Why does my Intel Tolapai network chip not transmit packets?
- by Hanno Fietz
I'm trying to deploy an embedded system (NISE 110 by Nexcom) based on the Intel EP80579 (Tolapai) chip. Tolapai apparently integrates controllers for Ethernet etc. on a single chip (Intel homepage).
The machine can't get a network connection. Diagnosis as far as I could manage:
Drivers
drivers from Intel compiled and installed without problems (version 1.0.3-144). Kernel version and Linux distribution (CentOS 5.2, 2.6.18) match the driver's installation instructions.
drivers are loaded and show up in lsmod (module names are gcu and iegbe)
interfaces eth0 and eth1 show up in ifconfig
ifconfig
I can bring up the interfaces with fixed IP
pinging the interface locally works
ifconfig shows flag UP but not RUNNING
Link
ethtool shows "Link detected: no", "Speed: unknown (65536)" and "Duplex: unknown (255)"
Link LED is on
on the other side of the cable, ethtool shows "Link detected: yes" and reports a speed of 1000 Mbps, which has allegedly been auto-neogotiated with the problematic device.
Network traffic analysis
the device does not reply on ARP, ICMP echo or anything else (iptables is down)
when trying to send ICMP or DHCP requests, they never reach the other end
activity LED is off on the device, on at the other end.
I tried the following without any effect:
Different cables (2 straight, one crossed), I get the link LED lit up on each.
Three different devices on the other end (one PC, one netbook, one router)
Fixed ARP table entries on both sides
Connecting both network ports of the machine with each other, won't ping through the cable, but will ping locally. Tried straight and crossed cables for that.
