TABLE OF CONTENTS It would be next to impossible to get a microcontroller on the air with 802.11b without the PRISM radio hardware contained within an 802.11b NIC like the TEW-222CF. I'm sure none of the TEW-222CF designers (or any other 802.11b CompactFlash NIC designers for that matter) were thinking that their CompactFlash 802.11b products would be used by an 8-bit microcontroller as a tool to enter the 802.11b wireless LAN sanctum that has previously been reserved for Linux and Windows operating system. With the sudden demise of the TREND- net TEW-222CF, I was forced to test and certify other manufacturer's 802.11b CompactFlash NICs for AirDrop compatibility.
If you read the marketing stuff that describes the TEW-222CF, it was designed to be used in PDAs, Palm PCs and Pocket PCs. With an available PCMCIA-to-CompactFlash converter, the TEW-222CF was also intended to replace an 802.11b PCMCIA NIC in your laptop personal computer. All of the downloadable and CDROM TEW-222CF drivers are geared towards Windows and I didn't see anything in the marketing data sheet that mentioned it was compatible with many of the popular off-the-shelf 8-bit microcontrollers from Microchip and Atmel. Come to think of it, I didn't see any references to Linux drivers either. Well, things are about to make a radical change. TRENDnet, Netgear, Linksys, Zonet, Xterasys. Welcome to Smallville, 802.11b.
The TEW-222CF is a CompactFlash Type 1 card, which is about 1.7 mm thinner than a CompactFlash Type II card. The TEW-222CF...
