Re: Pentium Freezes (Potato)

[Elizabeth Barham <soggytrousers@yahoo.com>]

ben <benfoley@rcn.com> writes:

> there's a bug in the vectra series that goes way way back that prevents 
> ne2000's, whether clones or otherwise, from even being recognized on the 
> board. i can't remember the details but it do remember coming across it when 
> trying to hook a 486 vectra to a client's newer machine. it just wouldn't 
> fly. i believe that we solved the problem by plip linking the two machines. 
> in any case, i distinctly remember that the vectra wouldn't even boot with 
> the ne2000. the hp site has info about it at
> 
> http://www.support.vectra.hp.com/vectrasupport/level4/4bpv02088/4bpv02088.html
> 
> the problem on the vectra is that the card needs to be configurable to suit 
> the vectra's quirks.

I read something on their site about a problem with Intel BusMaster
software. It has something to do with the drive's IRQ and the PCI
bus. One of the ways to overcome this problem is by installing a PCI
device in the machine. So I tried swapping out the NE2k with a PCI
Davicom NIC but the problem has not been corrected, unfortunatly.

Just a little while ago many errors were caught by the kernel. I do
not know if this just means that there is better error reporting with
2.4 or if these are the real, infamous kernel 'oops' messages. Most of
the errors involved virtual memory accesses. This may be a possible
clue to the source of the problem.

Thank you again,

Elizabeth