[KLUG Hardware] PCI Eathernet card will not work (device or resource busy)

[randall perry]

At 03:50 AM 1/30/2003 +0000, Scott Cleveland wrote:
>O.S. Suse 6.4
>Computer: compaq (hay stop laughing!) P-166 w/ 48mb of ram only 1 pci slot
I picked a Compaq P166 with 48MB of ram over a year ago for $15. (had more than 1 PCI slot)  Still runs fine.

>Eather net card: D-link DFE-530tx+
>I have another computer runing suse 6.4 and the same eathernet card and it works fine This other machine reconizes the card as a Real talk cad and used the module rtl8139.o
>
>When the compaq boots I get the message that the "device or resource is busy"
>also "insmod eth0 failed" and I can see that it is trying to load the correct module.  I get the same message when I try "bash# insmod rtl9139" I get the same error.
>
>I have tried to recompile the kernel to support this card directly and as a module . I get the same message with eather configuration.
>There is in my bios, setings for my 1 PCI slot.
This is where you might want to start (faster and easier than a kernel recompile if you knew you had the right Realtek drives anyway)

>They are:
>
>Option Rom Scan:  Enable or disable
Disable this unless you plan to boot from the EEPROM and are using etherboot (or another PXE or Bootp server) to get the network info

>Enanle master: Enable or Disable
most likely the option for PCI bus mastering which is a traffic cop (of sorts) for devices using the PCI bus.  I am trying to remember when the 2.1 PCI spec came out...but can't.  Anyway, if your card and system support this option, you will see a performance boost, but I don't think that card can.  You might think to yourself "I only have 1 PCI slot".  That is true, but you probably have more than 1 PCI device (integrated video, IDE interface....) 
Disable it.

>Latency Timer: Default 0020h 0040h 0060h 0080h 00a0h 00c0h 00e0h
Most likely the sausage-cottonTM to the problem. 
This is like double-dutch jump roping (or whatever that is called).  If the timing is too slow, the card will expect to communicate at a faster interval.  Visa-versa if you set it too fast, the card won't keep up.  More elegantly written and detailed info is here:
http://www.reric.net/linux/pci_latency.html

This is what could really throw a wrench in it.

>Also ther is an option for "plug and play o/s" yes or no.  Does any of the bios stuff matter in this case?
Set it to nonPNP if you want the BIOS to assign resources.

>Any Ideas?
Sometimes

>Thank you in advance for your help
>
>One other thing of note, my nic came with a cdrom of drivers and this module rtl8139 is included in the /LINUX directory.  Basicly I am sure this is the right module.

Don't forget to also check the basic stuff, like is it properly seated in the PCI slot (I know, sounds basic..but that happens).



Randall Perry
Senior Consultant/Trainer
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