Hi. I'm a computer tech that's new to Linux. I'm totally loving it except for the following issue. Here's my question.

I have an RT61 based wifi PCI card (Gigabyte GN-WP01GS). The problem is that when the card is plugged in, the system is liable to crash, particularly if I'm trying to use or set up the card. When it does crash, the system doesn't respond to any emergency keystrokes, and the mouse doesn't move. It goes completely dead and you need a cold boot.

I have tried it with 3 distros: Mandriva spring 2007, Kubuntu Feisty Fawn, and Ubuntu Feisty Fawn. All of these distros crash when the card is used. The same problem would happen I boot from the live CDs. Ironically Windows XP works without a hitch.

Xp is installed on one hard drive. The linux distros run on another hard drive. I let the installer format and partition the Linux drive before each install. I did not try to install multiple distros at once

Here are some details:
Mandriva: I used Serial Monkey rt61 drivers, manually installed. The internet was usable for a while but the system would crash randomly, within 2-3 hours but sometimes sooner. Incidentally I read on another forum that some RT61 cards crash this system if you lose the wireless signal. Related issue?

Kubuntu: It autodetected the card and could read the SSID's in my area, but the OS would crash quickly (within 5 minutes).

Ubuntu: The system crashes when I try to update the wireless settings via the Gui. It is running the serial monkey drivers, which it automatically installed. This is the OS I'm currently running.



Thanks for reading. Any suggestions would be appreciated.


Athlon XP 1700+
512 DDR
PCChips M847A Motherboard
ATI Radeon 9600 graphics card
Gigabyte GN-WP01GS wifi card (RT61 based) -- The card from hell