Re: new BSD user

BigBrother1984 wrote:
[snippage]

OK I dont get why everyone is talking about a cross over cable. I dont
need a cross over cable to plug into the router. I'm trying to get it
connected to the net not to another computer.

Probably we're fixated on it being a cable problem because experience has
shown us that most of the time we've seen "NO CARRIER" it was a physical
layer problem.

That said, it does not necessarily have to be. Sometimes when I'm stuck
going in circles when troubleshooting instead of trying to figure out
what's not working I look at what is working. A seemingly great deal of
problems center around interactions between multiple layers of
hardware/software. The trick is to identify the layers that are working in
order to reduce the complexity of the problem and narrow it down to a more
specific item.

A common cause of "NO CARRIER" can also be the failure of MDI auto
negotiation. A long time ago (pre auto negotiate) when the very earliest
switches came out it was necessary to use a crossover cable in order to
plug the NIC of a PC up to a switch port. The reason for this is the first
switch designs were used to segment networks by separating collision
domains, plugging hubs to the ports and then the PCs were connected to the
ports on the hubs. Those days are long gone. Just mentioning it for
history. Auto negotiate problems mostly occur when using dissimilar
hardware from multiple manufacturers.

As far as what you mean by "getting connected to the Internet" I'm not at
all sure what you are doing. Here I have a DSL connection and there is a
modem/router gadget plugged up to the phone line. I have the WAN port on
this plugged up to one NIC in my FreeBSD gateway/server box. That NIC is
set for DHCP as the modem/router contains a built in DHCP server. Since I
wanted to use my firewall and not the one in the modem/router I
reconfigured the modem/router to do what is called "split bridge". The
modem/router is still handling the PPPoE, so it was not necessary to set up
PPPoE on the FreeBSD machine. The "split bridge" config does "IP
passthrough" by assigning the external WAN IP address (assigned to me by
the ISP) to the NIC in the FreeBSD box. The other NIC in the FreeBSD box is
then plugged into a switch and the other computers on the LAN side.

What works for me may have nothing to do with what you need. But I recommend
one thing: start simple. Identify what needs to be accomplished in order to
get one NIC on your box connected. This means either compiling the right
driver into the kernel or loading the appropriate kernel module for you NIC
make/model. If this basic step doesn't work correctly, nothing else will
matter.

Ping your loopback. If this fails you have really mucked up something
serious. When a driver for your card is loaded and an ifconfig line
something like this:
ifconfig_xl0="inet 192.168.10.1 media 100baseTX mediaopt full-duplex netmask
255.255.255.0"
is placed in /etc/rc.conf when you boot the machine and do ifconfig -a you
should see this IP assigned to that card. At this point you should also be
able to ping that address. If not, you don't have the basic first steps
done correctly so there is little point to look elsewhere for trouble.
Notice the options above. This is where and how you would configure a NIC
manually to bypass MDI auto negotiate. If the port on your switch cannot
correctly auto negotiate with the NIC in your PC you might just see the
dreaded "NO CARRIER".

But as far as things go, there is the potential for your trouble to be lots
of other things. What I'm trying to get across is called "divide and
conquer" troubleshooting. Start with the most basic underlying
functionality that all the layers depend on and get that working the way
it's supposed to before even looking at other things.

Hope this helps you some. I don't know enough about your problem to be more
specific. Mostly meant to give you ideas. :-)

-Jason


.

Relevant Pages

  • UPDATE: bge0: Tx stall detected
    ... I forgot to mention that both the server and the port on the switch are ... strapped 100Full no auto negotiate ... detected, watchdog code 0x142b5 ...
    (SunManagers)
  • Re: Cat 2924
    ... Copyright 1986-2004 by cisco Systems, ... BOX in both H/W and S/W, compared to a C2924-XL Switch... ... FastEthernet0/1 failed front-end loopback test ... to make the port configuration "visible", you need to apply 2 commands ...
    (comp.dcom.sys.cisco)
  • Re: Cat 2924
    ... Copyright 1986-2004 by cisco Systems, ... BOX in both H/W and S/W, compared to a C2924-XL Switch... ... FastEthernet0/1 failed front-end loopback test ... to make the port configuration "visible", you need to apply 2 commands ...
    (comp.dcom.sys.cisco)
  • Gigabit Flexibility with Magnum 6K32T Managed Switch from GarrettCom, Inc.
    ... OF GB THROUGHPUT WITH MAGNUM 6K32T MANAGED SWITCH ... Gigabit port capability to four Gb ports when compared to the ...
    (sci.engr.control)
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    (comp.dcom.lans.ethernet)