Re: Hmm.. Cannot get 2 NICs detected? Do I buy other NICs?

["Alson van der Meulen" <alm@flutnet.org>]

Richard Welty(rwelty@averillpark.net)@2002.01.01 23:29:25 +0000:
> On Tue, 1 Jan 2002 22:20:27 -0500 Christian J Hedemark <chris@yonderway.com> wrote:
> 
> > Nuno said:
> > 
> > > I also tried a 3COM 3C509BTP (10mbps/ISA), with no luck. (this model
> > > doesn't appear in the supported hardware list)
> > 
> > Not help, just confirmation.  I'm in the middle of refurbishing an old IBM
> > PC 330 (model 6577) into a firewall.  The 3C509 I had laying around did NOT
> > work under OpenBSD but it did work in that machine when Windoze 95 was still
> > on it.
> 
> hmmm. i had a pair of 3c509s (one combo, one TPO) that worked once upon a
> time. i put both of them into a 3.0 box for a firewall. one worked, the
> other would ARP, but wouldn't actually pass data (i looked at the arp
> tables on another machine hooked up to the bad card, and verified that both
> ends were seeing each other's MAC addresses.) i yanked it, put in a
> DFE-530TX, got the firewall working briefly, and then the other 3c509
> crapped out, to be replaced by yet another DLink.
Did you disable PNP?
> 
> mostly i think it's that 3c509s are very old cards. they also aren't very
> efficient cards (tend to require a lot of cpu intervention.) the DFE-530TX+
> is cheap ($12-$13 online from the right source). you can get the card
> cheaper if Staples still has their rebate going; $15 over the counter, with
> a $10 rebate. don't waste too much time on old 3com cards; you're not
> saving that much money.

It is designed more efficient than the popular RTL8139 chipset, where
most cheap NICs are based on, these depend more on the cpu than those
old 3c509's. They have always worked fine for me, after configuring it
using 3c5x9cfg (a DOS program, available from
ftp://ftp.3com.com/pub/nic/3c509/3c509x2.exe).

http://www.holland-consulting.net/tech/ocep/index.html#3c509
for more info on using the 3c509 with OpenBSD.

Alson