From: orville@weyrich.UUCP (Orville R. Weyrich)
Subject: Re: Problem with EISA, Racal Interlan, and TCP/IP
Reply-To: orville%weyrich@uunet.uu.net (Orville R. Weyrich)
Organization: Weyrich Computer Consulting
Date: Sat, 26 Sep 92 21:39:20 GMT

The following is a re-post  -- shortly after  posting the original my news
feed/e-mail feed site died. I did get one response, which indicated that
maybe the ethernet card DMA was  not compatible with my EISA motherboard.

I really would like  more information on this subject. If you posted
a  reply or sent me a reply via the defunct tnet.com e-mail address, 
I'd really appreciate it if you could  send me a copy to the following
address:

	uunet!weyrich!orville
or
	orville%weyrich@uunet.uu.net


In article <1992Sep19.064020.5116@weyrich.UUCP> uunet.uu.net!weyrich!orville writes:
>Hi --
>
>I have a currious problem and hope to turn it into an opportunity to learn
>something. :-)
>
>I had the opportunity to help install a TCP/IP network on an EISA machine
>today [not my machine -- EISA costs too much for me to afford :-(]
>
>The configuration: 
>	AMI 486/33 EISA motherboard with E0110791 BIOS release
>	AMI SCSI controller
>	Racal-Interlan ES-3210 ethernet
>	Interactive System V/386 3.2
>	TCP/IP 1.3
>	NFS
>
>The system has been in production for quite a while, but with no network or
>network card.
>
>I installed the TCP/IP and NFS and Racal-Interlan es0 driver with only one
>problem:
>	The install script has a bug in it that insists on storing IO address
>	4000-4fff in the file /etc/conf/sdevice.d/es0, regardless of what
>	EISA slot I choose. Not problem to manually edit the file to have
>	the IO address 5000-5fff that is appropriate for an ethernet card
>	installed in slot 5.
>
>The other parameters I used to set up the TCP/IP software are:
>	DMA 7
>	IRQ 15
>	Memory D0000-D3fff
>	thicknet (actually an adaptor is pluged into the AUI for 10base/T)
>
>I disabled BIOS ROM shadow for memory D0000-D3fff.
>
>Everything to this point is fine. I rebuilt the kernel and the system came up
>but NFS wasn't happy because the ethernet card was not yet physically 
>installed.
>
>I installed the ethernet card in EISA slot 5 and UNIX booted just fine and 
>lo and behold, NFS came up and I was able to do rlogins to/from the machine.
>
>Just one little problem: I did not set up the EISA configuration, and I did
>not set up the ethernet card. I just plugged and played. I got a nasty
>message from the ROM BIOS during POST that I had "Invalid EISA configuration
>for slot 5" Yeah, I can go along with that. I really hadn't intended to boot
>UNIX at all, but had intended to boot DOS from floppy in order to run the
>EISA setup and the Racal-Interlan test programs [I forgot to close the floppy
>door, so UNIX booted instead].
>
>So I figure I was just lucky, but in order to make the 
>	Invalid EISA configuration for slot 5
>message go away, I power down, boot DOS, and do the setup to instally the
>configuration file supplied by Racal-Interlan into the EISA setup. I used the
>appropriate DMA, IRQ, IO address, and memory addresses and everything looked
>good. The Interlan diagnostics agree that I have the parameters set up
>consistently with the way I configured the UNIX kernel.
>
>But the diagnostics fail. It's getting late, so I figure I'll just reboot
>UNIX so that the folks who are coming in to work tomorrow morning will have
>their system available for data entry.
>
>HORRORS. The system won't boot UNIX anymore. It starts to boot, then just
>goes off into nowhere with a blank console screen.
>
>I solve the problem by going back into EISA setup and deleting the 
>ethernet card from slot 5 of the configuration (only the motherboard in
>slot 0 and the SCSI controller in slot 1 are shown in the configuration now).
>
>I run the Interlan diagnostics, and the parameters show up as wrong --
>	DMA channel 1
>	Interrupt Level 0
>	Thinnet media
>
>But I am mainly interested in getting the system usable for tomorrow morning,
>don't need the network right away so I just shrug and reboot UNIX.
>
>UNIX comes up. NFS comes up. Rlogin works.
>
>So what gives? My limited understanding of EISA says that EISA cards like the
>Racal-Interlan ES-3210 *MUST* be "registered"  with the EISA ROM or else the
>system won't work.
>
>But in this case, it appears that the system only works if I DON'T register
>the EISA ethernet adaptor.
>
>Should I just pretend that I don't see the BIOS complaining about slot 5
>not being properly configured, that I don't know that the ethernet card
>in slot 5 isn't  registered, and that I can't get the Racal-Interlan
>diagnostics to work? After all, the system DOES seem to work, including
>the network.
>
>Or am I asking for trouble? This is a production system and avoiding down-time
>and trouble is very important.
>
>And finally, just out of curiosity, can anyone explain the seeming 
>contradictions? How does the ethernet card know what parameters to use?
>Did I just stumble on to the default values? Is the UNIX device driver
>smart enough to tell the card how it should be configured at boot-time?
>
>Thanks for reading this long post -- I hope that other readers find the topic
>interesting [and that someone has some answers :-)]
>
>orville
>
>--------------------------------------       **********************************
>Orville R. Weyrich, Jr.                          Weyrich Computer Consulting
>Certified Data Processor                       POB 5782, Scottsdale, AZ 85261
>Certified Systems Professional                      Voice: (602) 391-0821
>Certified Computer Programmer           Internet: orville%weyrich@uunet.uu.net
>--------------------------------------       **********************************


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