Re: SOLVED: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
Out of pure interest, I'd love to see whether xl on an earlier kernel (say 4.x, if the hardware can even run it) or even 6.x would work. Adrian ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On 23-10-2011 17:09, per...@pluto.rain.com wrote: but there was no forwarding table and all packets were forwarded to all ports. I always figured that's normal for a hub as opposed to a switch. I also remember that SOME hubs of that era had series problems if the cable was too short. How come I feel old. Well I think that that was the reason why thick-Ethernet used to have repeaters and bridges. Repeaters just did what they said, on the most basic electrical level. Nothing more that a 2 port HUB, but then with MUI connectors. They where just part of the collision domain. Bridges actually learned which hosts where on the left and the right side. And only bridged when they really needed to. Otherwise they'd leave the traffic on the segment where it originated. It did segment the collision domain into two parts. And they used to be horrendously expensive and only run 10Mbit. --WjW ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On Fri, Oct 21, 2011 at 1:28 AM, Damien Fleuriot m...@my.gd wrote: On 10/21/11 5:00 PM, per...@pluto.rain.com wrote: I have an 8.1-RELEASE system with an xl on the mainboard: xl0: 3Com 3c905C-TX Fast Etherlink XL port 0xdc80-0xdcff mem 0xf8fffc00-0xf8fffc7f irq 16 at device 4.0 on pci2 miibus0: MII bus on xl0 xlphy0: 3c905C 10/100 internal PHY PHY 24 on miibus0 xlphy0: 10baseT, 10baseT-FDX, 100baseTX, 100baseTX-FDX, auto xl0: Ethernet address: 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 xl0: [ITHREAD] It has been working properly while connected to an old 10-BaseT hub, but when I moved it to a (not as old) Netgear 10/100 dual-speed hub the link started to yo-yo: Pray tell, what's a dual-speed hub , marketing mumbo-jumbo ? If that's a hub that supports negotiation of different speeds (10 vs 100), then yes, I call that marketing mumbo-jumbo ;) Go back to the days of hubs, and the first 10/100 Mbps hubs from just about every manufacturer was labelled dual-speed. Meaning, it supported 10 Mbps connections and 100 Mbps connection (dual meaning two). ;) 3Com OfficeConnect hubs are all labelled dual-speed. With the advent of switches, the dual-speed moniker was pretty much universally dropped in favour of just listing the speeds it supported (10/100, 10/100/1000, etc). Maybe it's marketing mumbo jumbo, but it was pretty universal for the time. -- Freddie Cash fjwc...@gmail.com ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: SOLVED: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
Adrian Chadd adr...@freebsd.org wrote: Out of pure interest, I'd love to see whether xl on an earlier kernel (say 4.x, if the hardware can even run it) or even 6.x would work. I'll put that on the list for the next time I need to reboot it. I'm sure I have a 6.1 CD somewhere, and probably a 4.x CD also. (The box is old enough -- a Dell Precision 420 -- that it quite likely will run 4.x.) I've also got another old Dell with an xl on the mainboard -- an OptiPlex GX1 running 6.1 -- which will need to get moved to a 100Mb port one of these days. That will provide another data point. ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
Kevin Oberman kob6...@gmail.com wrote: Wow. it's 1985 again. O remember those 10/100 hubs. They were a royal pain! If I remember right, they kept costs down by building in half of a switch. Traffic from a 10 port to a 100 port was buffered, Speed conversion had to have been buffered in both directions. If trying to convert 100 to 10 unbuffered, only 10% of a packet could have been retransmitted (at 10) by the time the entire packet had been received (at 100). In the other direction, trying to send at 100 while receiving at 10 would have had 9 bit-times of gap for every live bit sent. but there was no forwarding table and all packets were forwarded to all ports. I always figured that's normal for a hub as opposed to a switch. I also remember that SOME hubs of that era had series problems if the cable was too short. You mentioned using a short cable. Have you tried a longer one? I seem to recall that 3 meters was the minimum, but it was so long ago that my memory is a bit fuzzy. The first cable I used was about 1 meter, the second less than 2. I suppose I could try a longer one. The only minimum length restriction I _remember_ with Ethernet was the separation of transceivers on a 10Base-5 backbone cable (and, perhaps, a corresponding separation between tees on 10Base-2). I think it was to avoid having two impedance bumps within one bit propagation time of each other or some such. ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On 21 October 2011 16:00, per...@pluto.rain.com wrote: ...snip... Both connections were using the same (short) Cat5 cable, I tried two different ports on the 10/100 hub, and other systems work OK on that 10/100 hub. How do I get this interface to operate properly at 100MB? ...snip... Auto-negotiation is a nightmare, and *will* cause you problems. The best you can do is try to try to set every device using the switch to 100Mbps full, if that doesn't work buy a proper switch. ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On 23 October 2011 20:14, Peter Maxwell pe...@allicient.co.uk wrote: ...snip... Auto-negotiation is a nightmare, and *will* cause you problems. The best you can do is try to try to set every device using the switch to 100Mbps full, if that doesn't work buy a proper switch. .. you mean 100/half, as full on a hub == path to fail. :P Adrian ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On 23/10/2011 13:14, Peter Maxwell wrote: Auto-negotiation is a nightmare, and *will* cause you problems. The best you can do is try to try to set every device using the switch to 100Mbps full, if that doesn't work buy a proper switch. Autoneg is only a nightmare if you use turn-of-the-millenium era kit, back when 100Mb/s was a big deal. xl(4) was particularly bad. On the other hand, for anything Gb capable nowadays connected to a switch autoneg pretty much just works -- em(4), bce(4) are excellent, and even re(4) gets this stuff right. Oh, and as someone else mentioned, 'full duplex' on one of those bastard devices that claim 10/100 speed because they have *one* 100Mb/s capable port, and everything else is a 10Mb/s hub... that way madness lies... Why anyone would use such a thing nowadays I don't know, as even cheapo DSL routers tend to incorporate Gb switched ports nowadays. Cheers, Matthew -- Dr Matthew J Seaman MA, D.Phil. 7 Priory Courtyard Flat 3 PGP: http://www.infracaninophile.co.uk/pgpkey Ramsgate JID: matt...@infracaninophile.co.uk Kent, CT11 9PW signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On Sun, Oct 23, 2011 at 8:54 AM, Matthew Seaman m.sea...@infracaninophile.co.uk wrote: On the other hand, for anything Gb capable nowadays connected to a switch autoneg pretty much just works -- em(4), bce(4) are excellent, and even re(4) gets this stuff right. There are still cases of incompatibility. I've got a cheap D-Link GigE switch that consistently autonegotiates bge(4) devices to 100/FD unless I force mastership on the NIC end with 'ifconfig bge0 link0'. em(4) device negotiates with the switch just fine, though. --Artem ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
SOLVED: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
You can either replace the NIC with something else, or replace the hub. IMHO, I would replace both. I can replace the hub easily enough -- I have a 100-only Netgear that _is_ a true hub (has been used successfully for sniffing) ... That fixed it. For the archives, this particular xl (on a Dell mainboard) is not compatible with a Netgear DS-106 dual-speed hub at 100MB, at least using the driver that shipped with FreeBSD 8.1-RELEASE. (I haven't tried other xl's, or other FreeBSD versions.) It does work with a Netgear FE-104 100-only hub. ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
... SOME hubs of that era had series problems if the cable was too short. You mentioned using a short cable. Have you tried a longer one? I seem to recall that 3 meters was the minimum, but it was so long ago that my memory is a bit fuzzy. The first cable I used was about 1 meter, the second less than 2. I suppose I could try a longer one. I tried one of ~5 meters. Same problem. The soultion was to use a 100-only hub instead of the dual-speed hub -- see the SOLUTION post elsewhere in this thread for details. ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
Jeremy Chadwick free...@jdc.parodius.com wrote: 1) I think you misunderstand what product it is you own. You have a hub, not a switch. This is confirmed by the fact that auto-neg chooses to negotiate half-duplex. Instead, you went later and messed about trying to force full-duplex, which isn't going to work on a hub. The fact you even tried it has many implications. Just one implication, really: I tried everything. I know that some gear from this era did not autonegotiate speed/duplex correctly, so when the autonegotiated configuration didn't work I tried both explicit duplex settings at 100Mb. (I don't _need_ full-duplex, but tried it for completeness.) If you want full-duplex, you need an actual switch. Netgear refers to hubs as actual hubs, and switches as actual switches. Do you know the difference? Yep, including