old computer won't boot after installing nic

[celejar]

I installed a cheap ethernet card in an old (Pentium 90 mhz, 16 MB RAM, ~500 MB HDD) computer and now it won't boot (I can get into BIOS but it hangs before booting). When I remove the card, the system reverts to normal (RHL 5.2 via LILO). I tried this several times. Could there be a PCI incompatibility?

 

[mainegeek]

What OS are you running?
Is the NIC ISA or PCI?
How long are you waiting at boot before deciding that the system is actually hanging?

 

[vbrocks]

Try putiing the board into another pci slot ...

 

[jsauce]

Could the NIC be bad? I've seen this when trying to boot into linux if the NIC is bad. You should also check to make sure the bios isn't setup to be plug and play and try setting the card up with the IRQ/address prior to booting.

John D. Saucier
jsauce@magicguild.com
Certified Technician
Network Administrator

 

[JinRoh]

Might be simple as an IRQ or DMA conflict ya kow?

 

[yada]

A lot of the cheap nics have a bit higher system requirement level than what you have there. But it is probably a bad card.

 

[SYAR2003]

Check on the box if it states that it's "plug and play"
compatibe . That way the bios or os can allocate resources
to it .And can be placed in any pci slot (keep away from
the ones thats shared with ide controller and graphics)
If not you have to specify it in the bios .

 

[celejar]

Thanks, guys. I've been away from my computer(s) for the last couple of weeks, and I'm going to try some of this stuff over the next day or two. I'll report what happens ...

celejar

 

[celejar]

Well, I tinkered with various BIOS settings until I found that changing something from "setup utility" to "use ICU" solved the problem; the system now boots. I still don't know if the card works, because I'm having trouble compiling the driver (it looks like I need kernel 2.2.x or higher, so I'll have to upgrade the system) but /proc/pci does recognize an ethernet controller. Yay! Thanks for the help.