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Wireless PCMCIA card range

PostPosted: Thu Jul 18, 2002 10:16 am
by g0tr00t
Question: What is the average range of a wireless PCMCIA card? (Built-in antenna)

Answer: It appears that each manufacturer will supply different ranges, but for averages the table below should suffice.

11 Mbit/s
Range in meters­(feet)
Open Office 160 m (525 ft)
Semi Open Office 50 m (165 ft)
Closed Office 25 m (80 ft)
Closed Office 25 m (80 ft)
Receiver Sensitivity -82
Delay Spread (at FER of <1%) 65ns

5.5 Mbit/s
Range in meters­(feet)
Open Office 270 m (885 ft)
Semi Open Office 70 m (230 ft)
Closed Office 35 m (115 ft)
Closed Office 35 m (115 ft)
Receiver Sensitivity -87
Delay Spread (at FER of <1%) 225ns

2 Mbit/s
Range in meters­(feet)
Open Office 400 m (1300 ft)
Semi Open Office 90 m (300 ft)
Closed Office 40 m (130 ft)
Closed Office 40 m (130 ft)
Receiver Sensitivity -91
Delay Spread (at FER of <1%) 400ns

1 Mbit/s
Range in meters­(feet)
Open Office 550 m (1750 ft)
Semi Open Office 115 m (375 ft)
Closed Office 50 m (165 ft)
Closed Office 50 m (165 ft)
Receiver Sensitivity -94
Delay Spread (at FER of <1%) 500ns

PostPosted: Thu Jul 18, 2002 12:55 pm
by Mojo-_-Jojo
Your range is going to be a function of several factors:

Transmit Power (ERP at the antenna)
Receive Sensitivity
Antenna Gain
RF Propogation Pattern
Obstructions between source and reception

The manufacturers numbers may or may not be typical. (I find that most vendors overstate their numbers.) Building construction varies from wood and sheet rock to concrete and metal.

Not to get overly technical, your mileage will vary!

Regards

Mo

WEP information

PostPosted: Thu Jul 25, 2002 11:04 pm
by JimmyPopAli
Q: Different equipment is marked as 40-bit, 64-bit, 104-bit and 128-bit WEP. Where can I learn more about WEP?

A: Actually, there are only two classes of WEP. However, due to the manner in which it is expressed, each class may be called by one of two different names. What you need to remember:

40-bit WEP is the same as 64-bit WEP.
104-bit WEP is the same as 128-bit WEP.


This is because the initialization vector used in the encryption is 24 bits. Therefore, 40+24=64, and 104+24=128. They are the same classes, just a different way to express it.

One other detail to note: Only 40/64-bit WEP is defined in the 802.11b standard. 104/128-bit WEP is implemented by many manufacturers, but it is not part of the standard. This means that different brands of equipment may not communicate with other brands using 104/128-bit WEP. While some do communicated well (e.g. Linksys and ORiNOCO), many units will work only at the 40/64-bit level with other brands of equipment .

============================================

Q: Where can I learn more about WEP?

A: Here are some good sites loaded with information on WEP.

Weaknesses in the Key Scheduling Algorithm of RC4
http://online.securityfocus.com/data/library/rc4_ksaproc.pdf

Attack to Break WEP
http://www.cs.rice.edu/~astubble/wep/

Cracking WEP Keys. Presented at Blackhat 2001
http://www.lava.net/~newsham/wlan/WEP_password_cracker.ppt

Practical Exploitation of RC4 Weaknesses in WEP Environments
http://dachb0den.com/projects/bsd-airtools/wepexp.txt

802.11b Wireless Security
http://www.dachb0den.com/projects/bsd-airtools/wireless.ppt

FCC Regulations

PostPosted: Thu Aug 08, 2002 4:57 am
by Thorn
Q: I keep hearing about the FCC and regulations. Where can I find out more?

A: The Industrial, Scientific and Medical (ISM) band, which WiFi is part of, falls under the Federal Communications Commission's Part 15 Rules. http://www.fcc.gov

An excellant summary of the Part 15 regulations can be found at: http://www.lns.com/papers/part15/ . It was written by Tim Pozar, one of the founders of the Bay Area Wireless User's Group and a broadcast engineer.

