rndis_wlan

The rndis_wlan FullMAC driver was added to the stock kernel as of 2.6.25. It is also available through the compat-wireless-2.6 package for pre-2.6.25 kernels.

supported chips

Broadcom 4320 USB WLAN chip, which is only wireless RNDIS chip known to date. Althought rndis_wlan has vendor/device-id list, driver can also autodetect any new wireless RNDIS device.

available devices

• Asus WL169gE

• Belkin F5D7051

• BT Voyager 1055

• Buffalo WLI-U2-KG125S

• Buffalo WLI-USB-G54

• Eminent EM4045

• Linksys WUSB54GSCv1 (v2 unsupported)

• Linksys WUSB54GSv1

• Linksys WUSB54GSv2

• U.S. Robotics USR5420

• U.S. Robotics USR5421

what works

• unencrypted networks

• WPA/WPA2 PSK/Enterprise

• WEP should work

• ad-hoc should work, unencrypted and WEP

• hidden networks, unencrypted and WEP

what does not

• Hidden + WPA

known problems

• Driver has been tested with b-variant of chipset/firmware. Older devices with a-variant of chipset/firmware used to operate poorly with this driver but this should be resolved on newer kernels (>=2.6.32).

• The driver included in kernels <= 2.6.37 shows very few scan results with a-variant devices. Workaround this by configuring the device statically (e.g., /etc/network/interfaces or by issuing iwconfig/dhclient right after boot). Do not rely on a beacon being detected to determine if a network is available or not — this is NetworkManager’s approach, which can make it take hours until it detects and configures an available network. This issue should be resolved in kernel version 2.6.38.