On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 02:23:09PM -0500, K. Mike Bradley wrote: > Hello list, > > > I am new to Linux and with all my searching, I can't seem to get an > understanding of NIC drivers in Linux. > > Obviously in this day and age most Linux installations need a NIC. > > (I mean ... how many Linux boxes would never be used to talk on the net???) > > I understand about modules and how drivers can be modules or compiled into > the kernel. > > What I don't understand is what to do if I need to get a driver for a NIC > because it is not recognized. > > I know what to do in Windows when a NIC is not up due to no driver, but not > in Linux. > > How does the many Distros of Linux support so many NIC's? > > I heard about this Tulip driver which does allot of NIC's. > > How do you tell what modules do what NIC's?
The critical thing to check is /etc/modules.conf (or /etc/modprobe.conf, if it exists) and look for the line "alias eth0 <something>" the <something> is what the machine thinks is the driver for the ethernet interface eth0. If you can figure out what driver your card should have (tip, go to www.google.com/linux and input the name of your card), then put it in that file, and you should be good to go. > I have an application where I need to compile into the Kernel every possible > NIC driver so I can do PXE boot of any hardware we might use. Some of the knoppix pre-made distro's might be right for this. Check out: http://www.knoppix.org/ - Rob .
