URTW(4) FreeBSD Kernel Interfaces Manual URTW(4)
NAME
urtw - Realtek RTL8187L/RTL8187B USB IEEE 802.11b/g wireless network
device
SYNOPSIS
urtw* at uhub? port ?
DESCRIPTION
The urtw driver supports USB 802.11b/g wireless adapters based on the
Realtek RTL8187L and RTL8187B.
These are the modes the urtw 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.
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 urtw driver can be configured to use Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP)
or Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA1 and WPA2). WPA2 is currently the most
secure encryption standard for wireless networks supported by OpenBSD.
It is strongly recommended that neither WEP nor WPA1 are used as the sole
mechanism to secure wireless communication, due to serious weaknesses.
WPA1 is disabled by default and may be enabled using the option
"wpaprotos wpa1,wpa2". For standard WPA networks which use pre-shared
keys (PSK), keys are configured using the "wpakey" option. WPA-
Enterprise networks require use of the wpa_supplicant package. The urtw
driver relies on the software 802.11 stack for both encryption and
decryption of data frames.
The urtw driver can be configured at runtime with ifconfig(8) or on boot
with hostname.if(5).
HARDWARE
The following adapters should work:
Alfa AWUS036H
ASUS P5B Deluxe
Belkin F5D7050E
Digitus DN-7003GT
Linksys WUSB54GC v2
Netgear WG111v2
Netgear WG111v3
Shuttle XPC Accessory PN20
Sitecom WL-168 v1
Sitecom WL-168 v4
Surecom EP-9001-g rev 2A
TRENDnet TEW-424UB V3.xR
EXAMPLES
The following example scans for available networks:
# ifconfig urtw0 scan
The following hostname.if(5) example configures urtw0 to join network
"mynwid", using WPA key "mywpakey", obtaining an IP address using DHCP:
join mynwid wpakey mywpakey
inet autoconf
SEE ALSO
arp(4), ifmedia(4), intro(4), netintro(4), usb(4), hostname.if(5),
ifconfig(8)
Realtek Semiconductor: https://www.realtek.com/en
HISTORY
The urtw device driver first appeared in OpenBSD 4.5.
AUTHORS
The urtw driver was written by Weongyo Jeong <
[email protected]>.
FreeBSD 14.1-RELEASE-p8 March 27, 2025 FreeBSD 14.1-RELEASE-p8