Wireless N
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Hi,
I was going through the PFsense documentations and noticed that there was now support for N wireless in Pfsense 2.2 based on FreeBSD 10.+
However there was no mention of an exact supported hardware, at workplace we have multiple N Aps that help with wireless.
Honestly lack of wireless is the only reason i am unable to utilized the awesomeness of pfsense at home. for Home users the best option would be an all in one alix based device for various reasons.
cheers
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Or a purpose-built wireless device. They're like $20 and you probably already have one.
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FreeBSD 10.1 has support for a load of Atheros cards that support 802.11N however not all are. A good place to start would be here:
https://wiki.freebsd.org/dev/ath_hal%284%29/HardwareSupport
That page hasn't been updated since Oct 2013 so anything on it should definitely be in 10.1.
The only way to really know though is to search the forum for confirmed working reports.Steve
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I ordered this (http://www.ebay.ie/itm/310790429513?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1438.l2649)
I'll let you know how it works with pfSense 2.2
Gonna take at least week before all the items necessary for build arrive (motherboard, cpu, ECC memory, wlan card)
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@Derelict purposes devices are great but i just want a smaller pfbox able to do everything a normal soho router does + more.
It would be absolutely fantastic if we had dev working on support for a set of standard easily accessible and cheap wifi PCI cards.
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I consider it a waste of valuable developer resources. This is a solved problem. No reason to wait for decent wi-fi. Get an AP.
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I consider it a waste of valuable developer resources.
Seems a little strong. In my opinion, the ability to create an "all-in-one" pfsense box is valuable for the small office and advanced home user "market". If pfSense does not want to target that market, then I see little value in built-in wireless access point support.
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Even in my SOHO setups I need an external AP. The router's locations aren't suitable for wireless reception unless someone lives in the basement.
Concrete ceilings, you know… -
Until my home box died recently I used both. There were a few times when I locked myself out of some interface and had to go over to wireless (or switch networks) to get back access to the webgui. Quite handy for that.
The pfSense devs are not really wasting anything by offering wireless support. The drivers are all provided upstream and the wireless setup pages hardly suck in development resources at a huge rate. I'd much rather they are included even if the single box SOHO market isn't the target.Steve
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Right, which is a "whatever's there is there" approach which makes perfect sense. If you want to wrestle with it, more power to you but if it doesn't do what you need, get an AP. Sort of like support for USB NICs.
If you want to know which wireless cards are supported, there's always the FreeBSD 10.1 HCL: https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/hardware.html
And with no first-hand knowledge or experience, I would expect something like this would probably be a decent choice, or why would it be on the netgate store? http://store.netgate.com/APU-Kits-C213.aspx
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Right, which is a "whatever's there is there" approach which makes perfect sense.
I second that!
It's just that I don't like to over-emphasize WiFi with pfSense. I own and sometimes use an alix3d2 with b/g card inserted and configured. But I surely don't jump the bandwagon demanding .11ac from pfSense which would be next.
Reliable WiFi is way more than entering an SSID, pass-phrase and off-we-go.
Just recently I heard >30 competing APs in my living room within the 2.4GHz band. Not counting Bluetooth and ZigBee devices.
Adding a WiFi card to my APU would only add to air pollution and be counter productive. However, the right AP in the right place does the trick.
FWIW
