Netstumbler; antenna aiming.

I was told by a Mfg. rep that Netstumbler will not work with his client
radio ethernet bridge because netstumbler is only for wifi client
adapters. Can this be?

I have heard that netstumbler is good for surveys and others have said
it is "listening to one end of a screwdriver to tune a car".

Are there better low cost alternatives to netstumbler, which seems to be
severely limited by chipset of mfg. to properly aim a wifi antenna?

For TV signals they use a field strength meter. Without laying out big
bucks, what can the average hobbiest use to survey a site and determine
the direction of the strongest signals?
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On 20 Jun 2006 05:16:41 +0800, ArnoldJ <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>I was told by a Mfg. rep that Netstumbler will not work with his client
>radio ethernet bridge because netstumbler is only for wifi client
>adapters. Can this be?

Basically true. Netstumbler requires an NDIS5 Windoze driver to
operate. The driver returns the various wireless statistics. These
statistics are not available in an ethernet card driver as used in a
"client radio ethernet bridge".

The exception is Kismet drone, where Kismet is actually running on the
ethernet client radio.
http://www.renderlab.net/projects/wrt54g/openwrt.html
http://toys.lerdorf.com/archives/20-...ys-WRT54G.html

>I have heard that netstumbler is good for surveys and others have said
>it is "listening to one end of a screwdriver to tune a car".

My opinion is that it's marginal for site surveys because it doesn't
show clients and radios with hidden SSID's. For site surveys a
passive sniffer such as Kismet is much better. It shows just about
everything 802.11. What it does NOT show are non-802.11 sources of
potential interference. That should be part of any site survey (but
usually is not).
http://wireless.wikia.com/wiki/Wi-Fi#Interference
Few of these will show up either Netstumbler or Kismet and require a
spectrum analyzer to see.

>Are there better low cost alternatives to netstumbler, which seems to be
>severely limited by chipset of mfg. to properly aim a wifi antenna?

See:
http://www.remote-exploit.org/index.php/Auditor_main
which includes Kismet. In boots and runs from a Knoppix Linux
"LiveCD". The catch is that it has a limited set of supported
hardware.
http://www.remote-exploit.org/index....itor_dev_list1

In the Windoze world, the main limitation is the lack of a promiscuous
mode network driver for the cards. In the Linux world, the main
limitation is the lack of cooperation and data from some vendors (i.e.
Broadcom).

>For TV signals they use a field strength meter. Without laying out big
>bucks, what can the average hobbiest use to survey a site and determine
>the direction of the strongest signals?

I have a Wi-Spy spectrum analyzer. It's not the best possible
spectrum analyzer, but it's much cheaper than the alternatives.
http://www.metageek.net/
I use a salad bowl "dish" antenna for directionality.
http://www.metageek.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=27
Again, not the best, but good enough.

I'm not sure how professional a job you want in the way of a site
survey. Article on site survey mapping vendors.
http://www.networkcomputing.com/show...leID=188500632
It's 4 pages long. You won't like the prices.

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# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558 (E-Mail Removed)
# http://802.11junk.com (E-Mail Removed)
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

Thanks, very good; complete reply.

Jeff Liebermann <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in
news:(E-Mail Removed):

> On 20 Jun 2006 05:16:41 +0800, ArnoldJ <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
>>I was told by a Mfg. rep that Netstumbler will not work with his client
>>radio ethernet bridge because netstumbler is only for wifi client
>>adapters. Can this be?
>
> Basically true. Netstumbler requires an NDIS5 Windoze driver to
> operate. The driver returns the various wireless statistics. These
> statistics are not available in an ethernet card driver as used in a
> "client radio ethernet bridge".
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