the fact that a true hub can't do speed translation because it doesn't buffer the entire packet -- it retransmits each bit as received. This device -- despite being called a hub -- has to contain at least one packet worth of buffering so that it can retransmit a packet received at one speed to the ports that are operating at the other speed. I also know, from direct experience with attempting to sniff traffic (via tcpdump, wireshark, etc.), that this model of so-called hub does _not_ unconditionally retransmit everything received from one port to all of the other ports, even if all are operating at the same speed. It seems to be some kind of hub-switch hybrid. This is the first time I have ever seen a hub in use in almost 10 years. Most of the gear here is in the museum category. The mail server is a Sun-3/60 that is over 20 years old. It ain't broke. (That's why there's a 10Mb hub, whose AUI uplink is connected to a 10Base-2 transceiver.) One of FreeBSD's advantages is that it tends to run well on old hardware. 2) There is no guarantee your NIC is fully compatible (negotiation-wise) with the hub. Vendor interoperability problems were extremely common back in the day (you're using a 3Com NIC from the mid-to-late 90s ... Yep, see comment re #1. However, if it were a negotiation problem, I would have expected hard-setting the NIC to 100 to have fixed it; the hub was showing that port as operating at 100. (BTW this model of hub is about as old as the NIC.) You can either replace the NIC with something else, or replace the hub. IMHO, I would replace both. I can replace the hub easily enough -- I have a 100-only Netgear that _is_ a true hub (has been used successfully for sniffing) -- although I suppose being the same brand and about the same age it may have a similar compatibility problem :( Replacing the NIC is a bit more of a problem, because it's built onto the mainboard. I do have some Intel NICs, and I _think_ the box has an unused slot. 5) The xl(4) driver is extremely old and basically is not maintained any longer. I would not be surprised if this was a driver bug. It had occurred to me that there might be a driver problem -- that was one reason for posting -- although all I found with Google was a watchdog reset problem that was fixed long enough ago that the fix surely would have been in 8.1. However if the driver is no longer maintained, and swapping out the hub doesn't fix it, it seems I may be reduced to playing musical NICs. ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
Can you boot releng_4 or releng_6 on this hardware? ie, does xl do the same thing on the same hardware with older OS code? Adrian ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On Oct 22, 2011 2:21 AM, per...@pluto.rain.com wrote: Jeremy Chadwick free...@jdc.parodius.com wrote: 1) I think you misunderstand what product it is you own. You have a hub, not a switch. This is confirmed by the fact that auto-neg chooses to negotiate half-duplex. Instead, you went later and messed about trying to force full-duplex, which isn't going to work on a hub. The fact you even tried it has many implications. Just one implication, really: I tried everything. I know that some gear from this era did not autonegotiate speed/duplex correctly, so when the autonegotiated configuration didn't work I tried both explicit duplex settings at 100Mb. (I don't _need_ full-duplex, but tried it for completeness.) If you want full-duplex, you need an actual switch. Netgear refers to hubs as actual hubs, and switches as actual switches. Do you know the difference? Yep, including the fact that a true hub can't do speed translation because it doesn't buffer the entire packet -- it retransmits each bit as received. This device -- despite being called a hub -- has to contain at least one packet worth of buffering so that it can retransmit a packet received at one speed to the ports that are operating at the other speed. I also know, from direct experience with attempting to sniff traffic (via tcpdump, wireshark, etc.), that this model of so-called hub does _not_ unconditionally retransmit everything received from one port to all of the other ports, even if all are operating at the same speed. It seems to be some kind of hub-switch hybrid. This is the first time I have ever seen a hub in use in almost 10 years. Most of the gear here is in the museum category. The mail server is a Sun-3/60 that is over 20 years old. It ain't broke. (That's why there's a 10Mb hub, whose AUI uplink is connected to a 10Base-2 transceiver.) One of FreeBSD's advantages is that it tends to run well on old hardware. 