Intel^® PRO/Wireless 2100/2200BG/2915ABG/3945ABG
native drivers for *BSD

Installing firmware binary images

The firmware is a program executed by the network adapter itself (not by the host CPU). For licensing reasons, the firmware images can not be shipped with the base system. They are distributed as a separate package:

# pkg_add http://damien.bergamini.free.fr/ipwfw/OpenBSD/ipw-firmware-1.3.tgz

This package will install the following files:

/etc/firmware/ipw-license
/etc/firmware/ipw-bss
/etc/firmware/ipw-ibss
/etc/firmware/ipw-monitor

These files will be loaded on demand by the ipw driver.

Configuring the adapter

Make sure that your adpater has been recognized during the boot process:

# dmesg | grep ipw
ipw0 at pci1 dev 4 function 0 "Intel PRO/2100 3B" rev 0x04: irq 11, address xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx

and

# ifconfig ipw0
ipw0: flags=8802<BROADCAST,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500
        address: xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
        nwid ""
        powersave off txpower 100dBm
        media: IEEE802.11 autoselect
        status: no network

Note that the output may vary slightly depending on your system configuration.

Enabling the radio transmitter

All Centrino® laptops have the ability to enable/disable the radio transmitter via a button or a switch. The radio transmitter is usually off by default. To know if your radio transmitter is enabled or not, use the ifconfig command:

# ifconfig ipw0
        ...
        powersave off txpower 100dBm
        ...

If your adapter radio transmitter is off, the tx power will be equal to -50dBm. Use your laptop switch to turn it on and re-run the above command to see if it has some effect. If your radio transmitter is still off, it is likely that your laptop uses a software switch that requires additionnal drivers to work. Unfortunately, not all those laptops are supported at this time. Post a message in the forum to indicate your laptop model/brand and we will see if we can do something to make it work.

Associating to an Access Point

If your radio transmitter is on, you can start scanning for an access point:

# ifconfig ipw0 inet 192.168.0.20 netmask 255.255.255.0

Replace 192.168.0.20 and 255.255.255.0 with a valid IP address and netmask on your wired network. Once you have done that, you should be able to ping hosts on the network. If you are experiencing problems with you wireless connection, make sure that you are associated to an access point:

# ifconfig ipw0
        ...
        status: active

If not, you may be out of range of the access point or have a configuration problem. It may also be the case that your adapter radio transmitter is off.

Advanced configuration

To join a specific BSS network with network name my_net, use ifconfig with the nwid option:

# ifconfig ipw0 inet 192.168.0.20 netmask 0xffffff00 nwid my_net

To join a specific BSS network with 40-bit WEP encryption enabled:

# ifconfig ipw0 inet 192.168.0.20 netmask 0xffffff00 nwid my_net \
        nwkey 0x1234567890

To join a specific BSS network with 104-bit WEP encryption enabled:

# ifconfig ipw0 inet 192.168.0.20 netmask 0xffffff00 nwid my_net \
        nwkey 0x01020304050607080910111213

The configuration of the ipw interface through DHCP is the same as for any ethernet adapter. You can use the following command to configure it via DHCP:

# dhclient ipw0