Subject: Re: Intel Pro/100S Dual Port NICs
To: Laine Stump <lainestump@rcn.com>
From: Andrew Gillham <gillham@vaultron.com>
List: port-i386
Date: 10/08/2001 18:05:33
On Mon, Oct 08, 2001 at 08:32:50PM -0400, Laine Stump wrote:
> "Olu Howard" <olu@serendipitynetworks.com> writes:
> 
> > Does i386 support the Intel Pro/100S Dual Port NICs??  I've had success
> > with the single port version of this card but the dual port version won't
> > even show a link light after the kernel loads (it works fine with Win2000
> > (BLEH!)).
> 
> I've got a Compaq dual NIC based on the same chips which works fine
> under -current as of a month or so ago. Don't know about earlier
> releases...

I think there is an evil timing bug lurking somewhere.  I have 4 identical
machines (ok, 2 with 300A celeron, 2 with 333A celeron) with Compaq branded
fxp boards.  One (possibly two, can't remember) of them would lose link with
my switch as soon as NetBSD probed the card.  Multiple reboots and kernels
later it is fine.  I went back to the old kernels and seems fine.  So I think
there is some kind of timing issue or race condition in the fxp driver or the
phy driver.  I haven't had trouble this week though. :)  I will try to test
it out some more and figure out if it is only on the machines with the same
CPU speed, or anything else that might be a pattern.  It was happening every
single reboot for a while.

-Andrew