Re: a NIC card gone bad.
Marc Jackson wrote:
Hi Marty and others,
troubleshooting the network *is* part of his job description. I just
like to make sure I've done my part. :) I've used a lot of systems
over the years. I'm trying to make sure that this variant of
linux/unix doesn't require that I do something else to make the NIC
usable.
I think it's unlikely that Debian's kernel makes any difference. The
kernel maintainer might patch in some well tested security patches, for
example, but that's unlikely to be at the root of your problem. The most
telling data is that Becker's driver doesn't work, which could point
to an autonegotiation problem.
re: trying another port on the other end of the LAN segment. I have
tried the other port in
the wall jack. Unless they've done something *really* bad that would
indicate that I've tried
another port on the switch as well as wires & jack.
It may very well be that the "brand name networking device" in the
closet has not auto-negotiated. That is what the networking guy is
supposed to determine, since
I don't have the keys to the "closet". :) Hopefully, my networking
guy will set his networking
device to 100 Mb fullduplex since that is what my NIC is set at, and I
can't think of a reason
why I wouldn't want it to have that setting. :)
It's all supposed to be done automatically with a combination of hardware
and software, following the algorithm in the ethernet spec. The problem
is that for whatever reason, it doesn't always work correctly, especially
in various corner cases with some Linux drivers. One way to troubleshoot
autonegotiation is to allow the link to become established and then see
what each end "thinks" its connection type is (speed and full or half duplex)
making sure that they match. On the Linux side, the driver reports this
information and it could be apparent from the NIC LEDs as well, depending
on the NIC card.
Regards,
Marc
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