Date: Mon, 2 Nov 1998 14:15:11 -0500 (EST) From: Bill Paul <wpaul@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu> To: hackers@FreeBSD.ORG, hardware@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Call for testers for Macronix fast ethernet driver Message-ID: <199811021915.OAA07892@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu>
next in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
This is a call for testers for those with Macronix 98713, 98715 and 98725 ethernet cards. There is now a driver for these cards available at the following location: http://www.freebsd.org/~wpaul/Macronix/3.0 source for FreeBSD 3.0 http://www.freebsd.org/~wpaul/Macronix/2.2 source for FreeBSD 2.2.x The Macronix PMAC chips are tulip clones. So far I have run tests with both a 98713A and a 98715A. The 98725 reports the same PCI device ID as the 98715 part, however it's revision is 0x3x where the 98715's revision is 0x2x. The original 98713 (without the A) appears to support an MII bus for external transceivers, however the 98713A and up all use an internal transceiver with NWAY support. For the interested, datasheets and app notes can be had at www.macronix.com. One should read carefully the app note for the 98715A. It explains that in order to put the PMAC chips in proper operating mode, you have to write a magic value to CSR16 (there's one value for the 98713 and another for all the other models). The app note tells you what values to write but doesn't say what the various magic bits mean. Of the two boards I have, the 98713A is made by NDC and is called a SOHOware fast ethernet card. The 98715A was supplied to me by Macronix and has no vendor name on it, but its ethernet address appears to contain Accton's OUI. To add the driver to an existing system, do the following: - Unpack your kernel source code under /usr/src. - Download the corrent version of if_mx.c and if_mxreg.h for your system (3.0 or 2.2.x) and copy them to /sys/pci. - Edit /sys/conf/files and add a line that says: pci/if_mx.c optional mx device-driver - Edit your kernel config file (e.g. /sys/i386/conf/GENERIC) and add a line that says: device mx0 - Config and compile a new kernel and boot it. As usual, please send success or failure reports to wpaul@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu. NOTE: I still have not received a lot of feedback on the PNIC or Winbond drivers, or even the RealTek driver for that matter. If you are using one of these drivers, please let me know. If you are using one of these at 100Mbps, I'd be especially interested to hear what sort of performance you observe. In my tests, I typically see about 9.5MB/sec on transmit, which seems a bit weak. The Winbond does a bit better than this (10MB/sec). Remember folks: I'm waiting for feedback from _you_ so that I can judge when a driver is stable enough to merge into the repository. The more information you give me, the faster I can add these drivers to the system. Actually, I'm also interested in performance stats for real DEC tulip chips with the de driver. I'm wondering how real DEC chips do at 100Mbps modes. Next on the hit parade: the VIA Rhine! -Bill -- ============================================================================= -Bill Paul (212) 854-6020 | System Manager, Master of Unix-Fu Work: wpaul@ctr.columbia.edu | Center for Telecommunications Research Home: wpaul@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu | Columbia University, New York City ============================================================================= "It is not I who am crazy; it is I who am mad!" - Ren Hoek, "Space Madness" ============================================================================= To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hardware" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?199811021915.OAA07892>