Weblog entry #40 for Utumno
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I thought I'd share with you how the latest iwl4965 wireless drivers are doing w/ respect to kismet, monitor mode, packet injection etc.
1) Stock Debian 2.6.25-2-486 kernel, kismet 2008-05-R1 ( from Debian unstable ) , ThinkPad X61 with
utumno# lspci | grep 4965
03:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation PRO/Wireless 4965 AG or AGN Network Connection (rev 61)
Results: managed, ad-hoc mode - works, monitor mode - works, kismet is able to see management packets but no data packets. No matter what I do, it will not see clients nor data packets.
Coming out from monitor mode is kinda problematic: I press 'Q' in kismet, then it either segfaults leaving my card in an unknown state ( rmmod iwl4965; modprobe iwl4965 fixes that ) or sometimes exits cleanly but warns me that resetting the card failed. I still have to rmmod+modprobe to use the card in Managed mode.
Packet injection does not work. Trying out the latest compat-wireless-2008-07-19 + packet injection patches ( tutorial: http://aircrack-ng.org/doku.php?id=iwl4965&DokuWiki=b0f74a175e2ec1e58a11d7d3bfdb5650 ) does not work either: such compiled driver does not even work in managed mode, and rmmoding it results in a hard freeze ( there's nothing I can do apart from pushing the reset button )
2) Stock 2.6.26 kernel from kernel.org, latest ( 2008-07-19 ) compat-wireless with packet injection patches for iwl4965 and mac80211 , the same kismet 2008-05-R1 and ThinkPad X61:
Managed, ad-hoc mode fully work. Kismet is now able to see data packets and clients. Exiting it sucks even worse now, though: I press 'Q', it will always hang. The only way to recover is press 'Ctrl-Z' to put it in the background, kill -9 it and rmmod+modprobe the drivers.
Packet injection with AirCrack-ng works, at least the injection test passes. I haven't tried any more sophisticated attacks yet.
Side note: with 2.6.26 also the LED in my laptop (signifying that wireless is being used) started working. So progress in all fronts, except exiting kismet :)
Comments on this Entry
I noticed you mentioned resetting the system by the reset button. Just incase you aren't aware but you can use Alt+SysRq key on your keyboard when you get a hard lock. Holding down these keys and typing R-E-I-S-U-B will safely shutdown/reset your system, instead of pressing the reset button on the case.
:)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_SysRq_key
sno
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Actually with Intel wifi chipsets ( and I've tried 2200, 3965 and 4965 ) I never had problems with managed mode. Stock debian kernels always worked right out of the box. Monitor mode + packet injection is a totally different story, though.
Thanks for the SysRq tip!
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ifconfig wlan0 down
iwconfig wlan0 mode managed
ifconfig wlan0 up
Then, in my Kubuntu (kind of debian, anyway), I go to control panel and Desactivate, then immediatly I Reactivate it. Then it's back. No crash, no bug, just a bit long!
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