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Resolved Is there a known USB 802.11ac USB adapter which features PPC drivers?

B S Magnet

B S Magnet

macrumors 603
Original poster
Dec 5, 2018
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23:58:30. Unceded Treaty 13 lands of N Turtle Isle
This topic comes with an understanding that plenty of 802.11n solutions for PPC systems exist already — both for USB and PCI cards (I use an Edimax 802.11n PCI card with MIMO which works with my Power Mac G5).

This topic also comes with an understanding that maximum data potential of the 802.11ac standard isn't generally realizable on a USB2.0 or a PCI lane.

But this topic is also being brought up as the frequency of off-the-shelf solutions for 802.11ac USB adapters are overtaking the availability of 802.11n models.

What I've found is there are non-branded USB 802.11ac adapters which purport to work with drivers for "OS X 10.4-10.12" or even "OS X 10.4-10.13" — while there is at least one vendor which purports this, but in practice the included 3" CD with drivers for Linux/Windows/Mac is an installer actually intended for "10.9-10.12" — this, for a RealTek 8812BU chipset.

Provided that drivers have been written to accommodate legacy Leopard and Tiger systems, I parse this as an implied Intel-only solution.

So the question: have any of you found an 802.11ac adapter with drivers which have managed to work with PPC architecture?
 
I'd say it's very unlikely, and AC isn't really worthwhile on a USB 2.0 bus as you say.

What wouldn't require drivers and still allow for a wireless solution would be to connect a G4/G5 Tower's Gigabit ethernet port to a wireless ethernet extender with WiFi AC like this.

Alternatively do what I do and wire up the whole house with Gigabit ethernet...there's really nothing as good.

Devices like iBook G3 and PowerBook G4's can barely utilise WiFi N given their general slowness of CPUs and HDDs in the vast majority of cases anyway. My G5 Quad does not come close to fully utilising Gigabit Ethernet.
 
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Hi B S Magnet,

Maybe because it's for a desktop system which mainly/always connects
to the same network you can look into something like this connected to
the ethernet port and no driver required :D

TL-WR902AC-01_1482226379460g.jpg


https://www.tp-link.com/us/products/details/cat-9_TL-WR902AC.html

Best regards,
voidRunner
 
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Neither of these solutions works for public cafés that provide only n and ac wifi. That's where I really see a problem in the future even though nowadays it's not a problem at all. Sooner or later we have to have a look at modified drivers or loose the "portable" in portable PPC Mac
 
IMHO N is more than enough. I mean... who has internet that's faster than 300Mbit? Not many.

5GHz N is what I use, and it's always very good.
 
timidpimpin said:
who has internet that's faster than 300Mbit?
Click to expand...
Is that uncommonly high? I live in rural WV, and even here, I have 400 Mbit, with the option to upgrade to gigabit for an extra $25/month if I wanted. I pretty consistently actually get the 400 Mbit speed too.
To be fair, my parents live about 15 miles away, and the best they can get is 12 Mbit DSL, so maybe I'm just lucky. :p
 
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amagichnich said:
Neither of these solutions works for public cafés that provide only n and ac wifi. That's where I really see a problem in the future even though nowadays it's not a problem at all. Sooner or later we have to have a look at modified drivers or loose the "portable" in portable PPC Mac
Click to expand...

I agree with this, as it gets to the root of my original question which has yet to be answered:

With USB "dongle-style" adapters rated for 802.11ac superseding 802.11n adapters being the new dominant product for aftermarket wifi — with, for example, WPA2 Personal (TKIP or AES) capability — does anyone have any successful experience using one of these adapters with PPC architecture?
 
Hi B S,

As far as I know there are no devices with PPC drivers available for AC wireless.
It's not only the device driver you need you also have OSX's network stack to deal
with ( protocol and security wise ).
If I'm not mistaken the N wireless has been available since leopard came out so thats why
you have N devices available.

I know the option I presented is not usb and not dongle-style but it's still small ( only 7cm wide )
and very lightweight ( I have the previous N version ).
It can act as an wireless client/repeater not only as a router thats why I suggested it and it's powered by
usb ( micro usb connector ).

I think there may be other smaller options but this one is easily available.

Best regards,
voidRunner
 
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vddrnnr said:
Hi B S,

As far as I know there are no devices with PPC drivers available for AC wireless.
It's not only the device driver you need you also have OSX's network stack to deal
with ( protocol and security wise ).
If I'm not mistaken the N wireless has been available since leopard came out so thats why
you have N devices available.
Click to expand...

I appreciate your follow-up to this.

I was trying to keep the question as broad as I could, given how there are probably others who will find themselves searching for 802.11ac USB adapter interoperability with PowerPC architectures.

I did make mention of my G5 as a point of reference, but I also use a pair of Rev. C clamshell iBooks and other PPC laptops in various states, including a couple of G4-era PowerBooks. Optimally, I was looking at the relatively cheap prices of 802.11ac "nano"-sized adapters and how, in increasing cases, they can come up for less than the price for now-legacy 802.11n "nano" adapters.

The notion of simply opening my laptop at a café and going online for stuff like email and TFF or WebKit is ideal, where possible. Some of my original Airport Cards at least can deal with WPA Personal (but none can use WPA2, which has been a de facto standard for security for quite a while).

Nevertheless, thanks for describing the technical limitations in some detail here. I suspect the 802.11ac adapter drivers written for OS X have taken the network stack into consideration, but only interfacing with Intel-compliant code (since it was the reigning standard for all Macs when IEEE 802.11ac was adopted ca. 2013.
 
amagichnich said:
Neither of these solutions works for public cafés that provide only n and ac wifi. That's where I really see a problem in the future even though nowadays it's not a problem at all. Sooner or later we have to have a look at modified drivers or loose the "portable" in portable PPC Mac
Click to expand...

I think it will be a very long time before n is uncommon, and those USB adapters are easy to get for PPC.
 
amagichnich said:
It's not primarily about speed but about wifi standards in public cafés, libraries etc where they are to change from b/g/n to n/ac in the next years. Then we are left out in the rain
Click to expand...
Still, realistically, I don't foresee "n" going anywhere anytime soon, and when it eventually happens, those adapters that were mentioned that plug into ethernet will probably have shrunken even more to make them an even more viable alternative.
 
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So, in conclusion:

1) Few, if any, have field-tested any of the 802.11ac USB adapters with drivers putatively written for 10.4 and 10.5, on PPC architectures, with any efficacy.

2) Run with 802.11n USB (2.4GHz) adapters even as those are becoming less common (and, in some cases, more spendy) to find new than 802.11ac USB (whether 2.4/5GHz or just 5GHz) adapters.

3) Run with the inelegant, clunky fallback of a dongle which occupies both the ethernet and a (or *the*) USB port(s) and requires enough power to possibly necessitate plugging a cord to the mains.


This is basically what I was trying to verify. Thanks.
 
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