[Prism54-users] how to have cardbus prism54 adaptor configure on insert?

[Gregory P. Smith]

It looks like when i insert my prism54 card (netgear wg511) /sbin/hotplug
is called and causes the hotplug pci.agent to load the prism54 module
and net.agent to attempt to configure the network device.  However for
some reason the network hotplug fails to configure the interface.

On hypothesis (I haven't traced things to confirm) is that this is
because hotplug is executing the net.agent but configuring the interface
up requires a firmware hotplug event is serialized by hotplug to only
occur after the net.agent finishes?

Manually running my /etc/init.d/net.eth1 script that makes the appropriate
iwconfig and ifconfig calls after i insert the card works fine.

How do other people have their card autoconfigure itself?  If my
hypothesis is correct there is a chicken and egg problem in the hotplug
system..

Is there any reason the firmware cannot be pre loaded at card insert /
prism54 module load time rather than being loaded on demand when the
interface is configured?  (does the firmware suck so bad that it can't
have an unconfigured interface draw little to no power?)

(it'd be nice if the old /etc/pcmcia/wireless.opts method worked but i
realize thats legacy now that pci hotplug is handling the card config
rather than cardmgr)

Greg

PS  I'm running gentoo - but this problem is presumably not distro
    specific.