Xircom CEM2 PCMCIA Card

[Hoodsey]

Anyone have any luck on this card? I got it because it's old and figured it'd work, TC picks it up under modules, but I can't get ETH0 to go up at all.

[maro]

Anything of note in the 'dmesg' output? Any hint that it might require a firmware? Does it work under a different OS (i.e. can you be sure that the hardware is OK)?

I've got an old Xircom 'RBEM56G-100' PCMCIA card and that "just works" (tm). I mean the NIC part of it, as I have not tried the modem in years ...

[Hoodsey]

Windows XP picks it up, but only the modem portion (even the Xircom support documents state that XP isn't supported and no drivers are available). And since my CD-ROM is picky I can only get very few distros. to load up (since I only have 64MB of RAM currently until my replacement RAM comes in).

[Rich]

Hi Hoodsey
As maro suggested, check the output of  dmesg. If you are not sure what to look for, open a terminal
and type   dmesg > dmesg.txt
The next time you post, click on Additional Options and attach the  dmesg.txt  file, maybe someone
else can spot something.

[Hoodsey]

Yeah, the problem is typing out the entire dmesg. I have no way to transfer between computers and with no ethernet... makes it difficult, LOL.

I'll post what I have when I get in from work tonight.

[curaga]

USB, floppy, irda, bluetooth, serial port, parallel port?

[Hoodsey]

USB board replacement is ordered, I don't have a floppy drive for my desktop, no bluetooth on the laptop, clueless on IrDA, Serial or Parallel.

Here's the PCMCIA section (typed out of course):

pcmcia_socket pcmcia_socket1: pccard PCMCIA card inserted into slot 1
pcmcia_socket pcmcia_socket1: cs: memory probe 0xa0000000-0xa0ffffff: clean.
pcmcia 1.0: pcmcia: registering new device pcmcia1.0
xirc2ps_cs: node-id not found in CIS
1.0: ttyS1 at I/O 0x2f8 (irq = 3) is a 16450

[maro]

I guess it is a bit tricky to get anything out of a running TC system if your options are that limited. But do you have a hard disk installed, and what type of file systems are present on it? Depending on your answer I'm pretty certain we could come up with a way.

OTOH judging from the node-id not found in CIS error message there might be something really odd (or wrong) happening. Searching through the kernel sources this message can be found in file: 'drivers/net/pcmcia/xir2ps_cs.c', function: 'xirc2ps_config()'. If I read the code correctly it seems to indicate a failure in a call to 'pcmcia_loop_tuple()' (and previously to 'pcmcia_get_mac_from_cis()'). I don't know what that means, it's just that my Xircom 'RBEM56G-100' PCMCIA card which uses the same driver does not cause any of those problems.

So let's hope that when the fuller 'dmesg' output becomes available something else might provide a clue.

[Hoodsey]

Right now it's a clean slate, no file systems, TC is the only OS I can get to load with 64MB of RAM. I got Puppy running a few times, and it sees the card too, but it fails to init ETH0 also.

[curaga]

As long as your other machine has a serial or parallel port, you can use that for networking. For serial it's a null modem cable, for parallel a laplink one. You'd use PPP, and it'd behave like a two machines connected directly via crossover ethernet.

You can even share the connection of the other machine, and get internet on the older one via this.


Infrared would be similar, but for transferring files it would be easier, as long as your phone has IR too.

[Hoodsey]

All the machines I have are newer (lacking serial and parallel ports) and my phone is a CrackBerry Curve with no IR. So this oldie is kicking my @$$ right now. I'll get my 256MB RAM stick by Saturday so I'll be able to install Win2K (which is supposedly flawless with this card). And my USB/Video board should be in tomorrow, so I should have access to thumb drives again. One way or the other we should be able to squash this issue soon.