Still having problems with getting five Compaq Prolinea 5100e's to recognize NIC's

[mark at buttery.org (Mark J. Dulcey)]

Jerry Feldman wrote (about someone else's problem):


>>                        I have 15 computers in my lab and 5 don't recognize my
>>                        Linux network (all identical 5100e Prolineas). I've
>>                        been told to turn off pnp but how? 

Plug and pray is something that you shut off in the computer's 
BIOS setup program. Most computers will give some indication on 
the screen about which magic key you have to type during the 
self-test to get there.

Once there, you're looking for a choice that says something like 
"Plug and Play setup". You don't actually get to turn it off 
entirely on most computers, but you can put one or more IRQs 
off-limits by reserving them for "ISA" or "legacy" devices. You 
want to do this for the IRQ used by the network cards.

In addition, the 3Com NICs can be configured to be either PnP, or 
to have fixed IRQ and IO assignments that are remembered by the 
card. You do that with a program that comes with the cards (or 
you can download a copy from ftp.3com.com if you don't have it); 
it runs under DOS. If your boxes are strictly Linux, you might 
have to make a DOS boot floppy to run the program. (I've also 
seen a Linux program that purports to configure 3Com NICs, but I 
haven't tried it.)

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