FCC Search

PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2002 11:08 pm
by stonent
If you want to see the inside of your WAP, Router or WiFi card, just go here:
https://gullfoss2.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/ws.exe/prod/oet/forms/reports/Search_Form.hts?form=Generic_Search

For example, type in "Linksys" and find the FCC ID. Click on the documents link and then the "Inside Photos"

Chipsets

PostPosted: Sat Sep 21, 2002 4:55 pm
by c-mag
THE TRUTH BEHIND WIRELESS HARDWARE
Two major chipset control Wireless networking. The Prism and WaveLan. Find out which is Windows XP friendly.

...

Story here.

Without WEP, with VPN

PostPosted: Wed Oct 02, 2002 1:01 pm
by blackwave
Question: If I'm connecting to my access point (or any, for that matter) without WEP enabled, but I'm connecting through a VPN, is my information that I'm transmitting safe? What if I'm just browsing with explorer on the net, though an encrypted page? If my transmissions are intercepted, will they be able to see what I entered in the web page?

Answer: There are different types of safe.

Your data going through an encrypted tunnel is safe from sniffers.

Not using WEP only exposes your network from someone associating to it, so they may have the ability to surf the net as well as whatever else is exposed on your network...

For best results please follow Thorn's RFC
NetStumbler.com Forums > Misc Forums > Off-Topic > RFC: Wireless security checklist
http://forums.netstumbler.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2920



Originally asked by phil22407
Answered by blackwave

APs and WEP

PostPosted: Thu Jan 16, 2003 1:56 pm
by fawking
Question: I know WEP is encrypting packets, but does it prevent you from connecting to the AP to try and use internet access? (As long as there are not MAC filters or anything else in the way.)

Answer: Yes, as the AP will only accept the encrypted packets.

Reportedly some APs will accept both encrpyted and non-encrypted traffic at the same time, so make sure you RTM when you're setting it up.

Originally asked by fawking
Answered by Thorn

SSID for Client Adapter so it grabs any AP availible

PostPosted: Sun Mar 09, 2003 1:25 pm
by aphex
Q: What is the SSID that will connect with whatever WiFi network is availible to it?

A: The SSID is "ANY" (without the quotes.)

Answered by DigitalMDX

Common acronyms

PostPosted: Fri Mar 28, 2003 7:36 am
by Thorn
Q: What are all those acronyms you guys at throwing around?

A: Here are some common acronyms:

AP Access Point
BSS Basic Service Set
CPE Customer Premises Equipment
DSSS Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum
EIRP Effective Isotropic/Intentional Radiated Power
EMI ElectroMagnetic Interference
ESSID Extended Service Set IDentifierFH
FHSS Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum
ISM Industrial, Scientific, and Medical
LOS Line Of Sight
NLOS Near/Non LOS
OFDM Orthonagol Frequency Division Multiplexing
PtMP Point-to-MultiPoint
PtP Point-to-Point
RF Radio Frequency
RFI Radio Frequency Interference
RSSI Receive Signal Strength Indication
SSID Service Set IDentifier
UNII Unlicensed-National Information Infrastructure
WEP Wired Equivalent Privacy

How Do I setup a SSH tunnel

PostPosted: Wed Jul 23, 2003 12:33 pm
by renderman
Q: How do I setup a SSH tunnel for <Insert service> over wireless

A: First you require an SSH capable server that you can log into, as well as a SSH client on the client computer

From there, follow these instructions to configure your client:

http://borosenclave.com/putty-ssh/ - For windows

http://internetconnection.net/support/tech-sshtunnels.shtml - For Unix

Google is your friend

Q: What signal level should I consider usable for a good wireless link?

PostPosted: Tue Feb 08, 2005 4:25 pm
by Dutch
Marius just posted an excellent explanation on his own site. I've taken the liberty to copy it here:
Marius wrote:
I get asked this question rather too often, so I'm posting my short answer here. The answer is rather more complex than it ought to be, and depends on a huge number of factors.

The most important is the receive sensitivity of your equipment. Many manufacturers fail to publish this data, but those that do will generally rate their radios by dBm at various data rates. As an example, let us take the venerable ORiNOCO Gold 802.11b "Classic" card. Its receive sensitivity is:
-94 dBm at 1 Mbps

-91 dBm at 2 Mbps

-87 dBm at 5.5 Mbps

-82 dBm at 11 Mbps

In theory this means, in order to operate at 11 Mbps, this card must be consistently receiving a minimum signal level of -82 dBm. Any less and it is likely to drop to one of the lower rates]Q: [/B] What signal level should I consider usable for a good wireless link?
A: Depends on your equipment and your environment.


Dutch