2) There is no guarantee your NIC is fully compatible (negotiation-wise) with the hub. Vendor interoperability problems were extremely common back in the day (you're using a 3Com NIC from the mid-to-late 90s ... Yep, see comment re #1. However, if it were a negotiation problem, I would have expected hard-setting the NIC to 100 to have fixed it; the hub was showing that port as operating at 100. (BTW this model of hub is about as old as the NIC.) You can either replace the NIC with something else, or replace the hub. IMHO, I would replace both. I can replace the hub easily enough -- I have a 100-only Netgear that _is_ a true hub (has been used successfully for sniffing) -- although I suppose being the same brand and about the same age it may have a similar compatibility problem :( Replacing the NIC is a bit more of a problem, because it's built onto the mainboard. I do have some Intel NICs, and I _think_ the box has an unused slot. 5) The xl(4) driver is extremely old and basically is not maintained any longer. I would not be surprised if this was a driver bug. It had occurred to me that there might be a driver problem -- that was one reason for posting -- although all I found with Google was a watchdog reset problem that was fixed long enough ago that the fix surely would have been in 8.1. However if the driver is no longer maintained, and swapping out the hub doesn't fix it, it seems I may be reduced to playing musical NICs. Wow. it's 1985 again. O remember those 10/100 hubs. They were a royal pain! If I remember right, they kept costs down by building in half of a switch. Traffic from a 10 port to a 100 port was buffered, but there was no forwarding table and all packets were forwarded to all ports. Total crap! I also remember that SOME hubs of that era had series problems if the cable was too short. You mentioned using a short cable. Have you tried a longer one? I seem to recall that 3 meters was the minimum, but it was so long ago that my memory is a bit fuzzy. R. Kevin Oberman, Network Engineer Retired kob6...@gmail.com ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
I have an 8.1-RELEASE system with an xl on the mainboard: xl0: 3Com 3c905C-TX Fast Etherlink XL port 0xdc80-0xdcff mem 0xf8fffc00-0xf8fffc7f irq 16 at device 4.0 on pci2 miibus0: MII bus on xl0 xlphy0: 3c905C 10/100 internal PHY PHY 24 on miibus0 xlphy0: 10baseT, 10baseT-FDX, 100baseTX, 100baseTX-FDX, auto xl0: Ethernet address: 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 xl0: [ITHREAD] It has been working properly while connected to an old 10-BaseT hub, but when I moved it to a (not as old) Netgear 10/100 dual-speed hub the link started to yo-yo: Oct 21 07:16:00 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN Oct 21 07:16:02 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to UP Oct 21 07:16:12 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN Oct 21 07:16:14 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to UP Oct 21 07:16:18 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN Oct 21 07:16:20 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to UP Oct 21 07:16:26 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN Oct 21 07:16:28 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to UP While it was misbehaving, ifconfig reported: # ifconfig xl0 xl0: flags=8843UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST metric 0 mtu 1500 options=80009RXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,LINKSTATE ether 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 inet6 fe80::2b0:d0ff:fe22:5a14%xl0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x1 inet 192.168.200.81 netmask 0xff00 broadcast 192.168.200.255 nd6 options=3PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV media: Ethernet autoselect (100baseTX) status: active Turning off unneeded features did not help: # ifconfig xl0 -vlanmtu -rxcsum # ifconfig xl0 xl0: flags=8843UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST metric 0 mtu 1500 options=8LINKSTATE ether 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 inet6 fe80::2b0:d0ff:fe22:5a14%xl0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x1 inet 192.168.200.81 netmask 0xff00 broadcast 192.168.200.255 nd6 options=3PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV media: Ethernet autoselect (100baseTX) status: active and neither did forcing it to 100baseTX, with either duplex setting: # ifconfig xl0 media 100baseTX mediaopt full-duplex # ifconfig xl0 xl0: flags=8843UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST metric 0 mtu 1500 options=8LINKSTATE ether 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 inet6 fe80::2b0:d0ff:fe22:5a14%xl0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x1 inet 192.168.200.81 netmask 0xff00 broadcast 192.168.200.255 nd6 options=3PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV