SUrvey

Faizan Khursheed · ‎04-17-2010

hey expert

what the difference between active survey and passive survey

Kayle Miller · ‎04-19-2010

I assume your referring to Active -vs- Passive in either Airmagnet Surveyor or Ekahau Site Survey, or a similar product.

If so then a Passive Survey essential puts the client card in scan/monitor mode where it checks each configured channel for a period of time then moves on to the next channel, It is in a purely listen only state. There is no association or authentication in a passive survey.

An Active Survey requires associating and authenticating with the access points in order to capture data for the survey and it only logs data for the access points that it associates to.

Hope this helps. Please feel free to rate it.

chad_teal · ‎04-20-2010

Passive surveys basically gathers all available 802.11 information in the wireless environment. During a passive survey you do not connect to any access points.

Active surveys require a lot more work. The advantage to an active survey is that you get real-world connection information (PHY data rates, packet loss, and also uplink/downlink rates. Let me know if you would like more information on what is required to do each type of survey.