaces may be configured together with 116.Cm hostap 117interfaces. 118Multiple 119.Cm station 120interfaces may be operated together with 121.Cm hostap 122interfaces to construct a wireless repeater device. 123For more information on configuring this device, see 124.Xr ifconfig 8 . 125.Pp 126Devices supported by the 127.Nm 128driver come in either Cardbus or mini-PCI packages. 129Wireless cards in Cardbus slots may be inserted and ejected on the fly. 130.Sh HARDWARE 131The 132.Nm 133driver supports most Atheros Cardbus or PCI cards, 134except those that are based on the AR5005VL chipset. 135More recent parts may require a hal that is not part of 136.Fb . 137.Pp 138A list of cards that are supported can be found at 139.Pa http://customerproducts.atheros.com/customerproducts/default.asp . 140.Sh EXAMPLES 141Join an existing BSS network (ie: connect to an access point): 142.Pp 143.Dl "ifconfig ath0 inet 192.168.0.20 netmask 0xffffff00" 144.Pp 145Join a specific BSS network with network name 146.Dq Li my_net : 147.Pp 148.Dl "ifconfig ath0 inet 192.168.0.20 netmask 0xffffff00 ssid my_net" 149.Pp 150Join a specific BSS network with WEP encryption: 151.Bd -literal -offset indent 152ifconfig wlan0 create wlandev ath0 153ifconfig wlan0 inet 192.168.0.20 netmask 0xffffff00 ssid my_net \e 154 wepmode on wepkey 0x8736639624 155.Ed 156.Pp 157Join/create an 802.11b IBSS network with network name 158.Dq Li my_net : 159.Bd -literal -offset indent 160ifconfig wlan0 create wlandev ath0 wlanmode adhoc 161ifconfig wlan0 inet 192.168.0.22 netmask 0xffffff00 ssid my_net \e 162 mode 11b 163.Ed 164.Pp 165Create an 802.11g host-based access point: 166.Bd -literal -offset indent 167ifconfig wlan0 create wlandev ath0 wlanmode hostap 168ifconfig wlan0 inet 192.168.0.10 netmask 0xffffff00 ssid my_ap \e 169 mode 11g 170.Ed 171.Pp 172Create two virtual 802.11a host-based access points, one with 173with WEP enabled and one with no security, and bridge them to 174the fxp0 (wired) device: 175.Bd -literal -offset indent 176ifconfig wlan0 create wlandev ath0 wlanmode hostap \e 177 ssid paying-customers wepmode on wepkey 0x1234567890 \e 178 mode 11a up 179ifconfig wlan1 create wlandev ath0 wlanmode hostap bssid \e 180 ssid freeloaders up 181ifconfig bridge0 create addm wlan0 addm wlan1 addm fxp0 up 182.Ed 183.Sh DIAGNOSTICS 184.Bl -diag 185.It "ath%d: unable to attach hardware; HAL status %u" 186The Atheros Hardware Access Layer was unable to configure the hardware 187as requested. 188The status code is explained in the HAL include file 189.Pa sys/contrib/dev/ath/ah.h . 190.It "ath%d: failed to allocate descriptors: %d" 191The driver was unable to allocate contiguous memory for the transmit 192and receive descriptors. 193This usually indicates system memory is scarce and/or fragmented. 194.It "ath%d: unable to setup a data xmit queue!" 195The request to the HAL to set up the transmit queue for normal 196data frames failed. 197This should not happen. 198.It "ath%d: unable to setup a beacon xmit queue!" 199The request to the HAL to set up the transmit queue for 802.11 beacon frames 200frames failed. 201This should not happen. 202.It "ath%d: 802.11 address: %s" 203The MAC address programmed in the EEPROM is displayed. 204.It "ath%d: hardware error; resetting" 205An unrecoverable error in the hardware occurred. 206Errors of this sort include unrecoverable DMA errors. 207The driver will reset the hardware and continue. 208.It "ath%d: rx FIFO overrun; resetting" 209The receive FIFO in the hardware overflowed before the data could be 210transferred to the host. 211This typically occurs because the hardware ran short of receive 212descriptors and had no place to transfer received data. 213The driver will reset the hardware and continue. 214.It "ath%d: unable to reset hardware; hal status %u" 215The Atheros Hardware Access Layer was unable to reset the hardware 216as requested. 217The status code is explained in the HAL include file 218.Pa sys/contrib/dev/ath/ah.h . 219This should not happen. 220.It "ath%d: unable to start recv logic" 221The driver was unable to restart frame reception. 222This should not happen. 223.It "ath%d: device timeout" 224A frame dispatched to the hardware for transmission did not complete in time. 225The driver will reset the hardware and continue. 226This should not happen. 227.It "ath%d: bogus xmit rate 0x%x" 228An invalid transmit rate was specified for an outgoing frame. 229The frame is discarded. 230This should not happen. 231.It "ath%d: ath_chan_set: unable to reset channel %u (%u Mhz)" 232The Atheros Hardware Access Layer was unable to reset the hardware 233when switching channels during scanning. 234This should not happen. 235.It "ath%d: unable to allocate channel table" 236The driver was unable to allocate memory for the table used to hold 237the set of available channels. 238.It "ath%d: unable to collect channel list from hal" 239A problem occurred while querying the HAL to find the set of available 240channels for the device. 241This should not happen. 242.It "ath%d: failed to enable memory mapping" 243The driver was unable to enable memory-mapped I/O to the PCI device registers. 244This should not happen. 245.It "ath%d: failed to enable bus mastering" 246The driver was unable to enable the device as a PCI bus master for doing DMA. 247This should not happen. 248.It "ath%d: cannot map register space" 249The driver was unable to map the device registers into the host address space. 250This should not happen. 251.It "ath%d: could not map interrupt" 252The driver was unable to allocate an IRQ for the device interrupt. 253This should not happen. 254.It "ath%d: could not establish interrupt" 255The driver was unable to install the device interrupt handler. 256This should not happen. 257.El 258.Sh SEE ALSO 259.Xr ath_hal 4 , 260.Xr intro 4 , 261.Xr cardbus 4 , 262.Xr pcic 4 , 263.Xr wlan 4 , 264.Xr wlan_ccmp 4 , 265.Xr wlan_tkip 4 , 266.Xr wlan_wep 4 , 267.Xr wlan_xauth 4 , 268.Xr hostapd 8 , 269.Xr ifconfig 8 , 270.Xr wpa_supplicant 8 . 271.Sh HISTORY 272The 273.Nm 274device driver first appeared in 275.Fx 5.2 . 276.Sh CAVEATS 277Different regulatory domains have different default channels for adhoc 278mode. 279See 280.Xr ifconfig 8 281for information on how to change the channel. 282Different regulatory domains may not be able to communicate with each 283other with 802.11a as different regulatory domains do not necessarily 284have overlapping channels. 285.Pp 286Revision A1 of the D-LINK DWL-G520 and DWL-G650 are based on an 287Intersil PrismGT chip and are not supported by this driver. 288.Sh BUGS 289There is no software retransmit; only hardware retransmit is used. 290.Pp 291The driver does not fully enable power-save operation of the chip 292in station mode; consequently power use is suboptimal (e.g. on a laptop). 293.Pp 294WPA is not supported for 5210 parts. 295