Re: wireless: orphan qfnfmac and plfxlc drivers?

[Stefan Lippers-Hollmann <s.l-h@gmx.de>]

Hi

On 2024-02-27, Kalle Valo wrote:
> Igor Mitsyanko <i.mitsyanko@gmail.com> writes:
> > On 2/16/24 01:37, Kalle Valo wrote:
> >> Jeff Johnson <quic_jjohnson@quicinc.com> writes:
> >>> On 2/15/2024 9:21 AM, Kalle Valo wrote:
[...]
> > that's right, Quantenna division was shutdown by ON. To my knowledge
> > no users of qtnfmac drivers are left after that. I would think
> > removing driver altogether is the right approach. I'm not associated
> > with ON anymore so it's just my personal opinion.
> >
> > CCing Krystal Heaton who I found on ON "contacts" web page (just in
> > case someone from ON wants to comment if removing qtnfmac driver from
> > Linux kernel is a concern).
>
> Sad news but thanks for letting us know. So unless anyone else objects
> the plan is to remove qtnfmac driver in the near future.

In theory, there would be quite a few /potential/ users for qtnfmac
and QT3840BC 'Topaz' (QSR1000) on a variety of early 802.11ac routers
and APs (particularly on ipq8064 SOCs[0]), but as the required qtnfmac
firmware for these chipsets has never been published, there is
no wireless support for (the typically 5 GHz-) "Topaz" wlan chipset
on those devices at all.

The devices are out there (albeit not the most common- or long-lived
combination), but they never had wireless support in the first place
(first because qtnfmac didn't support QSR1000, after that was
rectified[1], because the required firmware for qtnfmac/ QSR1000 has
never been published). It's a bit sad that these never got supported.

Regards
	Stefan Lippers-Hollmann

--
[0] e.g. Linksys E8350, Linksys E8400, Netgear R7500,
    ZyXEL NBG6816 (Armor Z1), ZyXEL WAP6806 (Armor X1) (on mt7621)
    [Disclaimer: I don't own any of these myself, but I regularly
    see requests for Topaz wireless support on the r7500 and e8350]
[1] Tue Oct 16 10:23:58 2018 +0000, qtnfmac: add support for Topaz
    chipsets
    e401fa25cfa23df8b17960a656ff11f49facae84