RTW(4)

NAME
rtw - Realtek RTL8180L IEEE 802.11b wireless network device

SYNOPSIS
rtw* at cardbus?
rtw* at pci?

DESCRIPTION
The rtw driver supports PCI/CardBus 802.11b wireless adapters based on the Realtek RTL8180L.

A variety of radio transceivers can be found in these devices, including the Philips SA2400A, Maxim MAX2820, and GCT GRF5101.

These are the modes the rtw driver can operate in:

BSS mode
    Also known as infrastructure mode, this is used when associating with an access point, through which all traffic passes. This mode is the default.

IBSS mode
    Also known as IEEE ad-hoc mode or peer-to-peer mode. This is the standardized method of operating without an access point. Stations associate with a service set. However, actual connections between stations are peer-to-peer.

Host AP
    In this mode the driver acts as an access point (base station) for other cards.

monitor mode
    In this mode the driver is able to receive packets without associating with an access point. This disables the internal receive filter and enables the card to capture packets from networks which it wouldn't normally have access to, or to scan for access points.

The rtw driver can be configured to use software Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP). It is strongly recommended that WEP not be used as the sole mechanism to secure wireless communication, due to serious weaknesses in it.

In BSS mode, the driver supports powersave mode, which can be enabled via ifconfig(8).

The rtw driver can be configured at runtime with ifconfig(8) or on boot with hostname.if(5).

HARDWARE
The following adapters should work:
Card | Radio | Bus
Allnet ALL0182 | SA2400 | CardBus
Belkin F5D6020 V3 | SA2400 | CardBus
Buffalo WLI-CB-B11 | SA2400 | CardBus
Corega CG-WLCB11V3 | SA2400 | CardBus
D-Link DWL-610 |? | CardBus
Edimax EW-7106 | SA2400 | CardBus
GigaFast WF721-AEX (R* serial) | GRF5101 | CardBus
Jensen AirLink 6011 | GRF5101 | CardBus
Level-One WPC-0101 | SA2400 | CardBus
Linksys WPC11 v4 | MAX2820 | CardBus
Netgear MA521 | SA2400 | CardBus
Ovislink AirLive WL-1120PCM | SA2400 | CardBus
Planet WL-3553 | SA2400 | CardBus
Q-Tec 770WC | SA2400 | CardBus
Q-Tec 775WC | SA2400 | CardBus
Roper FreeLan 802.11b | SA2400 | CardBus
SAFECOM SWLCR-1100 | SA2400 | CardBus
TRENDnet TEW-226PC |? | CardBus
VCTnet PC-11B1 | SA2400 | CardBus
Winstron CB-200B | SA2400 | CardBus
Zonet ZEW1000 | GRF5101 | CardBus

EXAMPLES
The following example scans for available networks:

    # ifconfig rtw0 scan

The following hostname.if(5) example configures rtw0 to join network “mynwid”, using WEP key “mywepkey”, obtaining an IP address using DHCP:

    nwid mynwid nwkey mywepkey
    dhcp

The following hostname.if(5) example creates a host-based access point on boot:

    mediaopt hostap
    nwid mynwid nwkey mywepkey
    inet 192.168.1.1 255.255.255.0

SEE ALSO
arp(4), cardbus(4), ifmedia(4), intro(4), netintro(4), pci(4), hostname.if(5), hostapd(8), ifconfig(8) Realtek, http://www.realtek.com.tw.

HISTORY
The rtw device driver first appeared in OpenBSD 3.7.

AUTHORS
-nosplit The rtw driver was written by David Young <dyoung@NetBSD.org> and ported to OpenBSD by Jonathan Gray <jsg@openbsd.org>.

CAVEATS
GCT refuse to release any documentation on their GRF5101 RF transceiver.

While PCI devices will attach most of them are not able to transmit.

Host AP mode doesn't support power saving. Clients attempting to use power saving mode may experience significant packet loss (disabling power saving on the client will fix this).