FC6 ipw3945 on Dell D820 not working. What's the best way?

[David Kramer]

SO I bought this brand new Dell Latitude D820.  I've been trying to get 
a fully working Linux install on it for weeks.   I tried F7, but the new 
suspend mechanism doesn't work on this laptop, and there's no way around 
it, so I installed FC6.  But with FC6, I can't get the ipw3945 wireless 
working.  I can't catch a break!

There seems to be several ways: the iwl* packages, the ipw* packages, 
with or without Network Manager...

So scanning the internets and this list, this is what I have now:
[root at lexa ~]# uname -a
Linux lexa.thekramers.net 2.6.20-1.2962.fc6 #1 SMP
Tue Jun 19 19:27:14    EDT 2007 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux

[root at lexa ~]# rpm -qa | egrep '(3945|ieee)'
ipw3945d-1.7.22-4.at
ipw3945-1.2.0-18.3.fc6
ipw3945-kmdl-2.6.20-1.2962.fc6-1.2.0-18.3.fc6
ipw3945-ucode-1.14.2-4.at
ieee80211-kmdl-2.6.20-1.2962.fc6-1.2.16-18.fc6
ieee80211-1.2.16-18.fc6
libieee1284-0.2.9-3.2.2

[root at lexa ~]# lsmod | egrep '(3945|ieee)'
ipw3945               180000  1
ieee80211              46188  1 ipw3945
ieee80211_crypt         9216  1 ieee80211
ieee1394              294681  1 ohci1394

[root at lexa ~]# ps -e | egrep '(3945|ieee)'
  3672 ?        00:00:00 ipw3945/0
  3674 ?        00:00:00 ipw3945/1
  3675 ?        00:00:00 ipw3945/0
  3676 ?        00:00:00 ipw3945/1
  3685 pts/2    00:00:00 ipw3945d

[root at lexa ~]# egrep '(3945|ieee)' /etc/modprobe.conf
alias eth1 ipw3945
install ipw3945 /sbin/modprobe --ignore-install ipw3945 ;
   sleep 0.5 ; /sbin/ipw3945d --timeout=2
remove ipw3945 /sbin/ipw3945d --kill ;
   /sbin/modprobe -r --ignore-remove ipw3945

[root at lexa ~]# cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1
# Please read /usr/share/doc/initscripts-*/sysconfig.txt
# for the documentation of these parameters.
TYPE=Wireless
DEVICE=eth1
HWADDR=00:1b:77:2c:64:c4
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
NETMASK=
DHCP_HOSTNAME=lexa.thekramers.net
IPADDR=
DOMAIN=
ONBOOT=no
USERCTL=yes
IPV6INIT=no
PEERDNS=yes
ESSID=DONTPANIC
MODE=Managed
RATE='36 Mb/s'
CHANNEL=1

"iwconfig eth1" and "iwlist eth1 scanning" both produce good-looking 
results, but the WiFi light is flashing very quickly, and "ifconfig eth1 
up" doesn't get an IP address, nor does "dhclient eth1", which just 
keeps trying.


So what am I doing wrong?
What does the fast blinking WiFi lite mean?
What's the difference between the iwp* packages and the iwl* packages?

Thanks.  I hope I included enough information.  I'm pretty desperate at 
this point.  This is an expensive laptop!