[Paul L Rinaldo <prinaldo@mindspring.com>] Query re 802.11b

[Robert E. Seastrom]

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My favorite unnamed source speaks on the 802.11b topic.



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Date: Thu, 03 Oct 2002 11:21:19 -0400
Subject: Re: [Paul L Rinaldo <prinaldo@mindspring.com>] Query re 802.11b
From: unnamed source
To: "Robert E. Seastrom" <rs@seastrom.com>
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Feel free to forward without attribution.

On 10/3/02 8:57 AM, Robert E. Seastrom <rs@seastrom.com> wrote:
> If you have a moment for a brief reply, it would be appreciated.
> tacos@amrad.org has open posting for non-members.

It should be possible to rewrite the eeprom for different regulatory domains
on cards using the Intersil PRISM or Lucent HERMES chipsets, but you could
easily turn your card into a party favor if you do it wrong.

The process for updating the firmware on these cards is:
-- read out the current contents of the eeprom.
-- extract the "PDA" (a set of records describing device-specific info: trim
values for each channel, regulatory domain information, MAC address, etc.)
-- merge PDA records into new firmware image
-- write new image into eeprom

It should certainly be possible to modify the PDA in the middle (in effect,
this is what happens during manufacturing and testing to set the transmit
trim levels, allowable key sizes, etc.).  I can't supply code or docs, since
I'm under NDA for this info, but there should be enough code and info
already in the public domain to piece it together.



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