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Ralink RT2070, RT2770, RT2870, RT3070, RT3071, RT3072 devices (rt2870sta)

This page describes how to enable support for WiFi devices based on the Ralink RT2800U[D] and RT3000U[D] chipsets on Debian systems.

{i} Wheezy users, see rt2800usb for device support.

rt2870sta is a module for the Ralink RT2800U[D] and RT3000U[D] USB 802.11 draft-n wireless LAN chipsets. Supported devices are listed at the end of this page.

This experimental vendor driver is included as a staging driver in the mainline Linux kernel since 2.6.29. It is present in Debian kernel images since 2.6.29 (i386, amd64). The rt3070sta staging driver was merged with rt2870sta at Linux 2.6.32.

Firmware has been removed from the driver in Debian kernel images as of 2.6.30.1 It is available in the firmware-ralink package since version 0.17.2

<!> The staging driver depends on the x86 or x86-64 architecture (Debian i386 and AMD64 ports respectively) at this time.

{i} Ralink 802.11n PCI devices are supported by the rt2860sta driver. Ralink 802.11g USB devices are supported by the rt73usb and rt2500usb drivers.

Installation

Squeeze

  1. Add a "non-free" component to /etc/apt/sources.list, for example:

    # Debian Squeeze/6.0
    deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian squeeze main contrib non-free
  2. Update the list of available packages and install the firmware-ralink and wireless-tools packages:

    aptitude update
    aptitude install firmware-ralink wireless-tools
  3. If not already performed, connect the device to your system.
  4. The necessary kernel module should be automatically loaded. If necessary, it can be manually loaded via:

    modprobe rt2870sta
  5. Verify your device has an available interface:

    iwconfig
  6. Raise the interface to activate the radio, for example:

    ifconfig wlan0 up
  7. Configure your wireless interface as appropriate.

Lenny

  1. Add the Debian Backports repository to /etc/apt/sources.list, also including the "non-free" component. For example:

    # Backported packages for Debian Lenny/5.0
    deb http://backports.debian.org/debian-backports lenny-backports main contrib non-free
  2. Update the list of available packages:

    aptitude update
  3. Install a 2.6.32 kernel image appropriate for your system, along with the lenny-backports/firmware-ralink and wireless-tools packages. For example:

    aptitude -t lenny-backports install linux-image-$(uname -r|sed 's,[^-]*-[^-]*-,,') firmware-ralink wireless-tools
  4. Restart your system and boot with the newly installed kernel. If not already performed, connect the device to your system.
  5. The necessary kernel module should be automatically loaded. If necessary, it can be manually loaded via:

    modprobe rt2870sta
  6. Verify your device has an available interface:

    iwconfig
  7. Raise the interface to activate the radio, for example:

    ifconfig wlan0 up
  8. Configure your wireless interface as appropriate.

Wheezy

The Ralink staging drivers were disabled at linux-2.6 2.6.35-1~experimental.3. See rt2800usb for device support.

Troubleshooting

Supported Devices

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

The following list is based on the alias fields of modinfo rt2870sta in Debian 2.6.32 (2.6.32-34squeeze1) kernel images.

See Also


CategoryHardware | CategoryWireless

  1. Resolves Debian bug 521553. (1)

  2. Resolves Debian bug 533847. (2)