cable modem and linux

[erica057]

Hi,
I am a novice with Linux, and I seem to have hit a wall. Any help is INCREDIBLY appreciated, as I really want to make progress.

First, I created a partition for Linux on my PC, installed RH6.2, and I tried to configure X using both Xconfigurator and xf86config, but it wouldn't work. I think that it is because RH6.2 won't recognize my
video card (the 32MB NVIDIA GeForce2 MX 4X AGP Graphics Card). So, I went to http://www.nvidia.com/view.asp?PAGE=linux and found the drivers that I need. I tried saving the files to a floppy, but if it
is formatted for Linux, Windows won't let me save the file into it. I tried using VFAT to get Linux to recognize the Windows filesystem, but it just said "unable to open file". I figured that my next best bet would be to run lynx and download the RPM files from there.

WHICH BRINGS ME TO MY PROBLEM... I need to set up my cable modem so that I can connect to the internet. I am using Optimum Online in
NY. I searched for documents containing information on how to set up the connection, but all pages seemed to point me to http://www.netaxis.com/~wharris/optimum/index.html where I couldn't
even find a page. Can anyone help me? All replies are much appreciated.

[Craig McPherson]

First, I assume you have a NIC in your computer that's plugged into a cable "modem" via an Ethernet cable. That's the only setup that'll work: USB "modems" are out.

First you need to find out what Linux driver your NIC uses (tulip, rtl8139, etc). You'll need to know the brand and model of the NIC for this.

Check the NHFs section of this website, there are instructions there about configuring a network card, setting up the network interface, etc so I'm not going to explain the whole precedure from scratch. Please ask if you have any futher questions about the procedure.

[Craig McPherson]

NIC Installation: http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/network/nicinstall.html (not a very good one, but it'll work)
Internet Sharing: http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/network/eznetshare.html
Firewall: http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/network/firewall.html
NIC Driver List: http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/network/nicmodules.html
Iptables: http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/security/iptables_basics.html

Also read some old posts in the Networking forum, this has been explained a lot.

If you need further clarification it would help to know what distro you're using, because procedures vary.)

[erica057]

Originally posted by Craig McPherson:
<STRONG>First you need to find out what Linux driver your NIC uses (tulip, rtl8139, etc). You'll need to know the brand and model of the NIC for this.
</STRONG>

I'm not sure what driver it uses... http://www.dell.com/us/en/dhs/products/model_dimen_3_dimen_8100.htm lists the tech specs of my computer. It says "1 Integrated NIC: RJ45 connector". I looked at the driver list and couldn't find it...any ideas?

Oh, and I am using Red Hat 6.2

* * *

I tried to figure out which module it used by trial and error, and it appears to use tulip. However, I still get an error message:

/lib/modules/2.2.5-15/net/tulip.o: init_module: Device or resource busy

I really wish that I could figure this out...

[ 10 June 2001: Message edited by: erica057 ]

[FoBoT]

that link says

Integrated 3Com® 10/100 Ethernet Controller

hmm i would try 3C905B first, looking at the 3com website, seems this is the most common , right now

[erica057]

Grrr....none of these seem to be working, although when I type "insmod 3c5**" it gives an error message other than the device being busy or not existing. For what it's worth, when I typed "lsmod", the following was displayed:

Module: 8390 nfsd lockd sunrpc
Size: 5920 150936 30856 52356
Used: 0 8 1 1
by : (unused);(autoclean);(autoclean)[nfsd];(autoclean)[nfsd lockd]

I'm not really sure what any of this means...I'm still a novice, and I'm just trying to figure everything out...but perhaps this is pertinent information? I do not know...

[ 10 June 2001: Message edited by: erica057 ]

[Craig McPherson]

Hopefully it's an integrated PCI card and not an ISA, but since it's integrated you can't really tell. I'll assume it's PCI, because I don't recall ever seeing an ISA 10/100.

Anyway, do this when you don't have ANY NIC modules inserted (remove them with rmmod or just reboot the system):

cat /proc/pci

That'll tell you the exact brand of your network card.

I see this:


Bus 1, device 10, function 0:
Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139 (rev 16).
IRQ 7.
Master Capable. Latency=64. Min Gnt=32.Max Lat=64.
I/O at 0xd400 [0xd4ff].
Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xfc9ff800 [0xfc9ff8ff].
Bus 1, device 12, function 0:
Ethernet controller: Accton Technology Corporation SMC2-1211TX (rev 16).
IRQ 10.
Master Capable. Latency=64. Min Gnt=32.Max Lat=64.
I/O at 0xd800 [0xd8ff].
Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xfc9ffc00 [0xfc9ffcff].


The first card uses the RTL8139 driver (now called 8139-TOO under kernel 2.4), and the second uses the Tulip driver. The first one was obvious by the name of the device, but I had to look the second one up on the INternet.

[erica057]

I know that this is going to sound really dumb, but I have searched both books and the internet and haven't found the answer. When I typed cat /proc/pci a page of information turned up as shown, but there was so much text that not all of it fit on the screen and I could only read what was towards the bottom. How can I view the whole thing? Sorry if this sounds silly...

[ds801]

It's true that Linux needs to have the NIC working before you can configure the cable modem connection, but I'm not sure why you're knocking yourself out trying to install the module for it. Was it NOT working in the first place? (You only indicated a problem with the video card I thought, or did I just miss something?) I'd think that RH would have installed the NIC module on it's own. Another common problem about hardware and Linux, is that most PC's that have Windows installed also have Plug-and-Play turned on in the BIOS. Sometimes PnP causes problems with resource allocation in Linux (and a common error that results is the "Device or Resource Busy" error. ) I'd leave the NIC module settings alone, and try turning off PnP in the BIOS first.

As far as the Optimum Online settings go, they use a "normal" DHCP setup, meaning there's no special proxy or host name settings. You should be able to go to the Networking section of the Linuxconf utility, and just set the NIC (usually eth0) to enabled, and to DHCP, and that should be it. I've never actually tried it, however, so you might want to wait for a response from an OOL subscriber, or check out the Unix or OOL boards at http://www.dslreports.com/forums

[erica057]

Yay! Linux is up and running now...I solved my problem by just upgrading to Red Hat 7.1. It supports my video card, so I was able to start the GUI, and it was easy to configure my cable modem from there. Thanks to everyone who helped, though!

[Craig McPherson]

Originally posted by erica057:
<STRONG>I know that this is going to sound really dumb, but I have searched both books and the internet and haven't found the answer. When I typed cat /proc/pci a page of information turned up as shown, but there was so much text that not all of it fit on the screen and I could only read what was towards the bottom. How can I view the whole thing? Sorry if this sounds silly...</STRONG>

Pipe it through a pager like less or more.

cat /proc/pci | more

more displays one screen and then stops until you press a key, then continues. less lets you scroll up and down through the output.

Anything commands in UNIX can be piped together. You should read about standard input, standard output, pipestreams, etc. in an introductory Unix text. It's good stuff.