FreeBSD 8.1 - Intel 3945ABG - WEP

P

pablo9000

Hi,

Can anyone tell me if the default wpi module for the Intel 3945ABG wireless networking card in FreeBSD 8.1 works correctly using WEP security?
Is anyone successfully using such a configuration?

I have seen that a few people have had success with the wpi module using WPA security but the only posts I can find on using it with WEP seem to end up suggesting jumping ship to OpenBSD.

I've wanted to give FreeBSD a go for a while now (been happily using Linux for the last few years, but got the tinkering itch again), I'm not ready to jump ship just yet if there is a chance I can get this working.

Thanks,

Paul
 
There's no reason why WEP won't work when WPA does. In any case, you really shouldn't use WEP anymore. Any WEP key can and will be cracked in about 5 minutes.
 
I know WEP is very insecure but I'm in a shared house and its not my router - it would probably be easier to just steal my laptop than bother cracking the WEP key anyway :)

However, as you say it doesn't make much sense that WPA would work and not WEP - I was just going off what I found in other posts, I've not had it working either way myself. Maybe I overlooked something configuring wpi/wlan, I'll have another look when I finish the day job.

Thanks, Paul
 
In case anyone is interested, I got it working with WEP by using a static IP address and passing the router information rather than using DHCP.
 
You probably could use "dhclient wlan0" to get a DHCP-assigned address and other info. Setting a static IP shouldn't be necessary.

If you show us your rc.conf and detail how you're connecting we can help you troubleshoot why it's not working. Setting a static IP to use WEP is a silly hack that shouldn't be necessary when there are elegant solutions available.

For example here's the relevant information from my rc.conf that I use.
Code: 
wpa_supplicant_enable="YES" #wpa_supplicant handles WEP and WPA.
wpa_supplicant_conf_file="/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf" #set config file for wpa_supplicant

ifconfig_em0="up" #bring up ethernet
ifconfig_iwn0="ether 00:24:e8:9d:9d:33" #bring up wireless device, give same MAC address as ethernet
wlans_iwn0="wlan0" #create wlan interface for wireless device
ifconfig_wlan0="WPA" #use wpa_supplicant to configure the wlan interface
cloned_interfaces="lagg0" #create an aggregated link
ifconfig_lagg0="laggproto failover laggport em0 laggport wlan0 DHCP" #combine ethernet and wlan interfaces into a failover link, use DHCP to configure the aggregated link

And here's a functional /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf:
Code: 
ap_scan=1
ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=wheel

network={
        ssid="linksys"
        #psk="password"
        psk=ecc9991e3cfb1b117bdbbd00deb407f0232944b56821647e2349139d02fd2bfb
}
network={
        ssid="my_net"
        key_mgmt=NONE
        wep_key3=3456789012
        wep_tx_keyidx=3
}
I have an Intel 5300 wireless card so it's called iwn0 instead of iwi0, and you'll want to change the MAC address to that of your ethernet NIC, whatever kind that is. You can leave out the entire section about link aggregation as well if you'd like to keep it simple and get it working, and your rc.conf would look more like this:

Code: 
wpa_supplicant_enable="YES" #wpa_supplicant handles WEP and WPA.
wpa_supplicant_conf_file="/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf" #set config file for wpa_supplicant

wlans_iwn0="wlan0"
ifconfig_wlan0="WPA DHCP"

Whatever you do, be sure to read the handbook page on wireless networking:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/books/handbook/network-wireless.html

For the failover link aggregation I have read this page also:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/books/handbook/network-aggregation.html
 
Thanks for the feedback, it spurred me to have another go and not settle. I have now got it solved using DHCP.

Originally my configuration was very similar to what you suggested (using the cut-down version of the rc.conf).

The problem it turns out was with using the wpa_supplicant.conf, I suspect it wasn't passing the password as 64bit HEX (I'm sure there is a way of doing this?).

My working config is:

/boot/loader.conf
Code: 
if_wpi_load="YES"
wlan_wep_load="YES"

/etc/rc.conf
Code: 
wlans_wpi0="wlan0"
ifconfig_wlan0="ssid xxxx wepmode on weptxkey 1 wepkey 1:0x0123456789 DHCP"

Thanks for the push, Paul
 
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