Airport Extreme Card - alternatives?

[mannybianco]

It seems that the Airport Extreme card that came in my ibook is a bit on the limited side, particularly it lacks the ability to do a couple of things that would make it a very useful wireless networking tool:
1) Cant change the MAC address, even though you can on the wired ethernet interface in the ibook
2) Doesnt support a passive/promiscous/packet sniffing mode

Does anybody have suggestions for a 3rd party product that could be used with the current ibook g4 that does support these things?

Any advice appreciated...

 

[grapes911]

1. You better have a good reason to change your MAC Address. That Networking 101. Even though the chances have changing it to a computer on your network are small, its never a good idea.

2. I'm pretty sure it does, if you use the right driver.

Being you have an iBook, your only other options are too get a USB wireless adapter.

 

[linky]

It seems that the Airport Extreme card that came in my ibook is a bit on the limited side, particularly it lacks the ability to do a couple of things that would make it a very useful wireless networking tool:
1) Cant change the MAC address, even though you can on the wired ethernet interface in the ibook
2) Doesnt support a passive/promiscous/packet sniffing mode

Does anybody have suggestions for a 3rd party product that could be used with the current ibook g4 that does support these things?

Any advice appreciated...

if 80211.G is not a requirement i would recommend the Dlink DWL-122. It's based off of a prism 2 chipset and can go into passive mode (unlike the AE's broadcom) - it works well with the various stumbler programs and is ~30$

 

[mannybianco]

Thanks for the responses guys.

From what I can make out, the underlying AE Broadcom driver is pretty well closed off and does not officially allow you to do things like change to monitor mode. The only other drivers i have seen mentioned is the one that kismac uses, which seems to be different, but still doesnt support monitor mode. If there are other drivers, please point them out, would be much appreciated. Or is this one of those Apple update things where previous versions of Apple's own driver allowed it, but they have since switched it off?

How well does the D-Link coexist with the Airport Extreme? As it is only "b", i wouldnt want to have to physically remove the AE, as the bandwidth is useful.

 

[grapes911]

From what I can make out, the underlying AE Broadcom driver is pretty well closed off and does not officially allow you to do things like change to monitor mode. The only other drivers i have seen mentioned is the one that kismac uses, which seems to be different, but still doesnt support monitor mode. If there are other drivers, please point them out, would be much appreciated. Or is this one of those Apple update things where previous versions of Apple's own driver allowed it, but they have since switched it off?

The drivers included with KisMac are the ones I was refering too. Sorry, I should have stated that.

 

[mannybianco]

Hmm...nosing round the forums nobody seems to have anything good to say about the D-Link, and nothing better to suggest either. With the ubiquitous nature of AE, this whole area looks closed off.

The Kismac drivers are odd, I could have sworn I read somewhere that they had finally been able to get the AE into passive mode, but I have the latest version and the AE still shows up as active mode only. And it keeps locking up.

 

[linky]

Hmm...nosing round the forums nobody seems to have anything good to say about the D-Link, and nothing better to suggest either. With the ubiquitous nature of AE, this whole area looks closed off.

The Kismac drivers are odd, I could have sworn I read somewhere that they had finally been able to get the AE into passive mode, but I have the latest version and the AE still shows up as active mode only. And it keeps locking up.

the DWL122 is a USB thumbdrive looking device, it's not all that great for wardriving due to it's lack of external antena but i've been able to break 3 or 4 friends/family wep keys in just a few hours when they where *sure* they had their network protected ;D

 

[grapes911]

the DWL122 is a USB thumbdrive looking device, it's not all that great for wardriving due to it's lack of external antena but i've been able to break 3 or 4 friends/family wep keys in just a few hours when they where *sure* they had their network protected ;D

Is that how you test if a network device is good: Can I break WEP? Anyone can break Wired Equivalent Privacy with any wireless network device. Anyone who trusts WEP for security is foolish.

 

[Hemingray]

Here's a good page I found with more discussion and links on the DWL-122. I went ahead and ordered one today for my iBook G4 just for the heck of it. $22 ain't a bad venture!

http://www.neowin.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t308830.html

Here's my only question: Does Kismac, once it's cracked a WEP key, actually report that key to you for future reference? Or does it just connect to the cracked network without telling you the results?

Why I ask: from what I've read, the DWL-122's driver is fairly unstable, even the 1.4.7 one. So I'd want to use the DWL-122 just for cracking a WEP key, and then once I've done that, switch over to my Airport Extreme card for more stability. But of course, if I did that I'd need to manually put in the WEP key for my Airport card to connect. Anyone?