3c900 card and kernel 2.4.3 <

3c900 card and kernel 2.4.3 <

[r.verhees]

Hi there,

when i install kernel 2.4.3 or higher on my slackware
system the card (3c900) gets detected but doesn't do
anything, i also get the line "using NWAY 8" or something
like that (had to switch back to 2.4.2 to type e-mail)
wondered if anyone else had this problem and if there's
some way to solve it?

if you need any other info please mail
Regards, Ronnie

Re: 3c900 card and kernel 2.4.3 <

[Juri Haberland]

r.verhees@chello.nl wrote:
> Hi there,
> 
> when i install kernel 2.4.3 or higher on my slackware
> system the card (3c900) gets detected but doesn't do
> anything, i also get the line "using NWAY 8" or something
> like that (had to switch back to 2.4.2 to type e-mail)
> wondered if anyone else had this problem and if there's
> some way to solve it?

Hi Ronnie,

did you receive any answer?

Do you use 10Base2 (aka cheaper net)?
I do and after upgrading to 2.4.3 (I think) I had to force the driver to
use the BNC connector though the card was configured (via the little config
program supplied by 3com) to always use the BNC connector...
This way I lost several hours to figure out why it wasn't working anymore and
to discover that I have to build it as a module instead of having it compiled
into the kernel because I couldn't make it work with kernel options - only
with driver options...
Any suggestions?

Juri

-- 
Juri Haberland  <juri@koschikode.com> 

Re: 3c900 card and kernel 2.4.3 <

[Andrew Morton]

Juri Haberland wrote:
> 
> r.verhees@chello.nl wrote:
> > Hi there,
> >
> > when i install kernel 2.4.3 or higher on my slackware
> > system the card (3c900) gets detected but doesn't do
> > anything, i also get the line "using NWAY 8" or something
> > like that (had to switch back to 2.4.2 to type e-mail)
> > wondered if anyone else had this problem and if there's
> > some way to solve it?
> 
> Hi Ronnie,
> 
> did you receive any answer?
> 
> Do you use 10Base2 (aka cheaper net)?
> I do and after upgrading to 2.4.3 (I think) I had to force the driver to
> use the BNC connector though the card was configured (via the little config
> program supplied by 3com) to always use the BNC connector...
> This way I lost several hours to figure out why it wasn't working anymore and
> to discover that I have to build it as a module instead of having it compiled
> into the kernel because I couldn't make it work with kernel options - only
> with driver options...
> Any suggestions?

Yes, sorry.

The problem with earlier kernels was that autoselection
would notice the lack of 10baseT link beat and would then
advance on to trying AUI/SQE/10base2/etc.  None of these
interfaces allow the driver to know if there's anything
connected and the driver consequently gets stuck on that
interface.  The net effect: if you unplug the 10baseT
the driver gets stuck and you have to reboot.

So autoselection was turned off if the NIC was found
to have autonegotiation hardware.  If you want to use
the other interfaces, you have to provide an option,
as described in Documentation/networking/vortex.txt.

For non-modular drivers things are less easy.  If you
want to force it to use 10baseT (if_port zero) then
it should work OK if you cheat and use mem_start=0x400.
So `ether=0,0,0x400'.

For BNC, it should work just fine with `ether=0,0,1'.
If it doesn't, please shout at me.   Compile the
driver with `static int vortex_debug = 7;' at line
183 and send me the boot logs.

Thanks.


-

Re: 3c900 card and kernel 2.4.3 <

[Juri Haberland]

Andrew Morton wrote:
> Juri Haberland wrote:
>> 
>> Do you use 10Base2 (aka cheaper net)?
>> I do and after upgrading to 2.4.3 (I think) I had to force the driver to
>> use the BNC connector though the card was configured (via the little config
>> program supplied by 3com) to always use the BNC connector...
>> This way I lost several hours to figure out why it wasn't working anymore and
>> to discover that I have to build it as a module instead of having it compiled
>> into the kernel because I couldn't make it work with kernel options - only
>> with driver options...
>> Any suggestions?
> 
> Yes, sorry.
> 
> The problem with earlier kernels was that autoselection
> would notice the lack of 10baseT link beat and would then
> advance on to trying AUI/SQE/10base2/etc.  None of these
> interfaces allow the driver to know if there's anything
> connected and the driver consequently gets stuck on that
> interface.  The net effect: if you unplug the 10baseT
> the driver gets stuck and you have to reboot.
> 
> So autoselection was turned off if the NIC was found
> to have autonegotiation hardware.  If you want to use
> the other interfaces, you have to provide an option,
> as described in Documentation/networking/vortex.txt.

Actually I would expect the driver to use the default setting from
the EEPROM as it did before (or at least it seemed to me like that).

> For non-modular drivers things are less easy.  If you
> want to force it to use 10baseT (if_port zero) then
> it should work OK if you cheat and use mem_start=0x400.
> So `ether=0,0,0x400'.
> 
> For BNC, it should work just fine with `ether=0,0,1'.

According to vortex.txt it should be `ether=0,0,3'. I think I tried
that, but will do so again this evening.

> If it doesn't, please shout at me.   Compile the
> driver with `static int vortex_debug = 7;' at line
> 183 and send me the boot logs.

