On Wed, 6 Mar 2002, Stephen M Jones wrote:

> 1. What is causing the hang?  Since I never see this problem on the other
>    machine, I'm concerned with the tlp0 (DEC500) interface.  There are an
>    alarming number of collisions:
> 
> Name  Mtu     Ipkts    Ierrs  Opkts   Oerrs  Colls
> tlp0  1500    4363083     0  4404094     0 311902
> tlp0  1500    4363083     0  4404094     0 311902
> tlp0  1500    4363083     0  4404094     0 311902
> ex0   1500    6853858     0  7397736     0     0
> ex0   1500    6853858     0  7397736     0     0
> 
> No other interface on any of the other 5 systems have collisions.  Also,
> the cable checks out just fine.

  I don't think either the de or tlp driver properly set the DE500
NICs into full-duplex.  I've got two systems with two DE500-BA each,
and even with a -current tlp driver, it was still generating
collisions.

> Some messages that show up in dmesg are similar to "stray kn300 irq 44"
> which maps back to an ethernet interface (though typically the ex0 and
> not the tlp0!)

  Ah - this might be part of your problem.  I've got a couple of 3COM
3C980 server cards and a 3C905B card.  The elinkxl driver seems to get
an interrupt once in a while which the driver doesn't think came from
the card.  That generates the stray interrupts.  On my PC164, if I
get more than 3 or 4 stray interrupts, the alpha disables that interrupt
and the interface stops working.  Do you see one of the messages
that says "...; stopped logging"?  If so, that's when the interrupt
has been disabled.

--
Michael L. Hitch			mhitch@montana.edu
Computer Consultant
Information Technology Center
Montana State University	Bozeman, MT	USA