ALFA Driver Guides — Overview

一句話定位（One-liner）: Every ALFA wireless adapter on Linux is powered by one of seven chipsets — three MediaTek chipsets with in-kernel drivers that work out of the box, and four Realtek chipsets that need an out-of-tree DKMS build. Find your chipset below and jump to its guide.

Chipset Map

Chipset	Adapters	Driver binding	In-kernel?	Guide
MT7612U	AWUS036ACM	mt76x2u	✅ In-kernel	MT7612U guide
MT7610U	AWUS036ACHM	mt76x0u	✅ In-kernel	MT7610U guide
MT7921AUN	AWUS036AXM, AWUS036AXML	mt7921u	✅ In-kernel	MT7921AUN guide
RTL8812AU	AWUS036ACH	Out-of-tree / DKMS	❌ Not in-kernel	RTL8812AU guide
RTL8811AU	AWUS036ACS	Out-of-tree / DKMS	❌ Not in-kernel	RTL8811AU guide
RTL8832BU	AWUS036AX, AWUS036AXER	Out-of-tree / DKMS	❌ Not in-kernel	RTL8832BU guide
RTL8821CU	AWUS036EACS	Out-of-tree / DKMS	❌ Not in-kernel	RTL8821CU guide

How to Pick

1. Identify the chipset — run lsusb and match the vendor:product pair against your adapter's spec sheet.
2. MediaTek chipset? You are done — the driver is in the kernel. Go straight to the guide to confirm with dmesg / iw dev and enable monitor mode.
3. Realtek chipset? Follow the matching guide to build the DKMS module. Remember: a kernel update needs sudo dkms autoinstall afterwards.

The full system walk-throughs live in the Linux setup guides and the compatibility matrix.