ethernet/3com/3c509.rst

1 .. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0
21 ethercards in Linux. These cards are commonly known by the most widely-used
22 card's 3Com model number, 3c509. They are all 10mb/s ISA-bus cards and shouldn't
23 be (but sometimes are) confused with the similarly-numbered PCI-bus "3c905"
28  - 3c509 (original ISA card)
29  - 3c509B (later revision of the ISA card; supports full-duplex)
30  - 3c589 (PCMCIA)
31  - 3c589B (later revision of the 3c589; supports full-duplex)
32  - 3c579 (EISA)
45 The driver allows boot- or load-time overriding of the card's detected IOADDR,
47 needed except to enable full-duplex mode (see below). An example of the syntax
62 Full-duplex mode
65 The v1.18c driver added support for the 3c509B's full-duplex capabilities.
66 In order to enable and successfully use full-duplex mode, three conditions
69 (a) You must have a Etherlink III card model whose hardware supports full-
70 duplex operations. Currently, the only members of the 3c509 family that are
71 positively known to support full-duplex are the 3c509B (ISA bus) and 3c589B
73 full-duplex mode; these include the original 3c509 (no "B"), the original
76 (b) You must be using your card's 10baseT transceiver (i.e., the RJ-45
77 connector), not its AUI (thick-net) or 10base2 (thin-net/coax) interfaces.
78 AUI and 10base2 network cabling is physically incapable of full-duplex
82 itself full-duplex capable. This is almost certainly one of two things: a full-
83 duplex-capable  Ethernet switch (*not* a hub), or a full-duplex-capable NIC on
86 Full-duplex mode can be enabled using 'ethtool'.
90   Extremely important caution concerning full-duplex mode
92   Understand that the 3c509B's hardware's full-duplex support is much more
94   at the physical layer of the network it fully supports full-duplex operation,
95   the card was designed before the current Ethernet auto-negotiation (N-way)
97   auto-negotiate a full-duplex connection with its link partner under any
98   circumstances, no matter how it is initialized***. If the full-duplex mode
100   independently _forced_ into full-duplex mode as well; otherwise various nasty
101   failures will occur - at the very least, you'll see massive numbers of packet
102   collisions. This is one of very rare circumstances where disabling auto-
103   negotiation and forcing the duplex mode of a network interface card or switch
113 0  transceiver type from EEPROM config (normally 10baseT); force half-duplex
114 1  AUI (thick-net / DB15 connector)
116 3  10base2 (thin-net == coax / BNC connector)
117 4  10baseT (RJ-45 connector); force half-duplex mode
118 8  transceiver type and duplex mode taken from card's EEPROM config settings
119 12 10baseT (RJ-45 connector); force full-duplex mode
122 Prior to driver version 1.18c, only transceiver codes 0-4 were supported. Note
124 full-duplex mode, no matter what the card's detected EEPROM settings might be.
126 never automatically enable full-duplex mode in an existing installation;
134 ----------------------------------------------------
145    - a "green" mode enabled that slows the processor down when there is no
148    - some other device or device driver hogging the bus or disabling interrupts.
177 with all. This can be fixed by disabling PnP support using the 3Com-supplied
188 ----------------------------------
211 0x02	Out-of-window collision.
231 host is incorrectly set to full duplex on a half duplex network.
239 to full duplex (see above).