# [solved] Need a recommandation on usb wifi

## Elleni

I need to add wifi connectivity to my gentoo box. So I did a quick search and have the following two favorites, though I want to make sure they are well supported on my gentoo box. Can you please comment on them? If any of these don't seem appropriate maybe an alternative could be suggested? 

As this will be replacing wired connection it should be reliable fast and stable so I thought, maybe I should buy an 802.11ac stick / usb3.0. 

https://www.digitec.ch/en/s1/product/asus-usb-ac68-usb-30-1300mbits-600mbits-network-adapters-6070053?supplier=406802

or 

https://www.digitec.ch/en/s1/product/tp-link-archer-t9uh-ac1900-usb-30-adapter-usb-30-1300mbits-600mbits-network-adapters-6305565?supplier=406802

or 

https://www.digitec.ch/en/s1/product/netgear-a7000-100pes-usb-30-1300mbits-600mbits-network-adapters-6496558?supplier=406802

Will any of these be supported by recent kernel directly, or at least with linux-firmware package?

Or would it be better / easyer to buy a pcie card for wireless connectivity? 

I am asking because we moved and decided that on the new appartement we want to avoid ethernet cables crossing floors and laying around everywhere, so this will be my main network connection. I read that from performance point of view (throughput and latency) usb stick is not a problem anymore esp. if one has usb3.0.Last edited by Elleni on Wed Feb 20, 2019 7:20 pm; edited 1 time in total

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## Muso

I bought these two.   Not only do they have full Linux support, but the Linux drivers allow these dongles to go into monitor mode.   

This one I use for my phone (running Kali Nethunter)

1000mW 1W 802.11g/n High Gain USB Wireless G / N Long-Rang WiFi Network Adapter

And this one I use with my Gentoo laptop (with pentoo overlay)

Panda Wireless PAU09 N600 Dual Band (2.4GHz and 5GHz) Wireless N USB Adapter W/ Dual 5dBi Antennas

Both work beautifully.    Enjoy with wifite  :Very Happy: 

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## Elleni

Thanks for your fast reply and recommandations. So is 802.11ac not worth the hassle ? They seem to be faster thats why I thought of bying one of them, and they seem to be available on stock here in switzerland while panda and alfa ones I would have to buy @amazon, which I dont really want  :Smile: 

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## Muso

 *Elleni wrote:*   

> Thanks for your fast reply and recommandations. So is 802.11ac not worth the hassle ? They seem to be faster thats why I thought of bying one of them, and they seem to be available on stock here in switzerland while panda and alfa ones I would have to buy @amazon, which I dont really want 

 

The main thing, for me, is full functionality.   So that requires a dongle that can go into monitor mode.   The thing is, if you get a dongle that can, the drivers will be top notch.   

rt2800usb, ATH9KHTC (AR9271, AR7010), RT3070, & RTL8192CU work very well.

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## NeddySeagoon

Elleni,

You want to use the 5GHz band. The 2.4GHz band is very crowded, which reduces the useful bandwidth for everyone.

If you are accustomed to 1GHz wired networking, you will want 802.11ac too. 

Wired is full duplex, 1GHz both ways at the same time.

WiFi is half duplex, so the latency is worse. 

802.11ac on USB must be on USB3.  USB2 is at best only 400Mbit/sec so cannot keep up.

I can't recommend any devices. All my wifi enabled devices have 802.11ac built in.

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## Elleni

Hi Neddy, 

thanks for clarification so I guess, I will have to find out (I am trying but did not get it yet) to find out, what chipsets are beeing used on the three products I posted , and see if those have corresponding modules in recent kernels and/or if they need additional firmware that ideally would be shipped with linux-firmware package. Any help on this would be really apreciated  :Smile: 

I am googling around but did not get the appropriate informations yet. On the other side I would like to buy the sooner the better, as I have no internet connection at home. Apart from laptop of my wife using windows and wireless hotspot of my mobile.   :Embarassed: 

Muso, I see - I must do some further digging then to find appropriate models with chipsets you suggested, while supporting 802.11ac on USB 3.0 and being well supported and available on a shop in switzerland as I would like to walkin and grab the damn thing to setup my online connectivity as soon as possible  :Smile: 

And is it true that the overhead because of usb is not a point anymore and there is no need / benefit to buy an internal pcie wifi card nowadays if having a quite recent box with ryzen 5 - six core cpu?

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## NeddySeagoon

Elleni,

You need the device ID of the actual device you have. Vendors change then from time to time.

Take you laptop with you to the shop and ask to check the vendor and device ID before you buy.

It may be on the packaging but even if it is you may not recognise it.

Here is a thread on one of your devices that ends in success.

That sample used the rtl8814AU chipset. The thread is two years old. If you buy one today, you might get a different chipset.

