Stueyb

Thought id ask this one because ive spent two days tearing my hair out over a new server im installing.

We have just purchased a pair of PowerEdge 350s. One of them has an extra intel 82550 ? dual port Ethernet on a pci card, as well as the two onboard ones.

The problem is that it won't ping f all. Only when connected to the other pci card does the ethernet work. It works on both ports. The onboard ones dont work. Remove the pci based one and the onboard ports begin to work (well one of them does).

Replace the card and get the prob again.

I thought perhaps IRQ etc, but there is nowhere to change the interrupts. The BIOS doesnt even mention the ethernet ports.

This server is running on NT4 SP6a, with all hotfixes.

Called Dell and their "tech support" was no use at all.

Even went as far as uninstalling the cards, TCP/IP and re installing from scratch.

The card have been config'd as so:

Onboard 1: 10.0.0.158
Subnet : 255.255.0.0
Dns: 158.43.128.1

Onboard 2: 10.0.0.159
Subnet : 255.255.0.0
Dns: 158.43.128.1

PCi card 1: 10.0.0.160
Subnet : 255.255.0.0
Dns: 158.43.128.1

PCI card 2 1: 10.0.0.161
Subnet : 255.255.0.0
Dns: 158.43.128.1

*Sonic*

Can I ask why you have got an extra dual port card

do you need all 4 ports?

dont even think about load balancing/teaming especially if they are broadcom

They basically have caused no end of issues having them teamed, never used to be a problem until recently, and its only discovered through sniffer software, and analysing the packets

it does sound like a conflict with resources tho for the problem you are having

Steve

*Sonic*

Weird

No probs on the NG, did some of that last week, on a Nokia 330

been working on 4.1 all day today tho

tis definatly strange that the PCI NIC appears to knock off the onboard ones

do you get any errors in the event log for any of the NIC's when you have a NIC in the PCI slot?

and do you have the intel util in the systray, that should show all the cards and interrupts etc

Steve

*Sonic*

u using crossover cables, or are all the ports plugged into a hub/switch ?

Steve

Jeff Wiltshire

Give each interface a different IP address Subnet and it will work....assuming you cable the interfaces correctly.

orbv

Not 100% sure now NT works but with the above configuration most unix's will do either:

i, send all packets down the first adapter in the routing table as there are on the same network.
ii, round robin between the adapters.

You need to put the adapters on different ip networks eg...

Onboard 1: 10.0.0.158
Subnet : 255.255.0.0

Onboard 2: 10.1.0.159
Subnet : 255.255.0.0

PCi card 1: 10.2.0.160
Subnet : 255.255.0.0

PCI card 2 1: 10.3.0.161
Subnet : 255.255.0.0

Also if any of the ports do have the same mac address you could have other problem but sort the ips out first.

Stueyb

Im not using xover cables, just standard ethernet ones. They are plugged into a 3com 4200 Switch at the mo.

Ill try the different subnets thing tommorow and see what happens. If it works ill be glad and owe you a beer

sjah555

Don't think me totally dense please, but have you tried plugging the card into a different pci slot as the IRQs cannot be changed in the BIOS or manually.... therefore the conflict may be overcome enabling it to change its own parameters ....

-Sal-

Stueyb

Sal,

Great idea in principle. Only problem is there is only 1 pci slot on the entire board as its a 1U unit. Anyone want to buy a cheap server ????

Stueyb

In reply to why am I using W2k rather than NT4, it comes down to the fact that our Service providers insist on 4 because it is "proven" apparently

*Sonic*

Have you ran the system config utility ?

This is where you can view/change IRQ settings, and sometimes you have to do this before adding cards to the server

As it will reassign any resources that may conflict

(it is the EISA config)

Just a thought


Steve

Stueyb

Ill try it tommorow and let you know

*Sonic*

Something else to try is to hardcode the network settings

ie if your switch that your plugged into is 100Mb Full Duplex, then change the ports from Auto (if set to this) to 100Mb Full Duplex, also do the same on your NIC's

Dont use any auto negotiation on your settings

Steve

*Sonic*

Also

try pinging the loopback address, 127.0.0.1

try the very latest drivers, and run the NIC diagnostics

Steve

Stueyb

Just to keep you all informed of goings on. I decided to trash nt4 and install 2k as someone suggested. Now all the ports work fine. Why ? God knows, but at least it works now!

Thanks to everyone who tried to help, its much appreciated.

Regards

Stuart

*Sonic*

Stu

I would take a very good guess at drivers

there is an issue with NT using the wrong drivers on Intel NIC's on Dells, you have to download the latest ones, and use those instead

Steve

Stueyb

Its actually being used for a Firewall NG System to replace our firewall 4.1, so we need 1 port for LAN, 1 for DMZ, and one to the router.

These cards arent broadcom, but im just sick of the bloody things. I even tried a 3com 3c905 and that wouldnt work on the pci slot either.

Im actually setting all the ports to internal address just to test everything works btw

[Edited by Stueyb - 1/5/2003 12:49:43 AM]

Jeff Wiltshire

The problem may lie with the use of internal addresses in the same range. If all of the cards are connected into the same switch you might (I'm guessing here) have a problem with MAC addresses from the cards. I would check the MAC addresses are all different and use different subnets for the cards just to check it out.

Why are you using NT4 rather than Win2000 ? You will find that NG is more stable under Win2k.


Jeff

[Edited by Jeff Wiltshire - 1/5/2003 7:02:58 AM]

Stueyb

It does have intel proset loaded in the tray, and it sees the nic cards, and senses activity from all the ports, even when plugged in together, even though ping isn't working !!

As for eventlog, it just says that the interfaces are up, no stop errors.


[Edited by Stueyb - 1/5/2003 12:12:53 PM]