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Re: Off-Topic: Beware of OrangeWire 802.11a driver for the Macintosh

2006-03-10 12:24:11
Situation update:

It appears that there are (at least) two different versions of DWL- AG660, one that works with their driver and one that doesn't. Obviously, I have the latter.

They are now actively working with me trying to get the driver to work also with this version of the card. Hence, even though I don't have a working system (yet), I am now satisfied with their e-mail support.

--Pekka Nikander

On Mar 6, 2006, at 22:26, Pekka Nikander wrote:

Some time ago, someone mentioned in this list the OrangeWare 802.11a compatible device driver for the Macintosh.
http://www1.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ietf/current/msg40249.html

Unfortunately it appears that their web page is optimistic and that in reality they do not support all of the cards that they list in their web site. Furthermore, their e-mail support leaves a lot for improvement; I haven't tried phone support due to the transatlantic costs and time zone differences.

I was unfortunate enough to buy a D-Link Air Premier DWL-AG660, and that one definitely doesn't work. If I plug the card to the laptop, the driver (OMI_80211g.kext) does not load. Looking up the card ID with System Profiler gives Vendor ID: 5772, Device ID: 27, which translates to IOPCIMatch of 0x001b168c. Adding this to the driver's Info.plist file makes the driver load on card insert, as it should, but still not the driver to recognise the card. The Mac OS X itself does recognise card; it is listed as Atheros Communications Inc AR5001-0000-0000, and System Profiler shows info on it.

I have now sent four e-mails to their support, the first one last Wednesday. I have got reply to one, and that was very unhelpful, basically asking if I had installed the driver as root or not, while I clearly indicated my findings above already in the first mail.

Hence, based on this experience so far, I would strongly advice making sure that the card that you plan to buy actually does work with the driver before buying a card. From the drivers Info.plist, cards with the following parameters appear to work:

3COM Wireless:                              0xa7270013 0x102610b7
DLink AirPlus XtremeG (Atheros 5212a):      0x1025168c 0x2027168c
Linksys A+G (Atheros):                      0x00181737
ZAtheros:                                   0x0013168c

The last one is what I suppose to match with DWL-AG660, but it doesn't, as you can see. Make sure that the IOPCIMatch code of your card, as generated from the Vendor ID and Device ID, matches one of the above. Otherwise you are almost sure to be left out of luck.

--Pekka Nikander

PS. If someone wants to buy an DWL-AG660 at Dallas (should work fine with Windows), please let me know.


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