D-Link PCMCIA Notebook Adapter & Gigabit

[dallen]

I am new to this forum and have been toiling over which section to post this question, so please excuse me if I chose incorrectly. I am hoping that one of the many smart people that frequent this forum can help me solve this minor inconvenience.

I am using Linux Mint 9 on my laptop because this is the latest edition that gives me decent frame rate graphic performance with my relatively older laptop's ATI Radeon 9600 graphics card (this is a separate issue for another thread, but any input on this is also welcome). My laptop's built-in network adapter does not support gigabit ethernet, so I use the PCMCIA port on the side to install a D-Link DGE-660TD Gigabit Notebook Adapter. It works well.

The issue is that every time I shut my laptop (which I leave running all the time) my system goes into hibernation (which I like). Upon opening the laptop and hitting the power button to bring the system out of hibernation mode, the adapter's green light (indicating gigabit) is orange (indicating 100M). The only way that I've found to restore the gigabit is to remove and re-insert the adapter. Since I do this often, I am concerned about the wear and tear. Also, it is a bit annoying.

Does anyone know how to stop this from occurring? If not, does anyone know how to restore the gigabit connection without having to remove the adapter?

Thank you in advance for any assistance and for understanding if I inadvertently failed to adhere to forum rules or etiquette.

[dallen]

Bump. Any guidance will be greatly appreciated.