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Atheros AR5210, AR5211, AR5212, AR5213, AR5414, AR2413, AR242x wireless devices (ath5k)

This page describes how to enable support for Atheros AR5xxx wireless chipsets using the ath5k driver on Debian systems.

ath5k is a module for Atheros AR5xxx PCI wireless LAN chipsets.

Unlike the MadWifi driver, ath5k does not require a binary HAL (hardware abstraction layer) for its use. No firmware is required to be loaded from userspace. It is a completely free and open-source driver. Supported devices are listed at the end of this page.

Atheros 802.11n PCI devices are supported by the ath9k driver.

Missing Features

As stated¹ on the Linux Wireless ath5k driver page:

• XR (eXtended Range)

If required, the above feature is available in the MadWifi driver.

Known Issues

The ath5k driver is in a constant state of development, with varying levels of support for chipsets depending on their age.

AR242x chipset

Found in the Acer eMachines D620 laptop, among others. This suffers from a "noise floor calibration timeout" bug, which means the wireless may not function after installing Lenny. The bug is fixed since Linux 2.6.28.1.

Lenny users: install a backported kernel image package from Debian Backports.

Installation

ath5k is included in the mainline Linux kernel since 2.6.25. It is present in Debian kernel images since 2.6.24 and included in the Squeeze and Lenny releases.

Switching from MadWifi to ath5k

The following section can be skipped if MadWifi was not previously used.

• Installation of madwifi-tools (version 1:0.9.4~rc2+dfsg-1 and later) installs /etc/modprobe.d/madwifi, which blacklists the ath5k driver.

  • Purge the madwifi-tools package (aptitude purge madwifi-tools) and run update-initramfs -u -k all to also remove this blacklist from initramfs.

• Amend /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules and change 'ath0' to 'wlan0'.

• Amend /etc/network/interfaces, changing all references of 'ath0' to 'wlan0'.

• Restart your system.
• Verify that wireless networking is functional.

  • If you can connect but not send/receive anything, you might need to adjust your firewall configuration. For example, if you have configured your firewall using shorewall, find and replace all occurrences of 'ath0' with 'wlan0' in files within /etc/shorewall.

  • squeeze/hostapd users: the ath5k driver implements access point functionality as of Squeeze. You are required to amend any existing hostapd configuration (driver=madwifi → driver=nl80211). See the hostapd Linux documentation page for more information.

Configuration

1. Install the wireless-tools package:

   aptitude update
   aptitude install wireless-tools

2. The necessary kernel module should be automatically loaded. If necessary, it can be manually loaded via:

   modprobe ath5k

3. Verify your device has an available interface:

   iwconfig

4. Raise the interface to activate the radio, for example:

   ifconfig wlan0 up

5. Configure your wireless interface as appropriate.

Supported Devices

Devices containing Atheros AR5210, AR5211, AR5212, AR5213, AR5414, AR2413 or AR242x chipsets are supported by ath5k.

The page HowToIdentifyADevice/PCI explains how to identify a PCI device.

The following list is based on the alias fields of modinfo ath5k in Debian 2.6.32 (2.6.32-38) kernel images.

• PCI: 10B7:0013 3Com Corporation AR5212 802.11abg NIC (3CRDAG675)
  PCI: 168C:0007 Atheros Communications Inc. AR5000 802.11a Wireless Adapter
  PCI: 168C:0011 Atheros Communications Inc. AR5210 802.11a NIC
  PCI: 168C:0012 Atheros Communications Inc. AR5211 802.11ab NIC
  PCI: 168C:0013 Atheros Communications Inc. AR5212/AR5213 Multiprotocol MAC/baseband processor
  PCI: 168C:0014 Atheros Communications Inc. (Device name unknown)
  PCI: 168C:0015 Atheros Communications Inc. (Device name unknown)
  PCI: 168C:0016 Atheros Communications Inc. (Device name unknown)
  PCI: 168C:0017 Atheros Communications Inc. (Device name unknown)
  PCI: 168C:0018 Atheros Communications Inc. (Device name unknown)
  PCI: 168C:0019 Atheros Communications Inc. (Device name unknown)
  PCI: 168C:001A Atheros Communications Inc. AR2413 802.11bg NIC
  PCI: 168C:001B Atheros Communications Inc. AR5413 802.11abg NIC
  PCI: 168C:001C Atheros Communications Inc. AR242x / AR542x Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express)
  PCI: 168C:001D Atheros Communications Inc. AR5007G Wireless Network Adapter
  PCI: 168C:0207 Atheros Communications Inc. AR5210
  PCI: 168C:1014 Atheros Communications Inc. AR5212 802.11abg NIC
  PCI: A727:0013 3Com Corporation 3CRPAG175 Wireless PC Card

Unsupported

• All Atheros-based USB devices:

  • For Atheros AR9170 (802.11n), see ar9170usb.

  • For Atheros AR5007UG (802.11g), see zd1211rw.

  • For Atheros AR5005UG (802.11b/g) and AR5005UX (802.11a/b/g), see ar5523.

• Devices with an Atheros AR5005VL (AR5513) chipset (PCI-ID 168c:0020):
  • D-Link DWL-G520M (PCI)
  • D-Link DWL-G650M (Cardbus)
  • ZyXEL Zyair M-102 (Cardbus)
  • ZyXEL Zyair M-302 (PCI)

Use of NDISwrapper may be possible for support of your device.

External Links

• http://madwifi-project.org/ - project homepage;

  • http://madwifi-project.org/wiki/About/ath5k - more information on ath5k

• http://wireless.kernel.org/en/users/Drivers/ath5k - driver page on Linux Wireless

See Also

• ath9k - Help page for Atheros 802.11n PCI devices

• WiFi/ath_pci - MadWifi driver

• How to use a WiFi interface

CategoryHardware

ToDo: Move ath5k-specific content from DebianEeePC/HowTo/UseUpstreamAtherosModules to here?