media: Ethernet 100baseTX full-duplex status: active # ifconfig xl0 mediaopt half-duplex # ifconfig xl0 xl0: flags=8843UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST metric 0 mtu 1500 options=8LINKSTATE ether 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 inet6 fe80::2b0:d0ff:fe22:5a14%xl0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x1 inet 192.168.200.81 netmask 0xff00 broadcast 192.168.200.255 nd6 options=3PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV media: Ethernet 100baseTX status: active but moving it back to the 10-BaseT hub (after restoring xl0 to autoselect) fixed the problem: # ifconfig xl0 media autoselect # ifconfig xl0 xl0: flags=8843UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST metric 0 mtu 1500 options=8LINKSTATE ether 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 inet6 fe80::2b0:d0ff:fe22:5a14%xl0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x1 inet 192.168.200.81 netmask 0xff00 broadcast 192.168.200.255 nd6 options=3PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV media: Ethernet autoselect (100baseTX) status: active [still yo-yo-ing, until moved to the old hub, then OK] # ifconfig xl0 xl0: flags=8843UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST metric 0 mtu 1500 options=8LINKSTATE ether 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 inet6 fe80::2b0:d0ff:fe22:5a14%xl0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x1 inet 192.168.200.81 netmask 0xff00 broadcast 192.168.200.255 nd6 options=3PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV media: Ethernet autoselect (10baseT/UTP) status: active Both connections were using the same (short) Cat5 cable, I tried two different ports on the 10/100 hub, and other systems work OK on that 10/100 hub. How do I get this interface to operate properly at 100MB? ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On 10/21/11 5:00 PM, per...@pluto.rain.com wrote: I have an 8.1-RELEASE system with an xl on the mainboard: xl0: 3Com 3c905C-TX Fast Etherlink XL port 0xdc80-0xdcff mem 0xf8fffc00-0xf8fffc7f irq 16 at device 4.0 on pci2 miibus0: MII bus on xl0 xlphy0: 3c905C 10/100 internal PHY PHY 24 on miibus0 xlphy0: 10baseT, 10baseT-FDX, 100baseTX, 100baseTX-FDX, auto xl0: Ethernet address: 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 xl0: [ITHREAD] It has been working properly while connected to an old 10-BaseT hub, but when I moved it to a (not as old) Netgear 10/100 dual-speed hub the link started to yo-yo: Pray tell, what's a dual-speed hub , marketing mumbo-jumbo ? If that's a hub that supports negotiation of different speeds (10 vs 100), then yes, I call that marketing mumbo-jumbo ;) Oct 21 07:16:00 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN Oct 21 07:16:02 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to UP Oct 21 07:16:12 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN [snip] Both connections were using the same (short) Cat5 cable, I tried two different ports on the 10/100 hub, and other systems work OK on that 10/100 hub. How do I get this interface to operate properly at 100MB? You change your faulty cable and enjoy ;) It is totally possible that your cable be the cause, and that it can operate just fine at 10MB but not at 100. ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
Damien Fleuriot m...@my.gd wrote: On 10/21/11 5:00 PM, per...@pluto.rain.com wrote: I have an 8.1-RELEASE system with an xl on the mainboard: xl0: 3Com 3c905C-TX Fast Etherlink XL port 0xdc80-0xdcff mem 0xf8fffc00-0xf8fffc7f irq 16 at device 4.0 on pci2 miibus0: MII bus on xl0 xlphy0: 3c905C 10/100 internal PHY PHY 24 on miibus0 xlphy0: 10baseT, 10baseT-FDX, 100baseTX, 100baseTX-FDX, auto xl0: Ethernet address: 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 xl0: [ITHREAD] It has been working properly while connected to an old 10-BaseT hub, but when I moved it to a (not as old) Netgear 10/100 dual- speed hub the link started to yo-yo: Pray tell, what's a dual-speed hub , marketing mumbo-jumbo ? That's what Netgear calls it :) If that's a hub that supports negotiation of different speeds (10 vs 100), then yes, I call that marketing mumbo-jumbo ;) It supports negotiation of either 10 or 100 on each port independently, so it must internally have a 2-port switch between the 10- and 100- sides. 10/100 dual-speed hub seems more compact than marketing mumbo-jumbo hub :) Oct 21 07:16:00 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN Oct 21 07:16:02 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to UP Oct 21 07:16:12 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN [snip] Both connections were using the same (short) Cat5 cable, I tried two different ports on the 10/100 hub, and other systems work OK on that 10/100 hub. How do I get this interface to operate properly at 100MB? You change your faulty cable and enjoy ;) It is totally possible that your cable be the cause, and that it can operate just fine at 10MB but not at 100. I tried a (different) brand-new cable. Same problem. I suppose maybe the xl's 100MB phy is dodgy, but it does work after a fashion -- some packets do get through during the times when the link is UP. Anything else to try? ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo
