I'm having numerous problems with getting Mandrake 10.0 community to function properly with my notebook. Any help you can give me would be great, I have a medium level of experience with Linux, so please be patient!
[list=1][*]ACPI

I'm using Gnome as my GUI, and I would like to be able to see my battery power. The default battery always shows its level at 0. After some digging, I have found that the ACPI and APM are not compiled into the kenel by default. So I got the kernel source rpm (kernel-source-2.6.3-4mdk). I then run the standard "make xconfig" and select ACPI Support, Sleep Sates, AC Adapter, Battery, Button, Fan, Processor Thermal Zone, Relaxed AML, PowerManagment Timer Support. I also select my processor as an Athalon, and enable the PowerNow option. I then save and exit, "make clean" and "make bzlilo". This will reboot with the new image just fine, however when I acutally enable ACPI on the lilo config, my system hangs as lilo tries to load the kernel. I also had this behavior with the old kernel, and I thought recompiling with the specific processor, powernow, and ACPI options would fix the issue. I have also read that ACPI conflicts with APM, so I have tried the kernel build with and without APM. Both have the same result. So I have to put in disk 1 boot to it, and reinstall lilo to get rid of the ACPI option to even boot.
[*]BroadCom Wireless Connectivity

I have a broadcom wireless 802.11g adapter. Since broadcom refuses to release Linux binaries, I downloaded and compiled the ndiswrapper module. I then gave it my broadcom inf driver, and I now have my broadcom module loaded. I can verify this by running "ndiswrapper -l" where I get the output "bcmwl5a present". If I run ifconfig I also get the device wlan0. My Access point is configured to use WPA-PSK. I have a shared key, we'll call it "Foo5Bar7!". So, since I have the wlan0 and the iw package I try the command. "iwconfig essid NINE key s:Foo5Bar7!" and "iwconfig essid NINE key s:Foo5Bar7! restricted". Neither work. In the documentation it says the the conversion of the string to hex with the s: doesn't work properly. So, does any one know where this information goes(what file) so I can figure out the hex myself? Also, is there a decent wireless gui for Gnome similar to (I hate to say it....) Windows? I'm on the move a lot, and I don't neccessarily know the name or the encryption level of the WAP's I'm using, so I need to be able to view that. Also, is there a way to start and stop networking devices without being root? I want to set this up so my fiancee can use the laptop as well.
[*]Second Monitor Output

I have the plugin for a second monitor, however whenever I plug it in, it only works for the lilo and boot sequence, then my monitor gives me an error the the frequency is not correct. If I plug it in After my X server oads, to works. It's an ATI Radeon Mobile with TV out., and I'm just using the Radeon Drivers bundled with Mandrake 10.0 Community. Any Ideas?
[*] Eth0 issues

I have the device eth0 set to load on startup. In the boot messages it says that it has failed. However I get an IP from my DHCP server, and it functions just fine, has anyone else encountered this?[/list=1]

Nevermind about the ACPI, I finally found a post that states the Mandrake Lilo Gui doesn't edit lilo.conf properly. I did it manually and it works!