Thanks for answering,

Juri

-- 
Juri Haberland  <juri@koschikode.com> 

Re: 3c900 card and kernel 2.4.3

[Juri Haberland]

Andrew Morton wrote:
> 
> Juri Haberland wrote:
> > Do you use 10Base2 (aka cheaper net)?
> > I do and after upgrading to 2.4.3 (I think) I had to force the driver to
> > use the BNC connector though the card was configured (via the little config
> > program supplied by 3com) to always use the BNC connector...
> > This way I lost several hours to figure out why it wasn't working anymore and
> > to discover that I have to build it as a module instead of having it compiled
> > into the kernel because I couldn't make it work with kernel options - only
> > with driver options...
> > Any suggestions?

> For non-modular drivers things are less easy.  If you
> want to force it to use 10baseT (if_port zero) then
> it should work OK if you cheat and use mem_start=0x400.
> So `ether=0,0,0x400'.
> 
> For BNC, it should work just fine with `ether=0,0,1'.
> If it doesn't, please shout at me.   Compile the
> driver with `static int vortex_debug = 7;' at line
> 183 and send me the boot logs.

Hi Andrew,

I tried it with 'ether=0,0,1', 3 and also 7, but to no avail. The output
of dmesg follows.

Thanks,
Juri

Linux version 2.4.4-xfs (root@pktomo.koschikode.com) (gcc version 2.96
20000731
(Red Hat Linux 7.1 2.96-81)) #4 Tue May 15 23:17:53 CEST 2001
[--snip--]
Kernel command line: auto BOOT_IMAGE=linux ro root=305
BOOT_FILE=/boot/vmlinuz hdc=ide-scsi ether=0,0,3
[--snip--]
PCI: Found IRQ 10 for device 00:0f.0
3c59x.c:LK1.1.13 27 Jan 2001  Donald Becker and others.
http://www.scyld.com/network/vortex.html
See Documentation/networking/vortex.txt
eth0: 3Com PCI 3c900 Cyclone 10Mbps Combo at 0xc800,  00:10:5a:d6:84:df,
IRQ 10
  product code 5050 rev 00.4 date 11-21-98
  Internal config register is 1800000, transceivers 0x38.
  8K byte-wide RAM 5:3 Rx:Tx split, autoselect/Autonegotiate interface.
  MII transceiver found at address 24, status 1809.
  Enabling bus-master transmits and whole-frame receives.
eth0: scatter/gather enabled. h/w checksums enabled
[--snip--]
spurious 8259A interrupt: IRQ7.
eth0:  Filling in the Rx ring.
eth0: using NWAY device table, not 8
eth0: Initial media type Autonegotiate.
vortex_up(): writing 0x1800000 to InternalConfig
eth0: MII #24 status 1809, link partner capability 0000, info1 0010,
setting half-duplex.
eth0: vortex_up() InternalConfig 01800000.
eth0: vortex_up() irq 10 media status 8080.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 0.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 5 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 1.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 5 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 2.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 4 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
eth0: Media selection timer tick happened, Autonegotiate.
dev->watchdog_timeo=500
eth0: MII transceiver has status 1809.
eth0: Media selection timer finished, Autonegotiate.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 3.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 5 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 4.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 5 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 5.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 4 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 6.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 6 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 7.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 5 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe081
eth0: interrupt, status e081, latency 4 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e081.
eth0: vortex_error(), status=0xe081
eth0: Updating stats.
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
boomerang_start_xmit()
eth0: Trying to send a packet, Tx index 8.
boomerang_interrupt. status=0xe201
eth0: interrupt, status e201, latency 5 ticks.
eth0: In interrupt loop, status e201.
boomerang_interrupt: wake queue
eth0: exiting interrupt, status e000.
eth0: Media selection timer tick happened, Autonegotiate.
dev->watchdog_timeo=500
eth0: MII transceiver has status 1809.
eth0: Media selection timer finished, Autonegotiate.
eth0: Media selection timer tick happened, Autonegotiate.
dev->watchdog_timeo=500
eth0: MII transceiver has status 1809.
eth0: Media selection timer finished, Autonegotiate.
eth0: Media selection timer tick happened, Autonegotiate.
dev->watchdog_timeo=500
eth0: MII transceiver has status 1809.
eth0: Media selection timer finished, Autonegotiate.

Re: 3c900 card and kernel 2.4.3

[Juri Haberland]

Juri Haberland wrote:
> 
> Andrew Morton wrote:
> 
> > For non-modular drivers things are less easy.  If you
> > want to force it to use 10baseT (if_port zero) then
> > it should work OK if you cheat and use mem_start=0x400.
> > So `ether=0,0,0x400'.
> >
> > For BNC, it should work just fine with `ether=0,0,1'.
> > If it doesn't, please shout at me.   Compile the
> > driver with `static int vortex_debug = 7;' at line
> > 183 and send me the boot logs.
> 
> Hi Andrew,
> 
> I tried it with 'ether=0,0,1', 3 and also 7, but to no avail. The output
> of dmesg follows.

Oh, and I forgot to say, that the card is actually set to autoselection
in the EEPROM (I just had a look with the DOS tool).

Juri