I had to replace the Realtek WiFi PCIe Mini-card in my MSI Wind with an
Atheros Ar242x to get it to work with Ubuntu. Either one worked with the XP
that came pre-installed. Once that was done the card was recognized and,
after the usual configuration for a static IP, it just worked. I also have a
wired internet connection and I may have had to use that to get needed
updates - can't recall as I do a lot of upgrading and making changes.

I am not sure how madwifi works as I have not used it, but the way ndiswrapper
works is that it adds a Windows api that must be loaded each time you boot the
computer. This means that after getting it to work you need to change settings
so the ndiswrapper module loads with your Linux distro at boot time. This means
that you need to take a few extra steps after you get it working. In
ndiswrapper, you can do it from the commandline using chmod and editing a file
or you can use the GUI tool ndisgtk which takes care of the details for you.

If madwifi is not working, you may have to re-install it and check to see if
there are any steps that you left out so the changes are permanent, ie. maybe
madwifi needs to be loaded at boot up. This is only one possibility. Someone who
has used madwifi may be able to provide more useful help.

Thank you for responding to my problem. I think we are talking about
the same thing here. To clarify I spent all day yesterday trying to
get to the bottom of the problem and here is what works:

The module needs to be loaded at boot time, using terminal and the
command (ifconfig ath0 up) starts the device up then it shows up on
the connection dropdown.

Now I need help with:

As a newbee I have only followed printed step by step instructions
while using the terminal, Heck, I had to fight to change directories
(looked it up in ubuntu reference). When you talk about using chmod
and editing a file I am lost! What file can I change so I can add the
command that will load the ath0 device, for an automatic start-up.

I figure by the time everything is working I may know enough to help
others. Programs like Open Office and Firefox sold me on the open
Source community, helping me to try Linux flavors. I can see why many
plug and play MS users reject Linux even if a working Linux system
will give them less headaches in the future. Maybe if ndiswrapper was
automatic for Wifi devices and other windows type devices that could
be fooled with later by those wanting to play with the system, MS
would have serious competition.

I have a book on PHP that tells people how to set there computer up as
a server to use as a test system. The author simply tells those that
use Linux, that he assumes if you have a Linux system you know
everything, how can that help Linux become main stream? Maybe it is
because the author has no idea how to set-up an apache server using
PHP on Linux, but for the reader who paid for his book, he should just
say so, such comments reduce the number of future Linux users.

It sounds like that it is set up to use modprobe ath_pci to load the module. You
won't have to go through all of the steps, but just have to use this command
each time you reboot.

Documentation I looked at:
http://madwifi.org/wiki/UserDocs/FirstTimeHowTo
http://madwifi.org/wiki/UserDocs
http://madwifi.org/wiki/UserDocs/Distro/Ubuntu

The first point is that madwifi is in the repositories as the last link above
shows.

What I was referring to was having this module load automatically each time you
reboot. This link is rather dated but the method will work with Hardy, but the
step you want is close to the bottom where is says to edit the file etc/modules:
http://www.stchman.com/ath_drv.html