[ale] Lost Wireless on Laptop

[Jim Moore]

Wednesday I fired up the laptop and did several things:
1.  Used the software updater to get Samba software.
2.  Attempted to install the Livna rep (unsuccessful, but that's another 
issue to be resolved later)
3.  The software updater updated about 15 packages.
4.  Dinked around the internet some.
5.  Shut Down.

 Thursday I fired up the laptop and ran into problems.
1.  As it was booting when it got to networking, rather than getting ip 
address for eth1 I got the message that " 8139too  device doesn't seem 
to be present"  Wireless for the laptop is Intel ProWireless 2200BG 
which is on eth1
2.  Went to Sys-Admin-Network and checked the device for eth1,  it's 
listed as the Intel card, but shows not activated.
3.  Tried to activate, but get the message that "8139 not present"
4.  Finally just shut down.

Am at a loss.  Is there someway to locate this mysterious "8139" and 
delete it thereby restoring the Intel?
Could always just. blow the partition and re-install.  Nothing critical 
that I would lose

How would one even go about probing for a mysterious device.  I can do 
some of the simple things at the command line, but know I've just 
scratched the surface of its capability and have so much to learn.

Jim