3c590 PCI ethernet card transmit time out

Yann Dupont (dupont@unantes.univ-nantes.fr)
Fri, 8 Mar 1996 17:01:33 +0100

Hello. I'm on the kernel list for 7 days, I hope this question and his
eventual solution haven't been raised before.

I've got 5 machines with 3C590 PCI ethernet card

2 are working absolutely OK :

pegase, 1 1.3.43 kernel (asustek, Award Bios):

eth0: 3Com 3c590 Vortex 10baseT at 0xe000, 00:20:af:f8:df:86, IRQ 12
Internal config register is 320012.
32K byte-wide RAM 1:1 Rx:Tx split, 10base2 interface.

popeye, 1.3.70 Kernel (Noname triton, Mrbios):

Overriding PCI latency timer (CFLT) setting of 0, new value is 255.
eth0: 3Com 3c590 Vortex 10Mbps at 0x1020, 00:20:af:f6:94:91, IRQ 12
32K byte-wide RAM 1:1 Rx:Tx split, 10baseT interface.
3c59x.c:v0.13 2/13/96 becker@cesdis.gsfc.nasa.gov

The 3 others are affected by the transmit time out problem (they all have
the same motherboard)

Dionos, 1.3.43 kernel (Biostar, Ami Bios :)

3c59x.c:v0.08 9/14/95 becker@cesdis.gsfc.nasa.gov
loading device 'eth0'...
eth0: 3Com 3c590 Vortex 10baseT at 0xff80, 00:a0:24:52:15:bd, IRQ 9
Internal config register is 320010.
8K byte-wide RAM 1:1 Rx:Tx split, 10base2 interface.
eth0: vortex_open() irq 9 media status 0800.

When on this machine i use remote X, FTP, or something using rather
large networks packets, i got this :

dionos:/$ ping -s 8192 popeye
PING popeye.ensinfo.sciences.univ-nantes.fr (193.52.100.124): 8192 data bytes

--- popeye.ensinfo.sciences.univ-nantes.fr ping statistics ---
3 packets transmitted, 0 packets received, 100% packet loss

dionos:/$ dmesg
(...)
eth0: vortex_open() irq 9 media status 0800.
eth0: transmit timed out, tx_status 00 status 6000.
eth0: transmit timed out, tx_status 00 status 6000.
eth0: transmit timed out, tx_status 00 status 6000.
eth0: transmit timed out, tx_status 00 status 6000.
eth0: transmit timed out, tx_status 00 status 6000.
eth0: transmit timed out, tx_status 00 status 6000.
eth0: transmit timed out, tx_status 00 status 6000.

I saw numerous post on this on the news, but never saw a clear answer.

Something I don't understand : On the computers failing, the RAM is
reported 8K-byte wide, on the computers working, they are reported 32K
byte ram. Is there something here ?

I tried numerous tweaking of Cmos parameters without success.

This problem shows 1.3.43 <-> 1.3.71.

Yann.