[tulip] Problem with smc 1255 card -- netdev watchdog timed o ut

[erik.ostlyngen@telelogic.com]

> > My network consists of an i386 linux and an UltraSparc linux connected
with
> > a crossed patch cable. The sparc station is switched off when the i386
box
> > (with the 1255 card) boots.

> Did you make the crossover cable?
> Is it
>    Cat-5 cable?
>    Paired correctly?  Are you _certain_?

The cable is a factory made cat-5, and I think it works ok. I've tried to
replace 
it with a switch with two uncrossed cables, and after booting first the
sparc then 
the intel, I got a stable connection.

I couldn't to reproduce the non-error, but tulip-diag showed that transmit
threshold 
was 1024. I hacked the driver to initialize with this value, and that
worked.

But I'm perhaps just avoiding the problem, not fixing it? If I understad the
driver 
code right, the driver should increase the transmit threshold each time I
get a 
buffer underrun.

The chip has the following code on it (produced in week 12, 2002?):

SMC
EN5251BE
0212TDEBEDC2897.00

The card is called 1255TX.


> > When the problem occurs, the sparc station reports "nfs server not
> > responding", 
> > so it looks like the problem is on the i386 side.

> Run 'mii-diag --watch'.
> I'm guessing that you will see the transceiver stuggling to maintain
> link beat.

mii-diag for eth0 is not available on my sparc (because of the kernel
config,
I think).

/ Erik P. Østlyngen