can't change the Gigabit card autonegotiation to disable

[michelle_12345]

All,

machine: ds10
os:5.1B
Gigibit network card:depga

enter:lan_config -i alt0 -a 0
rcinet restart

then check with hwmgr get attr -cat network,
but the auto_negotiation still keep 1.

would you pls give me some suggestion?

Best regards,

Michelle

[Victor Semaska_3]

Michelle,

On our ES45s we disabled autonegotiate at the SRM console. At the console do this to find the device name of the NIC:

>>> show *mode

Then use this to find the options:

>>> set _mode xxx

Finally, use the 'set' command again with the appropriate option and reboot.

Vic

[Ivan Ferreira]

I think that you cannot disable autonegotiation for GB ethernet, what you do in that case is to force to send a preferred speed to work when starts the negotiation.

[michelle_12345]

Hi Vic,

Thanks you for your kind reply!

after typing show *mode,

only com1_mode ;ewa0_mode and ewb0_mode are available.

I can't find the gigabit card name.

Michelle

[Victor Semaska_3]

Michelle,

ewa0 & ewb0 are your two network interfaces. So use this command to see the available options:

>>> set ewa0_mode xxx

If you don't know which interface is being used then set both:

>>> set ewa0_mode
>>> set ewb0_mode


Ivan,

That's how we disbaled autonegotiate on our ES45s which have Gigabit NICs. They're set to 1000mbps_full_duplex

Vic

[michelle_12345]

Hi Vic,

The ewa0 & ewb0 are 100M bit network card which come with mainboard. The Gigabit card is locate on pci slot.

I can't get Gigabit card name at console mode after typing show *mode

Regards,

Michelle

[Hein van den Heuvel]

Michelle, welcome to the HP (Tru64) forums.

'Word on the street' has it that you do NOT want to disable autonegotiation for gigabit.
Keep it enabled!

Why do you think it should be disabled?

I know that Disable seemed good practice for 100Mb links, but this is no longer the case for Gigabit.

Your Gigabit driver may be called 'alt'.

hth,
Hein.

[Victor Semaska_3]

Michelle,

That's weird. Does it show up with this command?

>>> show config

With that command on our ES45s they show up as:
Slot Option Hose 2, Bus 0, PCI
1 DEGXA-TA Gigabit Eth ega0.0.0.1.2 00-D0-59-61-72-A5

Do you get all network cards listed with:

>>> show device

On our ES45 they're listed as device ega0.

Vic

[Victor Semaska_3]

Hein,

It's been awhile since we set up our ES45s but if I remember correctly the NICs wouldn't work properly until we set the mode at the console. Maybe it's something to do with which kind of network switch you're using?

Also, at the OS level our gigabit NICs are bcm0.

Vic

[michelle_12345]

Hein,

the link speed is only 6~7M byte/s when I use FTP to transfer big file to another pc with Gigabit card. so I want to disable auto negotiation.

The link speed can up to 30~40M byte/s when I tranfer big file between 2 pc.

Regards,

Michelle

[Hein van den Heuvel]

Well, did you ask the switch what it negotiated to? (Maybe soem status led display?

Are all systems on a single switch, or could the PC's be more directly connected, and te Alpha having to go over a 100mb segment?

There is a lot of prior writing on gigabit and autonegotiation or not in this forum and other places.

Google for: +site:itrc.hp.com +tru64 +gigabit +autonegotiation


Also check out:
http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=997010

Good luck,
Hein.

[Al Licause]

As you will see by looking at other entries in this forum, the only network cards that read console settings are the DEC tulip devices....DE4xx and DE5xx series. All other network cards ignore the console settings, so don't bother trying to use the console for setting network card parameters other than DEC devices.

The recommended method for setting network card parameters is by means of lan_config.

The specifications for Gigabit network cards state clearly that autonegotiation should always be used at gigabit speeds. This is why many network cards do not allow or completely ignore any attempt to disable autonegotiation. While the alt driver can disable autonegotiation, it is not recommended as per engineering. End of story.

The fact that you have autonegotiation enabled is not why you are seeing slow throughput, so you will want to run further tests. Try to find a copy of the netperf test suite which allows a memory to memory transfer over the network. This eliminates any disk interaction. It will give you a good idea as to just how much data you are actually transferring over a period of time.

You might also want to run tcpdump on an ftp test to see exactly what is happening. Look for duplicate acks, duplicate transmissions, lost packets and/or delays by either the transmitter or receiver. Leave autonegotiation alone.

[Steven Schweda]

> [...] the only network cards that read
> console settings are the DEC tulip
> devices....DE4xx and DE5xx series.

Not really. I have an XP1000 with an
Intel-chip card:

>>>show config | grep ei
10 Intel 8255x Ethernet eia0.0.0.2010.1 00-50-8B-11-3A-D5

and it has a boat-load of related console
variables:

>>>show ei*
eia0_arp_tries 3
eia0_bootp_file
eia0_bootp_server
eia0_bootp_tries 3
eia0_def_ginetaddr 0.0.0.0
eia0_def_inetaddr 0.0.0.0
eia0_def_inetfile
eia0_def_sinetaddr 0.0.0.0
eia0_def_subnetmask 0.0.0.0
eia0_ginetaddr 0.0.0.0
eia0_inet_init bootp
eia0_inetaddr 0.0.0.0
eia0_inetfile
eia0_loop_count 3e8
eia0_loop_inc a
eia0_loop_patt ffffffffffffffff
eia0_loop_size 2e
eia0_lp_msg_node 1
eia0_mode Auto-Negotiate
eia0_protocols MOP
eia0_sinetaddr 0.0.0.0
eia0_tftp_blocksize 1024
eia0_tftp_tries 3
>>>


On the original question, while 100MHz is
the best my junk collection can do, I'd
look for a good reason to disable
auto-negotiation on a gigabit card before I
tried to do it. I would not assume that it
would help to do so.

[Al Licause]

RE: eia0 console parameters. Just because you see a long list of parameters for the device at the console doesn't mean that the driver actually reads the speed/duplex mode parameters.

This question has been visted time and time again and the answer remains the same. Only the DEC devices have a driver that reads consoel parameters and will thus allow speed/duplex mode settings from the console.