wanted THE perfect wlan pcmcia card...
 

Hi there

ok i am searching for a pcmcia wlan card which fits all my needs, i know that there are a lot of articles out there about wlan pcmcia cards, but they all can't give me enough information. So i would like to hear some statements from other users.

Okay here are the requirements:

- It "would" be great if it supports 802.11g
- it should be cheap or at least the ratio between usage and cost should be alright
- it should be Lucent MC plugable
- it should support the monitor mode "without" patching to hell...
- it should be fully supported under 2.6 kernel

yes, as you may have recognized i am searching the perfect wardriving wlan card.

Any sugesstions are appreciated.

Greets

Anyone?

Okay i came up with an SMC 2531W-B EU card it has the possibility to plug in an extern antenna.
Only cisco card has this future too.

I talked to the SMC Hotline and asked for the used chipset, they couldn't give me an answer!!!!
So I hope to get some answers from you guys. As anyone experience with this card? I couldn't find a thread regarding
this card nor google found anything useable.

Which cards have the ability to plug in external antennas, expect smc and cisco cards???

SMC, ZyXEL (maybe others) re-brand the Zcomax cards which may meet some of your requirements. The 2532W-B is 200mw (most cards are <100) and uses a detachable antenna. Remove it, and you can plug into the exposed MMCX connectors.

The chipset is Prism2.5 - well-supported, but 802.11b only. Demarctech also offers a version of this card type, including a 300mw version - the most powerful on I know of.

Comparable, but a slightly different design, is Senao. 200mw; internal and external antenna models. Netgate.com is the best U.S. source. They carry pigtails and antennae as well.

A nice, cheap magnetic-mount antenna that includes a pigtail compatible with the Zcomax-based designs: http://www.provantage.com/buy-7ZYXE0...1-shopping.htm
At $16, it's cheaper than the pigtail alone most places. I use this antenna with a 100mw ZyAIR B-101 version of the Zcomax with Kismet.

As for the patching, it's one small file and a couple of commands to make these cards work in monitor mode. Clear instructions are on the Airsnort site.

this may sound funny, and i laugh everytime i use it. The microsoft MN-520 has been by far the easiest to use under linux, and its cheap (29.99 at officeMAX). Uses the orinoco drivers and I got it to do monitor mode by simply applying the dragorn patch to the 2.6.6 source and compiling the kernel. Works like a champ.