PCMCIA Ethernet configuration for old laptop

Forum: Networking
Topic: PCMCIA Ethernet configuration for old laptop
started by: landslidepurist

Posted by landslidepurist on Jan. 28 2008,15:48

Hello everyone,

I've installed DSL on a very old P1 166mhz, 96mb RAM laptop and have put a PCMCIA ethernet card in (wired). DSL seems to recognise that it's there but doesn't configure it (i.e. the lights flash and the card manager seems to know it's there but it won't talk to my cable modem), so I can't get online.

Basically I haven't the faintest idea how to get it working as I'm very new to linux, so any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

By the way, the laptop is an Acer Extensa 390 and the card is a Micronet SP160TA, in case that helps.

Posted by curaga on Jan. 28 2008,16:11

Try

cardctl ls

Does it see your card?

Posted by roberts on Jan. 28 2008,16:19

It would appear that your pcmcia card is a cardbus style.
Many old laptops have difficulty with such.
Try adding the boot option pci=assign-busses

e.g.

dsl pci=assign-busses

plus any other boot options that you were using.

Posted by landslidepurist on Jan. 28 2008,19:50

Thanks for replying so quickly.

curaga -

I got this:

Code Sample

Socket 0:

no card

Socket 1:

3.3v CardBus Card
function 0: [ready]

...which is assume is good news!

roberts - do you mean to do this when I log on, before the GUI starts? I'll give that a go...

Posted by roberts on Jan. 28 2008,19:52

Enter at the very first boot: prompt on the initial DSL logo screen.

Posted by landslidepurist on Jan. 28 2008,20:53

Ok, I've tried that and I still can't get online.

Is there anything else I should try or do you think this card is a bit too new for this laptop?

edit: typos

Posted by curaga on Jan. 29 2008,07:02

cardctl status
cardctl ident

Try those too, I don't remember which one was the one that tells if there's a driver bound..

Posted by landslidepurist on Jan. 29 2008,09:04

cardctl status:

Code Sample

Socket 0:
no card
Socket 1:
3.3v Cardbus Card
function 0: [ready]

cardctl ident:

Code Sample

Socket 0:
no product info available

Socket 1:

product info: "Cardbus PC Card", Fast Ethernet CardBus PC Card"
manfid: 0x0000, 0x021b
function 6: (network)

Posted by curaga on Jan. 29 2008,09:34

cardctl status: Socket 0:
cardctl status: no card
cardctl status: Socket 1:
cardctl status: 5.0V 16-bit PC Card
cardctl status: Subdevice 0 (function 0) bound to driver "xirc2ps_cs"

That was my output from cardctl status. Unfortunately seems your card isn't supported. I grepped through 2.6.20.21 pcmcia net drivers too, without any mention of micronet. But, since it's a cardbus card, "lspci" will show it's chipset, and perhaps you can find an out-of-kernel driver.

Posted by landslidepurist on Jan. 29 2008,10:05

That's a shame. Can you recommend a card that I could use with DSL in this old laptop?

edit: I've tried lspci. It's a Texas Instruments PCI1250 (rev 02) CardBus bridge. This is all going completely over my head I'm afraid.

Posted by curaga on Jan. 29 2008,16:03

That's your pcmcia card slot, not the card

and that is supported, since it recognized it's a cardbus card and gave it the right voltage.
The card is either "ethernet controller" or "communication controller".

For other cards, Xircom ones are really good.

Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Jan. 29 2008,17:01

From < http://www.micronet.info/model_detail.aspx?series_no=21&sno=230 > it seems that this uses rtl8139. Though this old driver package seems to be for the 2.2.x kernel, I think that driver is already included in DSL and that package's docs might help you out. What's your output of `lsmod` ?

Posted by Onyarian on Jan. 29 2008,22:41

If it helps my results are:

dsl@box:~$ cardctl status
Socket 0:
3.3V CardBus card
function 0: [ready]
Socket 1:
no card
dsl@box:~$ cardctl ident
Socket 0:
product info: "D-Link", "DFE-690TXD", "PC Card"
manfid: 0x0149, 0x0000
function: 6 (network)
Socket 1:
no product info available

Works perfectly in my laptop Compaq armada 1770, PII, 266Mhz, 256RAM

In system stats, net, say:

FULLNAME="D-Link System Inc|DFE-690TXD CardBus PC Card"
DRIVER="8139too"
nameserver 87.216.1.65
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
inet addr:192.168.1.25 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:185 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:190 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:9 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:165316 (161.4 KiB) TX bytes:25004 (24.4 KiB)
Interrupt:11 Base address:0x4000

in modules:

mousedev 3832 1
hid 22788 0 (unused)
input 3168 0 [mousedev hid]
8139too 13800 1
mii 2240 0 [8139too]
crc32 2816 0 [8139too]
ds 6536 2
yenta_socket 9700 2
pcmcia_core 39840 0 [ds yenta_socket]

and finally in dmesg:

eth0: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex, lpa 0x45E1

Posted by landslidepurist on Jan. 29 2008,22:47

curaga - ah, ok. bit slow today. Thanks for the info.

thehatsrule - lsmod gives a lot of info.. is there anything in particular you want me to look for?

Posted by curaga on Jan. 30 2008,17:15

anything with "8139" in the name.

Posted by landslidepurist on Jan. 30 2008,19:53

Thanks for your help but this is all too much work for such an old laptop and for someone with such a limited grasp of linux as myself!

I think I might try a different (and cheaper) card.

I've been looking online at xircom cards and would ideally like to find one that is definitely supported by DSL. Is this easy to do?

Posted by Onyarian on Feb. 01 2008,12:43

Try one like mine,

D-Link Express EtherNetwork DFE-690TXD 32-bit Notebook Adapter

Is a Pcmcia that work out of the box with DSL if your laptop have a 32-bit pcmcia, if it is a 16-bit try to found other.
I have another laptop 486 with 16-bit pcmcia and this card don't work.

Posted by landslidepurist on Feb. 02 2008,12:42

Nice one, I'll try and find one of those. According to the manual the laptop likes 32-bit card.

Thanks.

Posted by NoobieDoobieDo on Feb. 07 2008,17:00

Quote (Onyarian @ Jan. 29 2008,17:41)

product info: "D-Link", "DFE-690TXD", "PC Card"
manfid: 0x0149, 0x0000
FULLNAME="D-Link System Inc|DFE-690TXD CardBus PC Card"
DRIVER="8139too"

You're using a DFE-690TXD but it's loading the modules for a 8139 DLink chip set. It may be that you need to load a different module for your card. *

DLink has < a page > on installing drivers on linux but its outdated and I wouldn't suggest following the directions here. However there may be some sort of useful information.

I did a little < google search > and it seems you're not alone.

*
1. Find module package / source
2. Compile / install module
3. rmmod 8139too (unload old module)
4. insmod XYZ (load new module)

Posted by Onyarian on Feb. 07 2008,18:53

Quote (NoobieDoobieDo @ Feb. 07 2008,12:00)

You're using a DFE-690TXD but it's loading the modules for a 8139 DLink chip set. It may be that you need to load a different module for your card. *

Perhaps you are right, but for me it works out of the box with this module, so I prefer to stay like now because it works.

Thanks.