On Mon, 2008-01-28 at 15:01 -0800, Dan Thurman wrote:
> On Monday 28 January 2008 01:54:16 pm Rick Stevens wrote:
> > On Mon, 2008-01-28 at 13:07 -0800, Dan Thurman wrote:
> > > Folks,
> > >
> > > Motherboard: P5GC-MX/1333, onboard Attansic L2 NIC chip
> > >
> > > Earlier I reported a nightmarish experience trying to get my onboard
> > > Attansic L2 NIC working after compiling the source code for it,
> > > installing it, and so on and could not figure out why the NIC was not
> > > turning on the phyiscal link.
> > >
> > > I think I understand the symptoms but not the underlying cause.
> > >
> > > I reported in my earlier post, that I blamed the twisted pair cable but
> > > it turns out this was not the problem. The cabled is fine. I had to go
> > > to my garbage can to retrieve the cable I almost threw out.
> > >
> > > I can repeatedly prove (at least to myself), that under a multiboot
> > > situation, if you boot using w2000/XP, M$ turns ON/OFF/ON the link when
> > > coming up and when it is shutdown/rebooted, it disables the link. It
> > > somehow turns the NIC OFF on reboot/shutdown.
> > >
> > > When you bootup Fedora, Fedora goes along as it normally does, probes
> > > eth0, but FAILS to turn ON the link. You CANNOT get Fedora to bring up
> > > the link no matter what you do. The ONLY way to get the link back is to
> > > physically power off the power supply because the motherboard always
> > > get's it's power unless the PS itself is turned off and until the power
> > > drains out.
> > >
> > > Only then, you can bring up Fedora's OS and get the NIC link to work.
> > >
> > > I wonder if M$ plugs microcode into the Attansic L2 chip that renders
> > > Fedora unable to turn on the link OR the code is missing from the Fedora
> > > networking process to turn ON the link.
> > >
> > > Can someone in development look into this and let me know what is going
> > > on?
> > >
> > > At the moment, I have a temporary solution for now but I'd like to make
> > > sure no other helpless chap faces this problem like I did for weeks
> > > trying to figure this out.
> >
> > Does "iwconfig wlan0 txpower on" turn on your card? Is there a modprobe
> > option you need? "modinfo name-of-driver" should show you those. On my
> > iwl4965, there's an option:
> > options iwl4965 disable=1
> > which would turn off the radio. By default it's on ("disable=0").
> > Perhaps yours is backwards?
>
> Thanks for responding.
>
> The following are the only published options available and none of them sets
> the link on or off as far as I can tell. I will try options atl2 MediaType=0
> and see if this helps. The NIC is not a wireless NIC so that won't work for
> me.
>
> Attansic L2 Options:
> ============
> MediaType
> Valid Range: 0-4
> 0 - auto-negotiate at all supported speeds
> 1 - only link at 100Mbps Full Duplex
> 2 - only link at 100Mbps Half Duplex
> 3 - only link at 10Mbps Full Duplex
> 4 - only link at 10Mbps Half Duplex
> Default Value: 0
> MediaType forces the line speed/duplex to the specified value in
> megabits per second(Mbps). If this parameter is not specified or is set
> to 0 and the link partner is set to auto-negotiate, the board will
> auto-detect the correct speed.
>
> IntModTimer
> Valid Range: 50-65000
> Default Value: 100
> This value represents the minmum interval between interrupts controller
> generated.
>
> RxMemBlock
> Valid Range: 16-512
> Default Value: 64
> This value is the number of receice memory block allocated by the driver.
> Increasing this value allows the driver to buffer more incoming packets.
> Each memory block is 1536 bytes.
>
> NOTE: Depending on the available system resources, the request for a
> higher number of receive descriptors may be denied. In this case,
> use a lower number.
>
> TxMemSize
> Valid Range: 4-64
> Default Value: 8
> This value is the number KB of transmit memory allocated by the driver.
> Increasing this value allows the driver to queue more transmits.
>
> NOTE: Depending on the available system resources, the request for a
> higher number of transmit descriptors may be denied. In this case,
> use a lower number.
>
> FlashVendor
> Valid Range: 0-2
> Default Value: 0
> This value standards on vendor of spi flash used by the adapter.
> 0 for Atmel, 1 for SST, 2 for ST
Was that the output of "modinfo attansic" or something from the source?
Seems rather, uh, verbose for a modinfo listing.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Rick Stevens, Principal Engineer rstevens@xxxxxxxxxxxx -
- CDN Systems, Internap, Inc. http://www.internap.com -
- -
- Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a -
- rigged demo. -
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