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## Elleni

Hello Neddy, 

So an rtl8814au chipset could work with Standard kernel modules out of the box? Or will I need to download something to make it work? I am asking as if I need to download, I have to do it on another box with internet access and copy it over to the target box by usb stick or something  :Smile: 

Most probably - but I'll confirm that later it will be: 

vendor id: 0b05

device id: 1817

chipset: rtl8811au

Although, I dont buy it for that purpose I am curious; will this device be able to do Monitoring mode?

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## NeddySeagoon

Elleni,

The driver is not in the kernel, not in 4.20.7 anyway, so you will need to get the driver.

The driver and firmware are included in github but how well is it maintained and for how long?

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## Ant P.

As far as I know, ath9k will get you the most stable wifi connection, as that's the hardware the Bufferbloat project focused on. It's not 11ac, limited to 135Mbps. But it'll give you all of that 135Mbps.

The driver stack matters far more than the numbers on the box. Avoid Broadcom chips forever, and be wary of Qualcomm. I haven't heard anything bad about Realtek/Ralink as of late.

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## Elleni

I decided to try asus usb-ac68 as those usb devices are not too expensive anyways. So I bought one. 

lsusb showing: 0b05:1853 ASUSTek Computer, Inc. 

Now here come the challenges   :Twisted Evil: 

My internetprovider did not activate my internet account on the new appartement yet. So I cannot temporary get internet on wired network in order to setup my new usb wifi stick. 

I see the following options: 

Old mobile with unofficial android pie lineage os, but its hotspot is not accessible from Opensuse tumbleweed setup on my wife s Laptop. 

Windows 10 setup on my wifes laptop can connect to above mentioned mobile's hotspot successfully. 

On my gentoo box I have a broadcom usb bluetooth device which can successfully pair with my mobile and also with my wifes laptop with booted windows. 

Unfortunatelly networking over bluetooth on my gentoo box cannot be activated either. Tried on plasma and on dantrells gnome. In /var/log/messages I can see the follwowing Networkmanager erros after a failed attempt of activating PAN networking over established bluetooth connection: 

Networkmanager state is now CONNECTING

device state change:prepare -> config (reason 'none', sys-iface-state: 'managed')

warn device: Error connecting with bluez: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.UnknownMethod: Method "Connect" with signature "s" on interface "org.bluez.Network1" doesn't exist

device state change: config -> failed(reason 'bluetooth-failed', sys-iface-state: 'managed')

info manager: NetworkManager state is now DISCONNECTED

warn device: Activation: failed for connection 'mywifeslaptophostname-network'

...

What is missing here in order to be able to establish networking over bluetooth? As said - pairing two bluetooth devices and sending files over bluetooth is working - only networking does not. 

What a pitty; if I could manage to establish bluetooth networking I could have internet connectivity on my gentoo box, which would enable me to download git sources, and emerge dkms as stated at the link Neddy posted and try to configure my new usb wifi stick so I will be ready when my provider finally re-enables my internet access.Last edited by Elleni on Wed Feb 20, 2019 1:43 am; edited 2 times in total

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## Elleni

Edit to add, I found out what kernel option was missing in order to be able to use shared bluetooth tethering connection of my mobile phone, it works with gnome now. 

```
[*] Networking support --->

      <M>   Bluetooth subsystem support --->

              ...

              < >     BNEP protocol support
```

In plasma there is still nothing happening when trying to activate networking over bluetooth, but thats ok. 

So I now have the prerequisites to try install above mentioned usb wifi stick  :Smile: 

But its to late now, will do so tommorrow and report back.

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## Elleni

 *NeddySeagoon wrote:*   

> Elleni,
> 
> The driver is not in the kernel, not in 4.20.7 anyway, so you will need to get the driver.
> 
> The driver and firmware are included in github but how well is it maintained and for how long?

 

I did sone reading and apparently airckrack-ng/rtl8812au should support this chipset and zugaina search shows them available in pentoo overlay  :Smile: 

I'll test and come back here. I will also test your suggested link of course.   :Very Happy: 

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## Elleni

I can confirm that following package enables my asus usb ac68 wifi stick. I just added

https://data.gpo.zugaina.org/pentoo/net-wireless/rtl8812au_aircrack-ng/rtl8812au_aircrack-ng-5.2.20_p20190107.ebuild

to my local overlay and compiled rtl8812au_aircrack-ng, rebooted and 88XXau module was loaded. I then could successfully connect to the hotspot I have activated on my mobile phone. I guess this is a quite recent driver and probably my best option for the moment. Thanks for your help guys  :Smile: 

I will put solved here, and wait until my appartement s provider will activate my network. Then I will be able to do some more testing to see how well this stick performs with this driver and maybe test others. Right now device network digagnose shows a connection with 72.2 Mbps so I guess the limit is my mobile phone.

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