[K12OSN] BUILT-IN NIC - solved (sort of)

[Ray Garza]

On Friday 25 May 2007 12:11:21 pm Terrell Prudé Jr. wrote:
> Ray Garza wrote:
> > On Thursday 24 May 2007 04:01:25 pm Ray Garza wrote:
> >> On Thursday 24 May 2007 11:29:26 am Ray Garza wrote:
> >>> I have some PC's that have a built in NIC w/option to boot from
> >>> network. I try using it but it cannot get the info from the DHCP
> >>> Server. If I boot from floppy it works fine.
> >>>
> >>> The built-in nic is a VIA Rhine II Fast Ethernet Adapter v2.14 and it
> >>> us using Intel UNDI, PXE-2.0 to boot from.
> >>>
> >>> You think I may have to upgrade the system BIOS? I'm not even sure if
> >>> there is an upgrade. I'll have to look. Is there anything I can do on
> >>> the server side to help it along?
> >>>
> >>> I've looked at the log files but didn't see anything about this pc
> >>> trying to connect.
> >>>
> >>> I've checked the archives and people have had success with this card
> >>> but no details were provided.
> >>>
> >>> Thanks,
> >>>
> >>> Ray Garza
> >>> Coordinator of Computer Services
> >>> Speer Memorial Library
> >>>
> >>> _______________________________________________
> >>> K12OSN mailing list
> >>> K12OSN at redhat.com
> >>> https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/k12osn
> >>> For more info see <http://www.k12os.org>
> >>
> >> I updated the BIOS to the MB and it still doesn't work. Errors with No
> >> DHCP reply so I gave up and booted from floppy. Problem solved :)
> >
> > Ok looking over my original email I realized I forgot one teeny-weeny
> > fact, I piggybacking on an existing network with another box (IPCop).
> >
> > I have an existing network of about 200 PC's running through IPCop
> > (static IP's). Out of those 200 PC's I needed to convert 16 PC's over to
> > k12ltsp (using the same physical network). I've read others were doing it
> > so I figured it would work too as long as I turned off DHCP services on
> > the IPCop box.
> >
> > IPCop: DHCP services: OFF - network: 192.168.0.0/24
> > K12ltsp: DHCP Services: ON - network: 192,168.1.0/24.
> > Both on the same physical network.
> >
> > For the most part the setup is working but here is what I have observed:
> > I have a few PC's that have the built-in nic as described before. The one
> > I had trouble with will not boot from the NIC using the BIOS
> > configuration. The other PC's will boot from the NIC via BIOS
> > configurations. So, I'm thinking that it was just a single PC issue.
> >
> > The rest of the PC's boot from the floppy because they have no buil-in
> > nic and we don't have the bootproms installed.
> >
> > Booting from the floppy I get several (about 4) "No IP found" errors then
> > it kicks in and loads up. I thought that it might be from heavy network
> > load but I looked at it this morning under light traffic and still got
> > the same "NO IP Found" errors. It looks like I get 3-5 of those errors
> > then it kicks in and boots up.
> >
> > I really don't see it as a major problem right now. Even under heavy
> > network load the k12 clients seem to work fine. Well, at least they are
> > able to boot up and people can log on and surf the web.
> >
> > I'll have to wait and see later on when the k12 pc's get more useage.
> > Anyone see anything that could account for the "NO IP Found" errors? I
> > have a Netgear gigabit and CISCO 3550 switch between the the k12 server
> > and the PC's. I wonder if they could be causing the errors.
> >
> > Oh well, sorry for the omission of some vital information. Just an
> > oversite.
> >
> > Ray
>
> Hmm...you've turned off the IPCop's DHCP server, but it does sound like
> there's something else on the network that's at least attempting to
> reply.  Could there possibly be something else trying to respond to the
> PXE-booting request but not, for some reason, configured to actually
> hand out an IP address?  The only thing that comes to mind here is a
> broken DHCP server of some sort on that network segment.
>
Well, if there is, I'm not aware of it. I'll look around to see if I got 
another DHCP server somewhere. I guess the easiest thing for me to do at one 
point in time unplug the k12 server and see if the pc's can pick up a lease 
somewhere. I should be able to do that today after we close.

Ray