Install Sitecom WLA-2100 (USB N 300Mbps Wifi Adapter) on Linux


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Using the mini USB Wifi 300Mbps-N adapter on Linux (or on Raspberry Pi controllers) can be a pain after we realize that this tiny Wifi adapter is not seen by Linux as a brand new wlan0 interface, but it is only, correctly, viewed by using dmesg | more or lsusb.

First, this problem can be addressed almost easily by reading the output of three typical tools used in Linux; in dmesg we see correctly (with the complete identified 0df6:0077) and in lsusb it will be recognized too, but when we will list all network interfaces it will not return any wlan0 interface:

dmesg:

[    2.905591] usb 1-1.2: New USB device found, idVendor=0df6, idProduct=0077
[    2.905643] usb 1-1.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber                                                                                                  =3
[    2.905662] usb 1-1.2: Product: 802.11n WLAN Adapter
[    2.905679] usb 1-1.2: Manufacturer: Realtek
[    2.905694] usb 1-1.2: SerialNumber: 00e04c000001

lsusb:

Bus 001 Device 002: ID 0424:9512 Standard Microsystems Corp.
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 0424:ec00 Standard Microsystems Corp.
Bus 001 Device 004: ID 0df6:0077 Sitecom Europe B.V.

ifconfig:

eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr B8:27:EB:DF:F5:F5

inet addr:192.168.1.71 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:3715 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:2365 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:3133502 (2.9 MiB) TX bytes:286659 (279.9 KiB)

lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:65536 Metric:1
RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX bytes:0 (0.0 B) TX bytes:0 (0.0 B)

Solution

We need to instruct Linux to use a particular Realtek chipset driver (tipically already included in any 3.x kernel version of almost any distro), so to do this we need to open a "rooted (as root)" Terminal (not using sudo as simple user) and type the following lines:

echo 'install 8192cu /sbin/modprobe --ignore-install 8192cu ; /bin/echo "0df6 0077" > /sys/bus/usb/drivers/rtl8192cu/new_id' | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/8192cu.conf

sudo echo "8192cu" >> /etc/modules

After these two commands just make sure that you have added "8192cu" inside /etc/modules, and then restart (or shutdown with shutdown now command) your Raspberry Pi.

After the reboot now your Raspberry Pi should list wlan0 interface in both iwconfig and ifconfig command's output.

NOTE: to use root user on Raspberry Pi just issue the following command: sudo su.