anyone know/use netstumbler?

[rainypickles]

so as far as i understand, netstumbler can be used to find wireless networks so in times of dire emergency, you can look up directions on the awesomeness internet.

my question is: do you really need netstumbler?

don't most wireless cards come with some program that searches for networks? just curious. (i dont have wireless yet)

 

[Firus]

I have used netstumbler here in my town of Kelowna BC Canada. Found over 30 wireless networks in a distance of less than 7 blocks.
To answer your question, you could technically do it without netstumbler, but you would have to keep hitting refresh, refresh, refresh in the network properties for wireless, which is really slow and you would probably miss any networks dues to the time it takes to refresh.

Netstumbler picks them up like nothing, and alerts you when it finds one via sound.
I really enjoy wardriving and am planning on mapping out the cities networks, once I can borrow my buddies GPS
I do not connect to the networks that I find, just seems un-ethical to me, its basically like stealing, and people could easily blame you of trying to crack into the network for evil purposes.