On Sat, Oct 22, 2011 at 05:10:04AM -0700, per...@pluto.rain.com wrote: Damien Fleuriot m...@my.gd wrote: On 10/21/11 5:00 PM, per...@pluto.rain.com wrote: I have an 8.1-RELEASE system with an xl on the mainboard: xl0: 3Com 3c905C-TX Fast Etherlink XL port 0xdc80-0xdcff mem 0xf8fffc00-0xf8fffc7f irq 16 at device 4.0 on pci2 miibus0: MII bus on xl0 xlphy0: 3c905C 10/100 internal PHY PHY 24 on miibus0 xlphy0: 10baseT, 10baseT-FDX, 100baseTX, 100baseTX-FDX, auto xl0: Ethernet address: 00:b0:d0:22:5a:14 xl0: [ITHREAD] It has been working properly while connected to an old 10-BaseT hub, but when I moved it to a (not as old) Netgear 10/100 dual- speed hub the link started to yo-yo: Pray tell, what's a dual-speed hub , marketing mumbo-jumbo ? That's what Netgear calls it :) If that's a hub that supports negotiation of different speeds (10 vs 100), then yes, I call that marketing mumbo-jumbo ;) It supports negotiation of either 10 or 100 on each port independently, so it must internally have a 2-port switch between the 10- and 100- sides. 10/100 dual-speed hub seems more compact than marketing mumbo-jumbo hub :) Oct 21 07:16:00 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN Oct 21 07:16:02 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to UP Oct 21 07:16:12 fbsd81 kernel: xl0: link state changed to DOWN [snip] Both connections were using the same (short) Cat5 cable, I tried two different ports on the 10/100 hub, and other systems work OK on that 10/100 hub. How do I get this interface to operate properly at 100MB? You change your faulty cable and enjoy ;) It is totally possible that your cable be the cause, and that it can operate just fine at 10MB but not at 100. I tried a (different) brand-new cable. Same problem. I suppose maybe the xl's 100MB phy is dodgy, but it does work after a fashion -- some packets do get through during the times when the link is UP. Anything else to try? 1) I think you misunderstand what product it is you own. You have a hub, not a switch. This is confirmed by the fact that auto-neg chooses to negotiate half-duplex. Instead, you went later and messed about trying to force full-duplex, which isn't going to work on a hub. The fact you even tried it has many implications. If you want full-duplex, you need an actual switch. Netgear refers to hubs as actual hubs, and switches as actual switches. Do you know the difference? Google and learn. The difference is huge. This is the first time I have ever seen a hub in use in almost 10 years. 2) There is no guarantee your NIC is fully compatible (negotiation-wise) with the hub. Vendor interoperability problems were extremely common back in the day (you're using a 3Com NIC from the mid-to-late 90s, you do realise that don't you?), and therefore everything you're using is subject to this problem. Read Wikipedia for lots of info. You can either replace the NIC with something else, or replace the hub. IMHO, I would replace both. 3) I recommend you replace the Netgear hub with a D-Link DGS-2205 or DGS-2208. These are gigE switches which do auto-neg properly with many products (Intel server-grade NICs, Realtek consumer NICs, Marvell NICs, Broadcom NICs). I can't guarantee compatibility with that 3Com NIC because as I said, I haven't seen one in use in over 10 years. 4) If replacing the Netgear product doesn't help, then your next step is to replace the 3Com NIC with something newer. Intel makes many PCI-based 100mbit and 1000mbit NICs that work wonderfully on FreeBSD via the em(4) driver. They are affordable and reliable. 5) The xl(4) driver is extremely old and basically is not maintained any longer. I would not be surprised if this was a driver bug. Finally: if you cannot afford any replacement products, I will be more than happy to purchase you brand new hardware (a switch and a NIC) that *absolutely* reliably works together, free of charge. Let me know. -- | Jeremy Chadwickjdc at parodius.com | | Parodius Networking http://www.parodius.com/ | | UNIX Systems Administrator Mountain View, CA, US | | Making life hard for others since 1977. PGP 4BD6C0CB | ___ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-stable-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
