1 .\" $NetBSD: we.4,v 1.15 2004/12/08 18:33:32 peter Exp $
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7 .\" by Jason R. Thorpe of the Numerical Aerospace Simulation Facility,
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36 .Nd "Western Digital/SMC WD80x3, SMC Elite Ultra, and SMC EtherEZ Ethernet cards device driver"
38 .Cd "we0 at isa? port 0x280 iomem 0xd0000 irq 9"
39 .Cd "we1 at isa? port 0x300 iomem 0xcc000 irq 10"
40 .Cd "we* at mca? slot ?"
44 device driver supports Western Digital/SMC WD80x3, SMC Elite Ultra, and
45 SMC EtherEZ Ethernet cards.
47 For some clone boards the driver is not able to recognize 16bit or 8bit
48 interfaces correctly. Since this makes a huge difference (see diagnostic
50 you can override this by specifying flags value in the config file:
52 .Cd "we2 at isa? port 0x300 iomem 0xe0000 irq 15 flags 4"
54 The values to add together for flags are:
58 force adapter to be treated as 8bit, even if it probes
59 as a 16bit interface. Improper use of this flag will make the
60 driver fail or send invalid Ethernet packets.
62 force adapter to be treated as 16bit, even if it probes
63 as a 8bit interface. For example the COMPEX ENT/U boards
64 identify as WD8003 compatibles, but are in fact 16bit cards.
65 Using this flag on a board that really is a 8bit board will
66 result in bogus packets being sent.
68 disable the use of double transmit buffers to save space in
69 the on-board RAM for more receive buffers.
72 Note that all supported MCA cards are 16bit.
74 The ability to select media from software is dependent on the particular
75 model of WD/SMC card. The following models support only manual configuration:
76 WD8003S, WD8003E, and WD8013EBT.
78 Other WD/SMC 80x3 interfaces support two types of media on a single card.
79 All support the AUI media type. The other media is either BNC or UTP
80 behind a transceiver. Software cannot differentiate between BNC and UTP
81 cards. On some models, the AUI port is always active.
83 The SMC Elite Ultra and SMC EtherEZ interfaces support three media
84 a single card: AUI, BNC, and UTP. If the transceiver is active, the BNC
85 media is selected. Otherwise, the AUI and UTP ports are both active.
87 To enable the AUI media, select the
94 directive. To select the other media (transceiver), select the
101 .It "we0: overriding IRQ \*[Lt]n\*[Gt] to \*[Lt]m\*[Gt]"
102 The IRQ specified in the kernel configuration file is different from that
103 found in the card's configuration registers. The value in the kernel
104 configuration file is being overridden by the one configured into the card.
105 .It "we0: can't wildcard IRQ on a \*[Lt]model\*[Gt]"
106 The IRQ was wildcarded in the kernel configuration file, and the card is
107 a WD8003S, WD8003E, or WD8013EBT, which do not support software IRQ
109 .It "we0: failed to clear shared memory at offset \*[Lt]off\*[Gt]"
110 The memory test was unable to clear the interface's shared memory
111 region. This often indicates that the card is configured at a conflicting
114 .It we0: warning - receiver ring buffer overrun
115 The DP8390 Ethernet chip used by this board implements a shared-memory
116 ring-buffer to store incoming packets.
118 The 16bit boards (8013 series) have 16k of memory as well as
119 fast memory access speed. Typical memory access speed on these
120 boards is about 4MB/second. These boards generally have no
121 problems keeping up with full Ethernet speed and the ring-buffer
124 However, the 8bit boards (8003) usually have only 8k bytes of shared
125 memory. This is only enough room for about 4 full-size (1500 byte)
126 packets. This can sometimes be a problem, especially on the original
127 WD8003E, because these boards' shared-memory access speed is quite
128 slow; typically only about 1MB/second. The overhead of this slow
129 memory access, and the fact that there is only room for 4 full-sized
130 packets means that the ring-buffer will occasionally overrun. When
131 this happens, the board must be reset to avoid a lockup problem in
132 early revision 8390's. Resetting the board causes all of the data in
133 the ring-buffer to be lost, requiring it to be retransmitted/received,
134 congesting the board further. Because of this, maximum throughput on
135 these boards is only about 400-600k per second.
137 This problem is exasperated by NFS because the 8bit boards lack
138 sufficient memory to support the default 8k byte packets that NFS and
139 other protocols use as their default. If these cards must be used
140 with NFS, use the NFS
146 to limit NFS's packet size.
147 4096 byte packets generally work.