Diff: MA101

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+++ Version 4 

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-### Index ### 

 

-The Netgear MA101 is a compact USB 1.1 wireless adapter with support for Windows, Linux and (at least one flavour of) BSD. 

- 

-!!! Vitals 

-* '''Manufacturer :''' Netgear 

-* '''Model :''' MA101 

-* '''Type :''' USB Wireless Adapter 

-* '''External Antenna Jack:''' None (comes with a small dipole antenna) 

-* '''Chipset:''' Atmel 

-* '''Power :''' 13dB 

-* '''Receive Sensitivity :''' 

-** -84dBm@1Mbps 

-** -87dBm@2Mbps 

-** -89dBm@5.5Mbps 

-** -91dBm@11Mbps 

-* '''Drivers URL :''' See below 

-* '''Available New :''' 

-* '''Average Price :''' ~ $150 

-* '''Vitals last updated :''' 5 June 2003 

- 

-!! Official Details 

-(http://www.netgear.com/products/prod_details.asp?prodID=105&view=hm Product Details) states the following... 

- 

-11Mbps wireless desktop PC networking Reliable, 802.11b standards-based networking USB Powered, No need to open the PC WEP encryption to ensure privacy. Supports Win98/Me/2000 5 year limited warranty 

-(for Linux support - see below) 

- 

-!! Pictures 

-{http://www.netgear.com/images/products/large/ma101_big.jpg MA101} 

- 

-!! Operating Systems 

-!!! Windows 

-Information here (TBA) 

-Comes with drivers for Microsoft Windows 98/2000 and Millennium on CD-ROM. 

-* If you experience problems under win2k, the Belkin F5D6050 driver can be tweeked to work. 

-* Does not seem to work under win2k3 server 

-**  Netgear claim win2k3 driver is in the pipeline (23/06/03) 

-!!! Linux 

-There is a (http://atmelwlandriver.sourceforge.net/news.html GPL driver) for the various Atmel-based USB drivers: 

- 

-I strongly recommend reading the (http://atmelwlandriver.sourceforge.net/howto/howto.html HOWTO) as it is invaluable for getting the MA101 up and running with Linux. 

- 

-Note that there are two revisions of the MA101 (you can tell by looking at the sticker under the unit). 

-* Rev A doesn't seem to be supported by the 'official' driver anymore as the developer dropped Intersil support: use the 20021209 release if you have a Rev A unit. 

-* Rev B (Atmel AT76C50x chipset) is definitely supported. 

-I have noted packet loss of ~ 40% when running the 029921209 driver with a Red Hat 2.4.18 kernel. Upgrading to 2.4.20 and the 2.1.1 driver is meant to fix that, but I found that setting "RTS threshold" to 200 with the lvnet tool (that comes with the driver) solved the problem. 

- 

-!!! BSD's 

-The OpenBSD atu driver supports the MA101, see the atu(4) manpage for more info: 

-(http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/man.cgi?query=atu&sektion=4 atu manpage) 

- 

-!! Firmware 

-TBA 

- 

-!! Adding an external antenna 

-There is no external antenna socket, and the MA101 comes with a five year warranty; if you're happy to void the warranty, adding an external antenna is quite easy. 

-(http://www.nodomainname.co.uk/MA101/MA101.htm Nodomainname) has more information. 

- 

-There is also information on creating a (http://www.nodomainname.co.uk/cantenna3/cantenna3.htm USB cantenna), which you could do with a MA101 

- 

-!! Misc Notes 

-* Quite small: 107 x 87 x 24mm 

-* USB 1.1 and happily runs over long (for USB) distances. I have it working reliably over > 6 metres and am going to test it over 10 metres next.