[NTLUG:Discuss] Compaq's & Linux

[Douglas King]

I am trying to use some "old' Compaq DeskPro DP2000 series 5200MMX desktops 
as DNS machines.  I have Red Hat 7.2 loaded on them.  It "appears" that the 
NIC's are going to sleep after a period of time, and the machines won't 
"serve up" DNS requests.  The either case a "page not found" or something 
of that nature.  After several hits on the machines, they perform 
correctly.  All the settings are correct (the best i can tell), but need to 
fix this problem.

NOW, here is what I know, and maybe you have input after this.  I have 
checked the bios settings, but on these machines, they want their own 
partitions for the bios settings, which I don't have.  I have booted to 
their special bios boot disk, but it will not let me change any settings 
unless I allow it to create these partitions.  I already have everything 
loaded and up to date with Red Hat.  Will I "toast" my drive if I allow it 
to create this bios partition?  Is so, what are my other options?  Is there 
something in Linux that will force these NIC's to "stay alive"?  If so...WHAT?