Aline,

This particular VIA driver is relatively new to the kernel source. The
chip itself is not even 2 years old and as such, the driver in SL303 is
most likely very immature.

I'd suggest trying to compile another ethernet module from the VIA
source for the card. You can goto www.viaarena.com to download the
source code for your particular ethernet chipset.

Either that, or throw a better supported intel/3com card into the
system.

Just one note, these ethernet chips are unreliable in windows on large
networks and the transceivers tend to have much difficultly with long
cable runs, whereas a more professional line of 3com or Intel cards has
no such problems. The realtek/via chips are prone to going AWOL, spewing
corrupted packets at least with windows boxes. This has just been my
experience with large campus networks.

You may be able to get it to work with the via driver source by
replacing the driver module in SL303, but you'll save yourself much
grief (kernel updates etc..) by just replacing it with a well supported
card.

The other option is to try running the 2.6.10 kernel from Fedora, it
should have the latest VIA Rhine driver in it.

Just my 2 cents...

Michael Joy
HEP - University of Mississippi
[log in to unmask]
On Fri, 2005-02-18 at 07:33 -0600, Aline Gesualdi Mello wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I’ve just installed CERN’s Scientific Linux 3.0.3 in a Pentium III
> machine.
> I’m having a problem with the Ethernet connection via dhcp.
> The system recognizes my Ethernet board but has no auto negotiation.
> 
> Board: VT6105 Rhine III Fast Ehternet
> 
> Here some commands to try to clarify the problem:
> > mii-tool –v eth1
> eth1: no autonegotiation, 10baseT-HD, link ok
>   product info: vendor 00:40:63, model 52 rev 4
>   basic mode:   autonegotiation enabled
>   basic status: autonegotiation complete, link ok
>   capabilities: 100baseTx-FD 100baseTx-HD 10baseT-FD 10baseT-HD
>   advertising:  100baseTx-FD 100baseTx-HD 10baseT-FD 10baseT-HD flow-
> control
>   link partner: 10baseT-HD
> 
> > cat /proc/pci
> Bus  0, device   8, function  0:
>     Ethernet controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6105 [Rhine-III] (rev
> 134).
>       IRQ 10.
>       Master Capable.  Latency=32.  Min Gnt=3.Max Lat=8.
>       I/O at 0xb400 [0xb4ff].
>       Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xec000000 [0xec0000ff].
> 
> > /var/log/messages
> Feb 18 08:57:43 localhost kernel: via-rhine.c:v1.10-LK1.1.18  July-4-2003
> Written by Donald Becker
> Feb 18 08:57:43 localhost kernel:   http://www.scyld.com/network/via-
> rhine.html
> Feb 18 08:57:43 localhost kernel: PCI: Found IRQ 10 for device 00:08.0
> Feb 18 08:57:43 localhost kernel: PCI: Sharing IRQ 10 with 01:00.0
> Feb 18 08:57:43 localhost kernel: eth1: VIA VT6105 Rhine-III at 0xb400,
> 00:08:54:06:f3:71, IRQ 10.
> Feb 18 08:57:43 localhost kernel: eth1: MII PHY found at address 1, status
> 0x786d advertising 01e1 Link 0021.
> Feb 18 08:57:43 localhost xinetd[2271]: pmap_set failed. service=sgi_fam
> program=391002 version=2
> Feb 18 08:57:43 localhost sendmail: sendmail startup succeeded
> ...
> Feb 18 08:58:37 localhost kernel: ip_tables: (C) 2000-2002 Netfilter core
> team
> Feb 18 08:58:39 localhost dhclient: DHCPDISCOVER on eth1 to
> 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 3
> Feb 18 08:58:39 localhost dhclient: DHCPOFFER from 201.17.44.1
> Feb 18 08:58:39 localhost dhclient: DHCPREQUEST on eth1 to 255.255.255.255
> port 67
> ...
> 
> I see an IRQ sharing between Ethernet and nVidia, but I don’t think this
> is the problem. In my opinion the problem is in dhcp client, but I don’t
> know how to fix it.
> 
> I installed the packages:
> dhclient-3.0.1-10_EL3
> dhcp-3.0.1-10_EL3
> dhcp-devel-3.0.1-10_EL3
> 
> but nothing happened.
> 
> Does anyone knows how to solve this ethernet problem? I can't work without
> a network connection.
> 
> Cheers.