Quoting Nick Rout <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> I helped (or maybe hindered) with a computer last nght.. Basically we
> got an ltmodem (Agere/Lucent) going on a mandrake box with kernel
> 2.6.3-15mdk. The MB appears to be via chipset, I'd say 3-4 years old
> (CPU is Athlon 1000 or 1100 from memory)
>
> The modem connected ok, but when we started any serious surfing (read
> clicking beyond about a google search) the computer froze hard, i mean
> no mouse movement, no response from the keyboard, screen frozen, no
> ability to switch to console, push the reset button frozen.
>
> I suspected IRQ problems, and discovered that both USB and the LTmodem
> were sharing IRQ5. Now I understood that modern computers can share
> irq's, but maybe there are exceptions. As the USB didn't seem to work
> well when the modem driver was loaded I think this could well be the
> right track.
>
> In the bios (and i am nervous about changing this sort of setting) it
> is
> set up to auto allocate (is that the right expression) all irq's. There
> is a facility to "reserve" irq's. There is a separate facilty to
> allocate an irq to usb, although not a specific IRQ number, just
> allocate or not allocate.
>
> Can anyone point me to the right resolution here? I suspect I should go
> into the bios and set it to "reserve" IRQ5 so that it does not get
> automatically allocated to USB, and is available for LTmodem to grab.
> However I have never played with this stuff in the bios much and I am
> not 100% aware of the implications. Certainly turning off USB
> altogether
> is not an option for these people as they have a USB digicam.
Here are my ideas.
Use the scanmodem program from linmodems.org to identify the hardware, do not
trust that the client knows exactly and correctly what all the details are.
Use google to verify the PCI id codes.
Tell the bios that the o/s is not able to do plug and play.
Make sure the kernel and the headers are truely mates for each other.
There have been mistakes made more than once by the distributors.
In effect this means getting a known good kernel archive and compiling it
yourself. Remember here that some modem drivers are not yet able to integrate
correctly with the 2.6.X kernels.
Configure the kernel by hand and ensure that irq sharing is off!!
It is sensible to trust knoppix to detect the hardware correctly. It's very
good.
Compile and install the kernel and modules.
Boot device driver and filesystem built-in. Everything else as modules.
Compile the modem driver.
Install it.
Some modem drivers ( slmodem iirc ) are implemented as daemons which will need
to be started. ( Probably, the best place to do this is via the /etc/inittab
file, because the daemon will be automatically restarted if it dies, but
otherwise as an entry into rc.local )
Etch into your memory that the acronym RPM stands for Really Piss-poor Method.
That is the reason why most modem drivers are distributed as tar files.
--
Sincerely etc.
Christopher Sawtell
