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Date:      Tue, 12 Oct 1999 14:05:53 -0400
From:      Christopher Michaels <ChrisMic@clientlogic.com>
To:        'Mitch Collinsworth' <mkc@Graphics.Cornell.EDU>
Cc:        'Mike Squires' <mikes@sir-alan.chem.indiana.edu>, questions@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   RE: Setting Intel Pro100B to half duplex 
Message-ID:  <6C37EE640B78D2118D2F00A0C90FCB4401105CE2@site2s1>

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Please re-read what was said.  See below.

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Mitch Collinsworth [SMTP:mkc@Graphics.Cornell.EDU]
> Sent:	Tuesday, October 12, 1999 1:43 PM
> To:	Christopher Michaels
> Cc:	'Mike Squires'; questions@FreeBSD.ORG
> Subject:	Re: Setting Intel Pro100B to half duplex 
> 
> 
> >Specify the 100BaseTX media w/o the "full-duplex" media option and it
> will
> >use half-duplex.  Auto is notorious for not properly detecting things.
> >-Chris
> 
	Read: set the media type (whereby disabling auto-neg), it will
default to half-duplex.

> umm,  the last time this question came up (i.e. when I asked it),
> the answer was that not specifying full-duplex puts you in autonegotiate
> mode.
> 
	not if you specify a media type.  100baseTX is the media,
full-duplex is a media option.

> Ok, after double-checking myself on this, the answer you (Christopher
> Michaels gave) was that you would get half-duplex.  But the answer
> David Greenman <dg@root.com> gave was:
> 
> >   The fxp device does default to auto-sense, but if you hard configure
> the
> >other end then [NWAY] autonegotiation is disabled, and thus whenever you
> do
> >that you have to set both ends if you want to be sure it is correct. The
> >default without autonegotiation is half-duplex.
> 
	Read: disable auto-neg (by setting the media type), it will default
to half-duplex.

> meanwhile fxp(4) says:
> 
> >     The fxp device driver was written by David Greenman.
> 
> Guess who I believe.
> 
	Both, because we both said the same thing?

> Also I'm curious about your statement about autonegotiate being
> notorious.  I've heard this stated frequently but never with any data
> to back it up.  After the above reply from Mr. Greenman I read up on
> autonegotiation in 3 different books on high-speed networking and have
> come to the _tentative_ conclusion that this rumor is based on old
> hardware.
> 
> It seems that the 100 Mbps ethernet spec pre-dates the NWAY
> autonegotation spec and in fact there was a different method used for
> autonegotiation in the earliest days of 100 Mbps ethernet.  My guess is
> that this rumor was started during those early days and is still being
> dutifully passed on by those who experienced problems with the early
> non-NWAY equipment (and those who've heard the war stories from them).
> 
> Can you (or anyone) state with any degree of certainty that any modern
> equipment built with NWAY autonegotiation exhibits any problems with
> autonegotiation?
> 
	I don't have definitive data to back that up.  I have had
auto-negotion set to full-duplex on a half-duplex hub (not switch).  This
coupled with the postings of many people on this list have led me to believe
that the auto-neg is not quite right.

> -Mitch


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