Intel I340-T4 E1G44HTBLK Quad Port NIC

vegastech

Yeah, I had a RAID controller that would not show the boot up sequence of a HP Z420 but it would eventually boot. If I removed the card then the PC would boot normally. As implied above, I believe it was sharing/overwriting a memory area. C800 comes to mind but it's been years.

For pfSense I'm always using HP NC365T cards. These are quad Intel T-340 chipset cards. On eBay you can find them for $25-$50. I've plugged these cards into everything under the sun and they've always worked. Whether this would still be an issue with the Opti3020 (hard coded memory mapped/limitation per the link above) or possibly the NC365T uses a different memory block allowing a boot is a guess.

provels

@DaddyGo
Oh, I think you may mean the Adaptec 1542B SCSI-1 jumper monster, with the plug-in terminators. Still have one in the parts box. The 29160 came along a bit later, was at least PCI-64. Good times indeed!

tgdsilva

@netblues I think so... I am not having much luck with this.

tgdsilva

@DaddyGo Thank you for finding the post and the video. I tried both suggestions and did not work out in my case.

First I removed one of the memory dimms and tried to boot. But I got the same outcome.

Second, I put over the pins as suggested in the video and tried to boot. Both memories was installed. I got the same outcomes as before.

tgdsilva

@vegastech I may try to get tge card you mention. Thank you!

tgdsilva

@provels I had high hopes when I saw the post and the video. Unfortunately, it didn't work out in my case.

provels

@tgdsilva
Sorry to hear. All I can suggest is keep diddling with the BIOS. Also, be advised the HP NC365T is the same i340 chipset, just OEM branded. I use the IBM OEM version myself w/o issue, but maybe this Dell is simply incompatible. Perhaps you could try posting in the Dell consumer forums. Or try an i350 card or the pre-i340 Pro/1000. Here's a good link to Intel NICs and their OEM equivalents:
https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/list-of-nics-and-their-equivalent-oem-parts.20974/
Good luck.

tgdsilva

@provels Thank you for your advise and help.

Impatient

If you have a cpu with graphic's built in you may be able to setup the bios to use it
and maybe the pc will boot.

tgdsilva

@Impatient I have Intel Core i3-4160 Processor. It does have
Intel HD Graphics 4400.

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/77488/intel-core-i3-4160-processor-3m-cache-3-60-ghz.html

I am not sure how to setup the BIOS to use it any differently than it is currently setup.

Impatient

There should be an option under (Video) in the bios to select which one to use.

Do Not select Auto.

DaddyGo

@tgdsilva said in Intel I340-T4 E1G44HTBLK Quad Port NIC:

I got the same outcomes as before.

We struggled hard, but I’m sorry we didn’t succeed...
Maybe a Dell TAC or forum can help with the solution.
I'm only familiar with Dell in PowerEdge theme

DaddyGo

@provels said in Intel I340-T4 E1G44HTBLK Quad Port NIC:

jumper monster,

I encountered a similar "jumper jungle" on Advantech ISA measurement data acquisition cards

tgdsilva

@Impatient Yes, I saw two options. Auto was selected. I selected the second option. However, I still could not boot with the NIC installed.

netblues

@DaddyGo I guess you preffer scotch tape than jumpers after all.

Impatient

https://forum.netgate.com/user/uncarvedblockhead

Here is a user that is running pfSense with I340 nic on a dell 3020::
Different CPU and I340 quad port nic.

DaddyGo

@netblues said in Intel I340-T4 E1G44HTBLK Quad Port NIC:

preffer scotch tape than jumpers after all

I'm glad those times are over (a little bit)
the time spent on the hardware was then not equal to the time spent on the software

tgdsilva

@Impatient Thank you! I contacted the user and waiting for a reply.

Impatient

@tgdsilva You can also try to disable hyperthreading on your cpu, Should be an option in the
bios and see if there is any difference.

The only problem I ever had with the Dell's is trying to run two 4 Port card's.
It would Post the bios and pfSense would install and function but would not Soft Repost without
forcing the power off.

uncarvedblockhead

@tgdsilva Very sorry, I haven't been on the forum in quite some time and just saw your DM. In case this comes up in someone's search looking for an answer to this problem, there's only one thing that I can think of that could be the culprit; with the I340-T4 card installed, the computer can only see/address one of the two RAM slots on the Dell Optiplex 3020. Just to be clear, I was running the SFF (Small Form Factor) variant. When I had 2x4GB sticks installed, it would only see 4GB in the BIOS. If I only had one 4GB stick installed it would boot fine, so long as it was in the slot closest to the CPU. If I only had one stick installed and it was in the other slot, it wouldn't boot at all.

Full disclosure, I'm not certain which slot it was that worked, but the 3020 SFF only has two slots so it's one or the other. The 7020 and 9020 models both have 4 slots, but I never bothered to try to replicate the problem with one.

Hopefully this will help someone, if not the OP.

Oh, and here's an unrelated present; wanna boot & run this machine off an NVME? Here you go: https://www.tachytelic.net/2021/12/dell-optiplex-7020-nvme-ssd/