ath card with two antennas and rfkill question

[Sam Leffler]

Markus Dolze wrote:
> -------- Original-Nachricht --------
>   
>> Datum: Sat, 15 Mar 2008 09:54:17 -0500
>> Von: "Yuri Lukin" <lists at swaggi.com>
>> An: "Markus Dolze" <bsdfan at nurfuerspam.de>, freebsd-mobile at freebsd.org
>> Betreff: Re: ath card with two antennas and rfkill question
>>     
>
>   
>> On Sat, 15 Mar 2008 14:39:37 +0100, Markus Dolze wrote
>>     
>>> Hello,
>>>
>>> I recently got a Compex WLM54G mini-pci card for my Toshiba 6100. I 
>>> connected the two internal antennas the laptop has and the card if 
>>> working fine, except that the laptop's "wireless switch" does not 
>>> work. I cannot turn the radio off (better this than the other way 
>>> round). I remember having read that this switch is connected to one 
>>> of the mini-pci pins and signals the card to turn off the radio. Why 
>>> doesn't it work then? Or is it a software / driver issue?
>>>
>>> My system is: 'FreeBSD kirika.zzz.de 6.3-RELEASE FreeBSD 6.3-RELEASE 
>>> #2: Mon Jan 21 23:49:38 CET 2008     
>>> root at zzz.de:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/KIRIKA  i386'
>>>
>>> 'sysctl dev.ath.0' shows (amoung others):
>>> dev.ath.0.%desc: Atheros 5212
>>> dev.ath.0.%driver: ath
>>> dev.ath.0.%location: slot=10 function=0 handle=\_SB_.PCI0.PCIB.MPC0
>>> dev.ath.0.%pnpinfo: vendor=0x168c device=0x001a subvendor=0x168c 
>>> subdevice=0x2052 class=0x020000 dev.ath.0.%parent: pci2 
>>> dev.ath.0.countrycode: 0 dev.ath.0.txantenna: 0 dev.ath.0.rxantenna: 
>>> 1 dev.ath.0.diversity: 1
>>>
>>> I am wondering as well: What are the countrycode, tx/rxantenna and 
>>> diversity settings for? I found no documentation about these. Or are 
>>> these settings read-only? How are the antenna numbers counted? 
>>> Should I have 'txantenna=1'?
>>>
>>> What does the 'countrycode' do and should I set any value (like 49 
>>> for Germany)?
>>>
>>>       
>> Typically the countrycode and regdomain is set in the EEPROM. I'm not sure
>> if
>> it's tunable with the 0.9.20.3 hal but you can set it in 0.9.30.7 to
>> enable
>> 900mhz cards:
>> http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2007-February/068996.html
>>
>> Also take a look at this page from madwifi:
>> http://madwifi.org/wiki/UserDocs/CountryCode
>>
>>
>>  Yuri
>>     
>
> Thanks for pointing this out. I that that madwifi.org is a Linux specific driver so I have ignored that site up to now.
>
> Setting 'countrycode=276' (Germany) allows the usage of the additional channels 12, 13.
>
> I found the answer to my antenna question on madwifi.org, too. Basically if 'diversity=1' I should let the hardware / driver select the antennas to use.
>   

madwifi uses the same hal and that is the code that enforce regulatory 
constraints.  Driver-related stuff may be common given the (distant) 
shared ancestry but for some things freebsd has diverged.  When the vap 
support comes into the tree freebsd will be a proper superset of madwifi.

    Sam