Wireshark-users: Re: [Wireshark-users] Using Wireshark to capture signal strength and data rate f

From: Guy Harris <guy@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Fri, 30 Jun 2006 13:07:18 -0700
Soh Kam Yung wrote:

1) Can wireshark display information like the data rate, signal and
noise level on each captured 802.11 packet?  [This information is not
part of the basic 802.11 Frame Format but is provided by some wlan
cards as 'extra' header info for each packet.  This info can, for
example, be displayed in AiroPeek.]

Yes, if the underlying packet capture mechanism and libpcap/WinPcap supply that information in a form Wireshark knows about (Prism header, AVS header, or radiotap header).

2) If the answer to 1) is yes, which wireless driver and OS must I use
to be able to capture this information from wireless cards?

OSes: sufficiently recent versions of Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, or DragonFlyBSD. *NOT* Windows.

Drivers: most of the drivers for the BSDs listed on the Wiki page should support it in sufficiently recent versions of the OS. The Cisco Aironet drivers on the BSDs don't. I don't know what all of the Linux drivers do, but I think the Aironet drivers don't and the Atheros and Prism drivers do.