Gigabyte AirCruiser N300 802.11n

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Gigabyte AirCruiser N300 802.11n

We have looked at many Gigabyte motherboards and graphics cards at Phoronix, but this computing company also maintains products in the mobile and communication sectors with such products as Bluetooth adapters, VoIP devices, Ultra Mobile PCs, wireless routers, and 802.11b/g/n wireless modules. Today we are checking out our first Gigabyte wireless product as we review the AirCruiser N300, which is a MiniPCI 802.11n (draft) wireless adapter. This wireless adapter uses the Ralink RT2860 chipset, and in this review we'll tell you how to setup this wireless card using ndiswrapper on Ubuntu 8.04.

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=12112

[Chandon]

Boo!!!

Reviews of products that actually *work* under Linux would be much more useful than this proprietary-driver-wrapper jank.

[negated]

What did you guys use for a hardware setup? Just from looking at your lspci output, it looks like a 780G desktop motherboard perhaps? If so, how did you connect the antenna(s)?

I'm curious because I just installed a mini-PCI wireless adapter into a notebook that didn't come with the antenna hook up, hence, no signal strength...just wondering how you got yours!

Thanks,
S

[deanjo]

Boo!!!

Reviews of products that actually *work* under Linux would be much more useful than this proprietary-driver-wrapper jank.

I'm not sure why a review of wireless card that has native linux drivers would be done using ndiswrapper as well.

[stan]

Perhaps I missed it, but your article doesn't include a link for where to buy the Gigabyte AirCruiser N300 802.11n. It would be nice to put such links on the front page so that people who like what they read can easily purchase the item :)

Ralink is the most FOSS-friendly wireless chipset manufacturer, and it would be nice to have a store that targets Linux users and sells Ralink-based wireless cards such as this. Many sellers like NewEgg, Amazon, or EBay don't list the chipset manufacturer, just the brand, so it's hard to know if the cards will work with Linux.

The closest thing I've found to a Linux-centric wireless card seller is http://www.minipci.biz , but they're only wholesale.

[bulletxt]

to those two above that seem to not know how to read:

they clearly state that there is an open source driver GPL made directly from the company. but there are 2 problems, the first is that the driver isn't still included in the kernel, the second is that it doesn't compile out of the box on a 2.6.24 kernel. so, now if you are smart enough to understand, it is way easier and faster to set and configure the driver with ndswrapper instead of playing with the source code to make it compile. do you actually understand this?

and to the guy who says "boo", you've got some problems. the card WORKS, we do not need a review of a card the works by itself. this review is usefull for people who have linux and buy this card and wonder why it doesn't work. you people are the wrong part of the linux world.

thanks phoronix for your work. I do appreciate it.

[deanjo]

to those two above that seem to not know how to read:

they clearly state that there is an open source driver GPL made directly from the company. but there are 2 problems, the first is that the driver isn't still included in the kernel, the second is that it doesn't compile out of the box on a 2.6.24 kernel. so, now if you are smart enough to understand, it is way easier and faster to set and configure the driver with ndswrapper instead of playing with the source code to make it compile. do you actually understand this?

and to the guy who says "boo", you've got some problems. the card WORKS, we do not need a review of a card the works by itself. this review is usefull for people who have linux and buy this card and wonder why it doesn't work. you people are the wrong part of the linux world.

thanks phoronix for your work. I do appreciate it.

First of all ndiswrapper doesn't "work out of the box" either. Second, time to compile GPL driver took about a total of a minute if a stable distro would have been used instead of a beta, that's the price you pay for running cutting edge vs stable. It won't be supported in the kernel until the Rt2x00 drivers add support for it. Using the ndiswrapper method limits the card to 54 mbit speeds where as the GPL drivers will give yoy full 802.11n speeds.

[Gabn]

It won't be supported in the kernel until the Rt2x00 drivers add support for it.

if your referring to this http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/ rt2x00 driver project.

Then the drivers could take awhile I asked serialmonkey and he said these cards arn't in Australia yet..

but they do plan on supporting them. so if you have one you know where to send them, if you want to speed up a in kernel driver.

I'm interested on what they motherboard they tested it on as well.

[plastikman]

Perhaps I missed it, but your article doesn't include a link for where to buy the Gigabyte AirCruiser N300 802.11n. It would be nice to put such links on the front page so that people who like what they read can easily purchase the item :)

Ralink is the most FOSS-friendly wireless chipset manufacturer, and it would be nice to have a store that targets Linux users and sells Ralink-based wireless cards such as this. Many sellers like NewEgg, Amazon, or EBay don't list the chipset manufacturer, just the brand, so it's hard to know if the cards will work with Linux.

The closest thing I've found to a Linux-centric wireless card seller is http://www.minipci.biz , but they're only wholesale.

I do not know ANYTHING about this retailer but here is a link to purchase. It looks like it is only a special order.

http://aztekcomputers.com/detail.php/part_num/ASI68137/GIGABYTE/GN-WI30N-RH

[joejarvis]

if your referring to this http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/ rt2x00 driver project.

Then the drivers could take awhile I asked serialmonkey and he said these cards arn't in Australia yet..

but they do plan on supporting them. so if you have one you know where to send them, if you want to speed up a in kernel driver.

Back in January, Ivo van Doorn wrote (http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=4200#27923) he had started work on the rt2800 drivers. I've been occasionally checking his git commits (http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/ivd/rt2x00.git;a=summary) but haven't discerned much re: rt2800. Can you provide any more of a status update? Thanks.

[Gabn]

Can you provide any more of a status update? Thanks.

I only know what serial monkey (aka Mark) is up to really because he is in my lug.

Part of the problem is hardware takes ages to get to Australia.

and i can't really comment on what Ivo van Doorn is up to..because i have no idea.

[joejarvis]

Back in January, Ivo van Doorn wrote (http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=4200#27923) he had started work on the rt2800 drivers. I've been occasionally checking his git commits (http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/ivd/rt2x00.git;a=summary) but haven't discerned much re: rt2800. Can you provide any more of a status update? Thanks.

Queue eerie music. Ivo checked in these broken drivers (http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/ivd/rt2x00.git;a=commit;h=f869900a96ba85ec9d2264cd0ba9 31623b812a75) today.

[bugmenot]

Thanks for the review. It really helps to know the details of what chipset the card has. I just received mine in the mail and it works great out of the box with OpenBSD 4.3. No 802.11n-Draft support for it, but it's a work in progress.

OpenBSD Ral Manpage
http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/man.cgi?query=ral&apropos=0&sektion=0&manpath=OpenBSD+Current&arch=i386&format=html