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Just figured out a nasty forcedeth network issue, so here's the details |
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if anyone is interested. |
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|
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My new amd64 box, a cheap Compaq desktop (AMD64 3800+, nVidia |
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MCP51 chipset), doesn't start the network properly when booting of the |
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2006.0 livecd (or universal cd, for that matter). Obviously it came |
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with Windows XP, and I'm setting it up to dual boot with Gentoo on a |
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second SATA drive (drives are cheap, and it saves having to risk |
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resizing the NTFS partitions). |
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I'd gone as far as buying a (cheap!) PCI network card; installed it and |
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booted from the CD - only to discover that not only did the new card |
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configure properly, but so did the on-board forcedeth one, that failed |
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consistently before! So, removed the PCI card, booted up and yes, the |
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forcedeth stuff came up fine again. Bizarre. |
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Later, I rebooted to Windows for a while, then shutdown and rebooted |
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from the livecd again - only to find the network was failing again! :( |
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At this point, it occurred to me that perhaps there is something the |
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Windows driver does to the chip that the forcedeth driver fails to |
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reset, leaving the chip in a not-working state. Pulled the power cord |
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out, stuffed it back in thinking this would ensure the device was reset |
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properly - but no :( still it failed. |
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|
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Crawled under the desk to put the PCI card back in again, and noticed |
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that after pulling the power cord out the power supply led remained lit |
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for quite some seconds (5 to 10!). Ahah - fancy-pants PSU, I thought; |
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obviously pulling the cable out and re-inserting it isn't enough to |
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remove power. After the light had gone out, just powered up again |
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(without putting the PCI card in after all) and lo, the interface came |
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up fine. |
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So the moral of the story is, if you're switching between Windows and |
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Linux and see this problem, the way to get around it is to completely |
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remove power and wait long enough for the PSU to switch off completely |
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before powering up. |
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I suspect later kernel versions may have this fixed - quite a few |
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changes went in to the forcedeth driver around 2.17.3, but until I have |
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the kernel built I can't say... |
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BTW anyone else think of the "Master Control Program" whenever you see |
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"nVidia MCP51" ;) |
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-- |
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Kevin F. Quinn |
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