I finally got my Intel 3945ABG WiFi chip installed (by reinstalling
SUSE 10.1 and doing an online update, which updated the Intel WiFi
packages), and it promptly burst into life, promting me for the
password. Cracked it it, I thought.

But now whenever I power the machine on it does not connect
automatically. When I click on the WiFi connection in KNetworkManager
(i.e. the one with the correct SSID) I am always prompted for the
password - which, as 26 hex digits, is a pain.

What may just be connected is that originally I was using KWallet.
With that enabling the connection always got stuck at 0%. Now I have
disabled KWallet I get the symptoms described above.