But no problem in the end for me. I am currently using MCNLIve "Delft" running from a USB drive (A nice arrangement, and I am looking forward to trying out the "Toronto" distro, as well as other Mandriva versions, soon.) The USB adapter was easily installed by using the ndiswrapper selection in the Mandriva Control Center, and selecting the Windows 98 driver after mounting the CD that came with the adapter. I haven't tried the other drivers, but a previous Internet search suggested the Win98 drivers as best. The rest of the install went very smoothly, and I was on the Net within a few minutes. My router is already set up for WPA, and this was all set up pretty automatically. I didn't need to enter any IP address, etc...
First impressions: the signal strength indicator shows a very low signal strength, but I usually get a strong signal using WinXP and this device. It doesn't seem to affect the connection, so maybe it's not correct. The device gets warm, but it seems to be OK. I believe the same basic USB adapter is available branded under other names and it is inexpensive.
After spending many evenings trying to get my realtek 8185 PCI card to run under Linux, the ENUWI-G2 was very easy with MCNLive. I suspect it wouid be OK with other Mandriva derived distros. Good Luck!
Next challenge: the Realtek 8185 card. Here I suspect that the supplied drivers are the real issue, the Windows XP ones won't load in ndiswrapper and the built-in R8180 drivers don't work, either.
that's all for now
sg
[moved from Networking by spinynorman - welcome aboard
]