[NTLUG:Discuss] Aberrations when connecting to Internet with Knoppix V5.0.1

[Leroy Tennison]

David Stanaway wrote:
> Russ wrote:
>   
>> Hi,
>>
>> I need opinions and advice on something I noticed just a day or so ago.
>>
>> I've been Googling for indications that others may have seen this, but
>> have found nothing.
>>
>> I know very little about the Ethernet and networking in general and I
>> noticed something strange when I booted with a new copy of Knoppix
>> V5.0.1.
>>
>> When I booted everything looked normal until it got to the process of
>> connecting to the Internet.  At that point I got:
>>
>> Service eth0 detected, DHCP Broadcasting for IP (Backgrounding)
>> Service eth1 detected, DHCP Broadcasting for IP (Backgrounding)
>>
>> Previously, when booting with version 4.02.0 I had seen only  the
>> first line involving "eth0".
>>
>> So I booted the same PC with Knoppix V4.02.0, Knoppix V3.7, and Ubuntu
>> Live V5.1.  In these cases, I saw only
>>
>> Service eth0 detected, DHCP Broadcasting for IP (Backgrounding).
>>
>> So I took the experiment one step further and booting Knoppix V5.0.1
>> and Knoppix V4.02.0 on a neighbor's PC.  The neighbor is hooked to the
>> Internet via Comcast and has a router in line.  In both cases, on the
>> message involving eth0 was displayed.
>>
>> I returned home, booted with Knoppix V5.0.1 and saw that my wife's PC
>> still displays "eth0" and "eth1" when booting.  Her PC has only one
>> NIC which is connected to a Comcast modem via a router as is my
>> neighbor's PC.
>>
>> Is this "eth1" message something I should check out?  How best would I do that?
>>
>> I should point out that I'm using Knoppix on my wife's PC because my
>> Linux PC (running Ubuntu) is completely unresponsive since I returned
>> from a six week vacation.  Not even a beep or a light.  I'm in the
>> process of investigating the problem.  It's been suggested that my HD
>> may have locked and I may have to give a bit of a knock.
>>
>>     
>
>
> Does the computer showing two ethernet interfaces have a firewire port?
> This could be ethernet over firewire.
>
>
> Try looking at
>
> dmesg | less
>
> or
>
> lsmod | grep ^mii
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> http://www.ntlug.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>
>   
Along those same lines, collect all the information you can while booted 
to Knoppix 5.  Does 'ifconfig | less' show a hardware address for eth1?  
If it does note the first three numbers (nn:nn:nn).  Go to www.ieee.org 
and, in their search field, enter OUI (stands for Organizationally 
Unique Identifier).  Take the first match which should say something 
like "... IEEE OUI and company id assignments".  Once at that page enter 
the numbers you noted only separating them with dashes instead of colons 
then click Search.  With some luck it should tell you the company which 
made the card.  You may be able to find them listed in dmesg as well 
(but look for the lower case equivalent of any alphabetic characters).

Does ifconfig show an interrupt or base address?  You may be able to to 
find these in dmesg and get more information about the device.  For 
'interrupt' look for IRQ, for the base address just search for the 
numbers after the 'x'.

Did it actually get an IP address?  The issue here is not what the IP 
address was/is but whether one was actually assigned, if it was that's 
another indication that you either have another NIC or something 
behaving like a NIC.

You can also use lspic (if it's a PCI-based device) and look for 
Ethernet controllers.

I just booted Knoppix 5.0.1 on one of my PCs which has only one NIC and 
it did not detect an eth1.  I also checked and it ships with mii-tool 
which is another program you can use to possibly gather information
 (use the -v switch).

Hopefully one of these approaches will yield enough clues to help you 
figure out what's going on.