by I've got a Dell Optiplex Gxi with a 3com integrated network card and
either an AHA2940UW or AHA2920 SCSI card (I can swap). Neither the
aic7xxx nor the future domain driver works with the vortex/boomerang
driver for the network card.
I read the information on the vortex driver on:
http://cesdis.gsfc.nasa.gov/linux/drivers/vortex.html
which states:
---
Special Dell instructions
A "SIOSIFFLAGS: Try again when starting an ethernet device means that
there is an interrupt conflict. Dell machines tend to assign multiple
PCI devices to the same IRQ line. Generally this works under Linux --
most PCI drivers are willing to share IRQ lines (with the inevitable
increase in CPU overhead). But some drivers, specifically several SCSI
drivers use the so-called "fast" interrupt structure that is
incompatible with most other drivers.
Generally the solution is to use BIOS PCI setup to change the IRQ
assigned to the card. But some Dell machines don't have this
functionality. The solution is to physically move the card to a
different slot.
---
Clearly there's an interrupt conflict on IRQ 11, which is where my PCI
bus has set up camp. However, the Optiplex comes with the Phoenix ROM
BIOS V1.10 A02, which doesn't have any way to change the IRQs.
Physically moving the card should not and did not help.
I've tried:
2.0.18 <-- vortex and boomerang, fdomain
2.0.27 <-- vortex and boomerang, fdomain and old aic7xxx
2.1.28 <-- vortex(*), fdomain and old aic7xxx
* I had to use the vortex driver that came with the patched version of
2.0.27 I picked up at the above web site for the kernel to even load
it, the one that came with 2.1.28 didn't load.
If I compile without SCSI, networking is fine. If I compile with SCSI,
I get the SIOSIFFLAGS error mentioned above.
Has anyone managed to get this combination of hardware to work?
Rob F