No NIC driver Atheros chip AR9287

[pliegz]

Hi all,
First time user of freebsd/freenas and first time posting.

I have installed the FreeNAS 9.1.1 and all appears to be working including two the onboard Marvell Gigabit NICs.
But I can't get my wireless pcie card to work.
This is the card, its got an AR9287 chip and I believe it is supported.
http://wikidevi.com/wiki/TP-LINK_TL-WN881ND

Code:

[root@freenas ~]# pciconf -lv   
none3@pci0:4:0:0:      class=0x028000 card=0x30a4168c chip=0x002e168c rev=0x01 hdr=0x00                                           
    vendor    = 'Atheros Communications Inc.'                                                                                     
    device    = 'AR9287 Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express)'                                                                   
    class      = network

Code:

[root@freenas ~]# dmesg | grep -i pci 
pci4: <ACPI PCI bus> on pcib4                                                                                                     
pci4: <network> at device 0.0 (no driver attached)

Code:

[root@freenas ~]# ifconfig -a                                                                                                     
msk0: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500                                                         
        options=c011a<TXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,TSO4,VLAN_HWTSO,LINKSTATE>                                                   
        ether 00:1e:8c:02:92:8e                                                                                                   
        nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD,IFDISABLED,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>                                                                       
        media: Ethernet autoselect (none)                                                                                         
        status: no carrier                                                                                                         
msk1: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500                                                         
        options=c011a<TXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,TSO4,VLAN_HWTSO,LINKSTATE>                                                   
        ether 00:1e:8c:02:98:da                                                                                                   
        inet 10.0.0.70 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 10.0.0.255                                                                     
        nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD,IFDISABLED,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>                                                                       
        media: Ethernet autoselect (100baseTX <full-duplex,flowcontrol,rxpause,txpause>)                                           
        status: active                                                                                                             
ipfw0: flags=8801<UP,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 65536                                                                         
        nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD,IFDISABLED,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>                                                                       
lo0: flags=8049<UP,LOOPBACK,RUNNING,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 16384                                                                 
        options=600003<RXCSUM,TXCSUM,RXCSUM_IPV6,TXCSUM_IPV6>                                                                     
        inet6 ::1 prefixlen 128                                                                                                   
        inet6 fe80::1%lo0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0xc                                                                                 
        inet 127.0.0.1 netmask 0xff000000                                                                                         
        nd6 options=21<PERFORMNUD,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>

So you FreeNAS can see the NIC but no drivers to operate it.
So I tried adding the following lines to /boot/loader.conf
if_ath_load="YES"
if_ath_pci_load="YES"
if_ath_hal_load="YES"

Still no drivers attached!
Any help would be appreciated, if this has already been covered & I missed it please point me to it.

 

[cyberjock]

There is no wireless support in FreeNAS at all.

 

[pliegz]

There is no wireless support in FreeNAS at all.

Then how do I add support, surely there is a way I can setup FreeNAS to use a wireless NIC.

 

[gpsguy]

Connect a wireless game adapter to a wired NIC or plug your FreeNAS box into a network with a wireless access point or router.

At the end of the day, you'll probably be back here complaining how slow the wireless connection is.


Sent from my phone

 

[cyberjock]

Then how do I add support, surely there is a way I can setup FreeNAS to use a wireless NIC.

You don't. There is no intention of ever supporting wireless NICs as file servers should not normally be using wireless exclusively because of their unreliable nature and poor performance. Generally, anyone that is actually considering a wireless NIC probably is making several other mistakes and not understanding the implementation of FreeNAS on their network(no offense).

 

[AlexFree]

Are there any changes of Wireless drivers support?

 

[cyberjock]

Nope. And not planned for the future. The problem is wireless is:

1. A pain to even consider supporting, even for a limited number of wireless chips. And believe me, only a *very* small subset of wireless NICs support access point mode. I'm thinking less than 5, and their performance and range is utter crap.
2. It's horribly unreliable (aka not something you'd *ever* do directly from a server).
3. It's horribly slow (aka not something you'd *ever* want to do directly from a server).
4. More crap that can go wrong.

So no, not right now and almost certainly "never".

Even if it *were* implemented you'd be terribly disgusted with the options and performance. It's like us "adding" support for some obscure technology that sucks. Great, now we can claim even better support. But at the end of the day it's a waste for the developer resources and very few people would benefit. And those that could use it will probably complain that "it still sucks".

You are far better off with dedicated wifi hardware (such as the Ubiquiti APs) than anything that you'd even consider plugging into your server.

 

[AlexFree]

cyberjock, you are absolutely right

 

[freenarb]

I have taken on-board the comments made above. However I would be really grateful for some assistance getting it working anyway, then I can write a how-to for other people who would like to try and are happy using a command-line approach.

The freebsd documentation already describes wireless configuration so, as far as I can tell, the only bit missing is how to get the kernel module (the atheros one in this case) loaded into the kernel.

Any tips?

Thanks!

 

[Rilo Ravestein]

I have taken on-board the comments made above. However I would be really grateful for some assistance getting it working anyway, then I can write a how-to for other people who would like to try and are happy using a command-line approach.

The freebsd documentation already describes wireless configuration so, as far as I can tell, the only bit missing is how to get the kernel module (the atheros one in this case) loaded into the kernel.

Any tips?

Thanks!

ROFL. There are no other people wanting to try wireless on FreeNAS, especially not after all the advice given everywhere. You could try your luck at the FreeBSD forums maybe.

 

[cyberjock]

We'll, good luck. The drivers aren't included, and only certain models of NICs will even let you do what you want in FreeBSD, then you'll have to compile FreeNAS with your drive. You're talking a SERIOUS barrier to get this work. Probably better off with FreeBSD.

 

[freenarb]

Thanks for taking your time and trouble to provide your invaluable help, guys, most appreciated.
(ie. I worked it out for myself.)

1) download the FreeBSD VM image, create a VM in VMWare Player, replace the blank vmdk file with the one you downloaded
2) boot the VM, login as root (no password), copy the if_ath* and wlan* files from /boot/kernel (use service netif start first if you need to sftp the files elsewhere)
3) copy the if_ath and wlan files into /boot/kernel inside FreeNAS
4) kldload if_ath_pci (which also loads if_ath and wlan)
5) check that ifconfig now lists an ath0 device
6) ifconfig wlan0 create wlandev ath0
7) ifconfig wlan0 up scan
8) repeat whilst scanning takes place

That proves that it's possible and it works and explains how to do it. Not such a serious barrier so far ;-)
Next installment, joining a network.

 

[Rilo Ravestein]

Thanks for taking your time and trouble to provide your invaluable help, guys, most appreciated.
(ie. I worked it out for myself.)

Of course nobody is going to invest their invaluable time in something nobody in their right mind would want: A (Free)NAS on WiFi

Nontheless, i'm going to watch this thread very closely to see where this is going ;)