Not detecting my PCMCIA NIC cards

fizix

Greetings,

I'm trying to install pfSense on a Thinkpad 390E with two PCMCIA Xircom CE3B NIC cards and no harddrive. I can only boot up in safe mode (not sure if that's normal) and when I get to the NIC assignment screen the only name options are for plip0 and 0. I know it detected the cards on startup as ed1 and ed2. Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Ian

wallabybob

What version of pfSense? If you haven't realdy tried one of the 1.2.3 snapshopt builds I suggest you do so since they include more up to date software than previous builds.

Could you post the startup output, particularly around the part that shows the detection of the two NICs. Perhaps the driver detected an error and consequently failed to make the devices available.

fizix

@wallabybob:

What version of pfSense? If you haven't realdy tried one of the 1.2.3 snapshopt builds I suggest you do so since they include more up to date software than previous builds.

Could you post the startup output, particularly around the part that shows the detection of the two NICs. Perhaps the driver detected an error and consequently failed to make the devices available.

I'm using 1.2.3 RC1, is there a newer build in a pre-compiled ISO that I can try? This is probably a newb question but how can I output the startup log? The only removable storage is the floppy drive.

Also, I did a little more hunting and was wondering if this could be related?

http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/query-pr.cgi?pr=kern%2F115623&cat=

wallabybob

You can find 1.2.3 snapshot builds in http://snapshots.pfsense.org/FreeBSD_RELENG_7_2/pfSense_RELENG_1_2/livecd_installer/

@fizix:

when I get to the NIC assignment screen the only name options are for plip0 and 0. I know it detected the cards on startup as ed1 and ed2.

On the NIC assignment screen, if you get one Ethernet interface along with plip0 (parallel port) you should be able to proceed. Make the Ethernet interface LAN, then you should be able to connect from another system to the pfSense WEB GUI and in Diagnostics -> Command in the Command box immediately under Execute Shell Command type```
dmesg

to display the startup output which you should then be able to copy and paste in a reply to this topic.

fizix

@wallabybob:

On the NIC assignment screen, if you get one Ethernet interface along with plip0 (parallel port) you should be able to proceed. Make the Ethernet interface LAN, then you should be able to connect from another system to the pfSense WEB GUI and in Diagnostics -> Command in the Command box immediately under Execute Shell Command type```
dmesg
to display the startup output which you should then be able to copy and paste in a reply to this topic.

The only options I have are "plip0" and "0". However, if I try to enter "0" as the interface name it tells me it's not a valid name.

wallabybob

During the startup copy down the text around the error reports for the ed devices. I expect you can suspend and resume the startup output by typing control-S to suspect and control-Q to resume.

Its strange that you get error reports for ed1 and ed2 since you say you have only two of those devices and the FreeBSD device numbering starts at 0, hence teh two devices should be units 0 and 1. Its also strange the startup reports ed devices since the xe man page claims the xe driver supports PCMCIA Xircom CE3B while the ed man page claims the ed driver supports ne2000 style interfaces.

I found a problem report for xe devices on OpenBSD (relevant only in that the BSDs share a lot of logic) which may be something like what you are seeing: http://www.monkey.org/openbsd/archive/misc/0404/msg01536.html I have idea if a fix for this was ever produced in FreeBSD.

fizix

@wallabybob:

During the startup copy down the text around the error reports for the ed devices. I expect you can suspend and resume the startup output by typing control-S to suspect and control-Q to resume.

Its strange that you get error reports for ed1 and ed2 since you say you have only two of those devices and the FreeBSD device numbering starts at 0, hence teh two devices should be units 0 and 1. Its also strange the startup reports ed devices since the xe man page claims the xe driver supports PCMCIA Xircom CE3B while the ed man page claims the ed driver supports ne2000 style interfaces.

I found a problem report for xe devices on OpenBSD (relevant only in that the BSDs share a lot of logic) which may be something like what you are seeing: http://www.monkey.org/openbsd/archive/misc/0404/msg01536.html I have idea if a fix for this was ever produced in FreeBSD.

OK, here is the log:


ed1: <xircom 10="" 100="" creditcard="">at port 0x100-0x10f
irq 11 function 0 config 1 on pccard0
device_attach: ed1 attach returned 6
ed2: <xircom 10="" 100="" creditcard="">at port 0x110-0x11f
irq 11 function 0 config 1 on pccard1
device_attach: ed2 attach returned 6</xircom></xircom>

Also, I tried the nightly snapshot from Sep 22nd and it still didn't detect the cards but instead of giving me plip0 and 0 as network interface name options it said "No interfaces found".

Did you look at the link I posted earlier? I wonder if that has anything to do with it.

wallabybob

@fizix:

Did you look at the link I posted earlier? I wonder if that has anything to do with it.

Its not obvious to me that there is a connection: different chipset and different bus (pccard vs cardbus).

It looks as if these are really old cards (pccard bus rather than cardbus) so I suspect you might find it hard to get any FreeBSD attention for this issue because it might be hard for the appropriate developer to get access to a card of your type.

fizix

@wallabybob:

@fizix:

Did you look at the link I posted earlier? I wonder if that has anything to do with it.

Its not obvious to me that there is a connection: different chipset and different bus (pccard vs cardbus).

It looks as if these are really old cards (pccard bus rather than cardbus) so I suspect you might find it hard to get any FreeBSD attention for this issue because it might be hard for the appropriate developer to get access to a card of your type.

You're right, I didn't notice that. However, the FreeBSD 7.0 HCL does list this card:

[i386,amd64] The xe(4) driver supports the following cards:

* Xircom CreditCard Ethernet (PS-CE2-10)
* Xircom CreditCard Ethernet + Modem 28 (PS-CEM-28)
* Xircom CreditCard Ethernet + Modem 33 (CEM33)
* Xircom CreditCard 10/100 (CE3, CE3B)

wallabybob

Unfortunately some manufacturers use the same model name for products with different chipsets. It looks like your card might be an example.

Since FreeBSD claims to support your card its worth submitting a problem report to see what happens.

fizix

@wallabybob:

Unfortunately some manufacturers use the same model name for products with different chipsets. It looks like your card might be an example.

Since FreeBSD claims to support your card its worth submitting a problem report to see what happens.

Ok, thanks. I submitted bug #101.