I can only ping myself

[toroid11]

Hi all, very green newbie here.
I managed to install the right module for my FA311 NIC - no thanks to Netgear for documenting the wrong one (rtl8139) instead of natsemi...
anyway I did ifconfig for lo (127.0.0.1) and eth0 (192.168.02) and can ping these both as IP and as names. But I can't ping 192.168.0.1 (or anything else on the home network).

This annoys me because with the same physical connection the network is fine with win 98 and the 192.168.0.1 machine provides ICS to all the other computers, including the dualboot linux/w98 (192.168.0.2).
I am not clear that I am doing things right with route...
can anyone spell out for me which commands I should issue after ifconfig? I tried all sort but I may have developed a blind spot. Thanks.

Other info:
kernel 2.4.9,
Mandrake,
PnPOS disabled (BIOS instead)
IRQ9 and IO 0xd400 (same as in W98).
ifconfig shows lots of dropped RX packets for eth0.

[toroid11]

I cannot find info on the meaning of those 71 dropped RX packets. They increase with time even if I don't do anything. There are also 2 RX and 45 TX packets. TX seem to depend on ping attempts (of course?).
It looks as if the interface is sending out but drops what arrives to it. The usage number does not increase.
Am I still using a wrong NIC driver after all????
How does one troubleshoot this setup?
Anybody else got a FA311 NIC working in linux?
Thanks for any help

[jumpedintothefire]

What does route -n give you?

[toroid11]

Hi jumpedintothefire!

after route -n I get:

Kernel IP routing table
Destination Gateway Genmask Flags Metric Ref Use Iface
192.168.0.1 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 eth0
192.168.0.3 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255 UH 0 0 0 eth0
192.168.0.0 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.0 U 0 0 0 eth0
127.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 255.0.0.0 U 0 0 0 lo
0.0.0.0 192.168.0.1 0.0.0.0 UG 0 0 0 eth0


the two w98 boxes (192.168.0.1 and 192.168.0.3) can happily ping each other and share files and printer using TCP/IP.

I noticed another thing in dmesg; after the eth0 is recognized, multiple lines appear saying:

Something Wicked happened. 18000

What the hell does this mean?

Where can I find a list of error codes?

Thanks for any hint... and apologies for delays in replying, I need to switch between OSs to go online...

[jumpedintothefire]

Your not alone with this problem, haven't found the fix yet:

http://www.mail-archive.com/linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org/msg53105.html
http://www.mail-archive.com/linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org/msg52090.html

throw Something Wicked happened! fa311into a search engine.

Where did you download the driver from?

in /var/log/messages, what is the version?

Try the natsemi.c driver from:

http://www.scyld.com/network/ethercard.html

[toroid11]

Thanks to jumpedintothefire for most helpful pointers!!!
Following his hint to google I found there is a can of worms of problem reports concerning FA311 NICs and various versions of natsemi.c and fa311.c files. Even hints of controversy about copyrights (see Becker's notes at www.scyld.com and headers of source files).
I tried to compile new modules from each source and got screenfuls of errors. Too steep a learning curve - I would love to learn C/C++ but I have no time right now.
The good news is that I am now writing this from my Linux box connected to the W98 box which has the modem and provides ICS to the home network.
I just got a no-name NIC with an rtl8139 driver,
which worked with no fuss with the module provided in the distro. So I'm happy, wiser but still kinda pissed off with netgear. Anybody wants a FA311? It works with windows...

[jumpedintothefire]

Have to hate a maker that changes the chipsets of the cards without renumbering it. How hard is it to stick a -1 or -a to the end of the part number??