Official MediaTek Wireless Utility on El Capitan (Tested with Archer T2U)

[Orochimarufan]

Official MediaTek Wireless Utility

I recently got a TP-LINK Archer T2U to use with OS X (El Capitan) on my Laptop until I decide if I want to swap out the PCI card (Intel). The reason I went for a Ralink/MediaTek stick is the absence of WPA-EAP (802.1x) on the Realtek OS X drivers.

However:

• it turns out the official Configuration Utility is broken: The window never opens, even though the tray icon shows
• There are multiple threads suggesting using either the BearExtender utility or the D-Link pref pane.
• The Pref Pane lacks EAP support
• BearExtender didn't work out for me.

So I had a quick look into what was wrong with the official utility.

• Turns out 802.11h support is broken
• It's trying to call a RAWL_QueryIEEE02811H method on the RaWLAPI, which doesn't exist
• It crashes before showing a window
• The threads handling the tray icon stay alive

802.11h is mandatory in many territories (At least for 5G), so what follows might be illegal. Proceed on your own account. Anyway, what can we do to use the utility anyway?

• First, go complain to MediaTek. This needs fixing.
• Install the driver, if you haven't done so already
• Open up MediaTek Wireless Utility/Contents/Resources/Settings.plist using your preferred plist editor
• Change DFS and EDCCA to 0
• Save and Reboot
• The Wireless Utility should work now.

I'm unsure of the exact consequences of this change. As I noted above, messing with 802.11h is generally NOT a good idea, and depending what the driver does with those settings, it can get you onto thin ice legally. I'm quite baffled MediaTek provides the option to do so this easily.

Also, I'm not sure it actually works *well* yet. You may do well to treat this post as "notes to myself" while I explore this further.

 

[fedrik456]

use official wireless utility by tp-link for 10.11 from http://www.tp-link.in/download/Archer-T2U.html
and install attached kext manually using kextbeast (to system -> library -> extensions folder)

 

[danielecr]

• Change DFS and EDCCA to 0

Thank you very much!
After hours of testing with different kexts and pref panes this solution is the only it worked for my mac 10.10.5 and Alfa AWUS036NH.

By installing only the pkg from MT7612_7610U_D5.0.1.25_SDK1.0.2.18_UI5.0.0.27_20151209.dmg the wireless utility started only when connecting the alfa to the usb port (after complete loading of osx).
If the wifi card was already connected to usb before the start up of the mac I couldn't start the wireless utility.
After DFS and EDCCA modifications I can start the wireless utility even if the usb wifi interface is already connected before powering on the mac.

Thank you again