buggy broadband (?)
Hi Folks,
I've got a Sid box (kernel 2.4.8) with two Linksys Etherfast v.2 NICs
which have worked flawlessly for several years now (confirmed by
tulip-diag). I recently got a SB4100 cablemodem and had ATT install a
line.
My problem is that I'm having to reset (ifdown/ifup) the interface
*often*, like every two or three minutes, which makes broadband nearly
useless. (Some days are better, but lately it's gotten very bad.
Indeed, dhclient sometimes fails to negotiate a lease after sending out
a ping and getting 100% packet loss).
iptraf reports that eth1 sends an arp request to the ATT router and
fails to get a reply. It tries a second time, then just sits there
broadcasting the arp request. Bah! syslog reports "receive_packet failed
on eth1: network is down", but after I bring eth1 down, which may or
may-not tell me anything.
The cablemodem, however, does not appear to lose sync: receive, send,
and online lights are steady-on.
How do I isolate the problem? That is, how do I determine if it's the
Linksys NIC, the Linksys NIC/cablemodem connection, a weak upstream
cablemodem signal, a weak downstream signal -- the tech had to install a
new line to make up for signal loss due to excessive splitting elsewhere
in the house, but he left apparently satisfied that there was enough
signal on the new line -- or something altogether else which I haven't
considered but you folks might catch?
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
Best,
Don
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