In some kernel configurations (users have most frequently reported the
problem only with 2.6.9), the default timeout value for the hotplug
subsystem is too low. You may have this problem if you see the
following in your kernel log (via dmesg or /var/log/messages):
ipw2200: Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 2200/2915 Network Driver, 1.0.1
ipw2200: Copyright(c) 2003-2004 Intel Corporation
ipw2200: Detected Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG Network Connection
ipw2200: ipw-2.2-boot.fw load failed: Reason -2
ipw2200: Unable to load firmware: 0xFFFFFFFE
ipw2200: failed to register network device
ipw2200: probe of 0000:00:0b.0 failed with error -5
To work around this, you can increase the default timeout value:
echo 100 > /sys/class/firmware/timeout
and then reload the ipw2200 module. If this corrects your problem, you
may wish to add the above line to your system startup scripts prior to
the point at which the driver module would be loaded.