WLAN not working rt2500

[Axel Heinrici]

Hello,

I have a MSI S270 laptop branded "Medion". It seems I got everything 
working with kubuntu 8.04 except for WLAN. 
My problem is there is too much of information on the web and there are 
lots of ways how set the network up properly. It still didn't get the 
full picture of how wpasupplicant, networkmanager, native devices, 
avahi etc. are playing together. I am willing to read documentation but 
I still need some help to get a general overview.

My topology:
I have a linux router making connection to the internet and running a 
DHCP server. Connected to that I have a linksys access point (just 
accesspoint and not a router). The access point is using WPA-encryption 
which is running fine with windows and my symbian cell phone. Ethernet 
connection is also workig.

Situation:
ifconfig shows 5 interfaces : eth0, lo, wlan0, wlan0, wlan0:avahi and 
wmaster0.
After I used the network-admin (KDEmenu->System->network) and put in the 
essid and the WPA passphrase a few packets are received and sended via 
wlan0. No packets are received or sent via wlan0:avahi nor wmaster0. 
DHCP is working for ethernet but not for WLAN.

thanks in advance
   Axel


some commandline sniplets possibly of interest:

<=============
:~$ ifconfig
eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  Hardware Adresse 00:11:09:ff:c7:bf  
          inet Adresse:192.168.0.240  Bcast:192.168.0.255  
Maske:255.255.255.0
          inet6-Adresse: fe80::211:9ff:feff:c7bf/64 
Gültigkeitsbereich:Verbindung
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metrik:1
          RX packets:33541 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:23034 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          Kollisionen:0 Sendewarteschlangenlänge:1000 
          RX bytes:44219279 (42.1 MB)  TX bytes:2387541 (2.2 MB)
          Interrupt:19 Basisadresse:0xe800 

lo        Link encap:Lokale Schleife  
          inet Adresse:127.0.0.1  Maske:255.0.0.0
          inet6-Adresse: ::1/128 Gültigkeitsbereich:Maschine
          UP LOOPBACK RUNNING  MTU:16436  Metrik:1
          RX packets:112 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:112 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          Kollisionen:0 Sendewarteschlangenlänge:0 
          RX bytes:5600 (5.4 KB)  TX bytes:5600 (5.4 KB)

wlan0     Link encap:Ethernet  Hardware Adresse 00:11:09:af:9a:40  
          inet6-Adresse: fe80::211:9ff:feaf:9a40/64 
Gültigkeitsbereich:Verbindung
          UP BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metrik:1
          RX packets:1795 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:1919 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          Kollisionen:0 Sendewarteschlangenlänge:1000 
          RX bytes:202835 (198.0 KB)  TX bytes:313896 (306.5 KB)

wlan0:avahi Link encap:Ethernet  Hardware Adresse 00:11:09:af:9a:40  
          inet Adresse:169.254.5.217  Bcast:169.254.255.255  
Maske:255.255.0.0
          UP BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metrik:1

wmaster0  Link encap:UNSPEC  Hardware Adresse 
00-11-09-AF-9A-40-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00  
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metrik:1
          RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          Kollisionen:0 Sendewarteschlangenlänge:1000 
          RX bytes:0 (0.0 B)  TX bytes:0 (0.0 B)
===========>

<===========:~$ lsmod |grep rt2
rt2500pci              20352  0 
rt2x00pci              11264  1 rt2500pci
rt2x00lib              22528  2 rt2500pci,rt2x00pci
rfkill                  8596  2 rt2x00lib
input_polldev           5896  1 rt2x00lib
crc_itu_t               3072  1 rt2x00lib
mac80211              165652  3 rt2500pci,rt2x00pci,rt2x00lib
eeprom_93cx6            3200  1 rt2500pci
===========>