Wi-Fi Tools

A good engineer takes pride in his tools.

As with many things in IT, there are many options to choose from and most work equally well provided the engineer has a thorough understanding of how to use them. I happen to use and prefer the following tools, but your taste may be different. Use what you like and know as long as it gets the job done.

Items with an asterisk are my preferred tools for each category.

Information Gathering:
*AirMagnet Wi-Fi Analyzer Pro
*MetaGeek inSSIDer
  Fluke AirCheck
  Ekahau HeatMapper (Free)
  Xirrus Wi-Fi Inspector
  WiFi Scanner (Mac)
  Kismet (Linux)

Predictive Site Surveys:
*Cisco Wireless Control System (WCS)
  AirMagnet Planner
  Ekahau Site Survey
  Motorola LANPlanner
  Aerohive Wi-Fi Planner (online - Free)

Post-Installation Site Surveys:
*AirMagnet Survey Pro
  Ekahau Site Survey
  TamoSoft TamoGraph Site Survey
  Veriwave WaveDeploy

Protocol & Roaming Analysis:
*WildPackets OmniPeek
*MetaGeek Eye P.A. (protocol visualization)
*Wireshark with CACE AirPcapNx and Wi-Fi Pilot (now Riverbed Cascade Pilot Personal Edition)
  Wireshark with Atheros Adapter (Linux)
  AirMagnet Wi-Fi Analyzer Pro with multi-adapter kit
  AirMagnet VoFi Analyzer
  TamoSoft CommView for Wi-Fi

Spectrum Analysis:
*MetaGeek WiSpy DBx with Chanalyzer Pro
*Cisco Spectrum Expert (cardbus)
*Cisco CleanAir Access Points (Cisco infrastructure only)
  AirMagnet SpectrumXT

Performance Analysis:
*Ruckus Zap (open-source tool, also built into Ruckus equipment as SpeedFlex)
*ZapPerf (port of Zap tool to iOS devices)
*Iperf (CLI) or Jperf (Java) (both Free)
*2nd Ping Test Tool (Free)
*TCP/IP on Ethernet Performance Model (reference only) (Free)
  Veriwave WaveDeploy
  Ixia IxChariot
  Ixia Qcheck (Free)
  Nuts About Nets NetStress (Free)

Security / Pen-Testing:
*Backtrack / Kali Linux
  Immunity SILICA-U
  TamoSoft CommView packet injection
  CACE AirPcapNx traffic replay and injection

Cable Plant Verification:
*PowerDsine PoE Tester
*Fluke MicroScanner Cable Verifier
*Tempo 200EP Tone Probe
*Smartronix SuperLooper Line (loop adapters)

Miscellaneous Tools:
*Nuts About Nets AirHORN
*tftpd32
*Cisco WLC Config Analyzer
*Microsoft Visio