Are there any WLANs that work out-of-the-box with Linux?

I am trying to switch to Linux even though I do not know anything about
writing device drivers. I have been told that one does not have to
know how to write device drivers in order to use Linux anymore. Furthermore,
I know of at least one guy who claims to have just plugged in a WLAN card
and used in under SuSE 9.2 Is this really possible? Which, if any, WLAN
devices work out-of-the-box?

--
Please reply to: | "When you are dealing with secretive regimes
pciszek at panix dot com | that want to deceive, you're never going to
Autoreply is disabled | be able to be positive." -Condoleezza Rice

Paul Ciszek wrote:

> I am trying to switch to Linux even though I do not know anything about
> writing device drivers. I have been told that one does not have to
> know how to write device drivers in order to use Linux anymore.
> Furthermore, I know of at least one guy who claims to have just plugged in
> a WLAN card
> and used in under SuSE 9.2 Is this really possible? Which, if any, WLAN
> devices work out-of-the-box?
>

The built in WiFi in my ThinkPad R31 works fine with SuSE 9.1 and I'll be
installing 9.2 shortly.

(E-Mail Removed) (Paul Ciszek) wrote:
>I am trying to switch to Linux even though I do not know anything about
>writing device drivers. I have been told that one does not have to
>know how to write device drivers in order to use Linux anymore. Furthermore,

I've been using Linux code since Linus first posted it, and
running Linux since 0.99pl6 (early 1993).

I've *never* written a device driver, and don't really have a
clue how.

>I know of at least one guy who claims to have just plugged in a WLAN card
>and used in under SuSE 9.2 Is this really possible? Which, if any, WLAN
>devices work out-of-the-box?

This message is being typed up on an HP Pavilion ze4900 laptop
with Broadcom wifi client hardware built in. Another box has a
Linksys wmp54g pci card, and both connect to a Linksys wrt54g
wifi router as the access point.

For the wifi clients, ndiswrapper is used to load the drivers
supplied with the cards. The Broadcom unit will work with
either the bcmwl5 or bcmwl5a drivers (available on the net or on
the CD supplied by HP). The Linksys card works with the rt2500
driver on the CD that came with the card.

The boxes all use a Slackware based system, running a 2.6.9
kernel.

So I'm sitting in the restaurant across the road from my home,
typing this up on my laptop, sipping coffee and talking to
friends... while I check Usenet and read my email too.

--
Floyd L. Davidson <http://web.newsguy.com/floyd_davidson>
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska) (E-Mail Removed)

On 2005-01-02, Paul Ciszek <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> I know of at least one guy who claims to have just plugged in a WLAN card
> and used in under SuSE 9.2 Is this really possible? Which, if any, WLAN
> devices work out-of-the-box?

Most Intel, Orinico and other devices that uses well-known chipsets
does. Suggestion: first check which chipset is supported and which
chipset is in the device you want to buy, then buy it. Not the other
way around.

Davide

--
Hey, you're right. I don't want to call a destructor on my objects, I
want to call a *destroyer*. Gozer has come for your memory, little
PersistentNode! -- Joel Gluth

Davide Bianchi wrote:

> On 2005-01-02, Paul Ciszek <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>> I know of at least one guy who claims to have just plugged in a WLAN
>> card
>> and used in under SuSE 9.2 Is this really possible? Which, if any,
>> WLAN devices work out-of-the-box?
>
> Most Intel, Orinico and other devices that uses well-known chipsets
> does. Suggestion: first check which chipset is supported and which
> chipset is in the device you want to buy, then buy it. Not the other
> way around.
>
> Davide
>

The built-in IBM a/b/g wireless (Atheros chipset) in my Thinkpad X31
worked out of the box with SuSE 9.1. The Intel 2100's in some Compaq
laptops we set up for school worked, too (SuSE 9.1) but needed a
firmware update which we did via SuSE's update mechanism (YaST).

Malke
--
"I have a cunning plan..."

In article <(E-Mail Removed) >,
Davide Bianchi <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>On 2005-01-02, Paul Ciszek <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>> I know of at least one guy who claims to have just plugged in a WLAN card
>> and used in under SuSE 9.2 Is this really possible? Which, if any, WLAN
>> devices work out-of-the-box?
>
>Most Intel, Orinico and other devices that uses well-known chipsets
>does. Suggestion: first check which chipset is supported and which
>chipset is in the device you want to buy, then buy it. Not the other
>way around.

I have tried to find out from a device's packaging which chipset it
uses, in vain. None of the stores I have been to have heard of
Orinoco. (Orinioco has been sold as Lucent, and they don't have that
either.) I had been hoping to be able to buy something off of the shelf,
but in that I am limited to what is on the shelves, and what is on the
shelves doesn't list their chipsets. Also, rev A vs. rev B of the same
product can use totally different chipsets.

--
Please reply to: | "When you are dealing with secretive regimes
pciszek at panix dot com | that want to deceive, you're never going to
Autoreply is disabled | be able to be positive." -Condoleezza Rice