> On a Dell Inspiron 8000 ntpd isn't able to keep the time
> synchronized either.

Does it have variable clock rates for power saving?

> It does currently not have a Orinoco
> card installed, but the wi driver is configured in the
> kernel.

The driver in the kernel does not do anything at all. The problem manifested
when a wi* card was present.

> So I doubt it is related to the Orinoco driver itself but
> maybe to the pcmcia driver in general.

No. Running -current (after the dev/ic/wi.c fix) my IBM Thinkpad keeps time
(with wi0 active) perfectly, dispersion is below 1 ms.

Martin