[AG-TECH] Problems with Duplex Network settings for Dell server

[Ben Green]

Hi Guys,

This isn't strictly a Toolkit related question (although it'll help me run one more successfully!), so apologies for posting here.

Please can some help me with the following problem, preferably someone with RHEL knowledge:

To run a VenueServer/BridgeServer requires a full duplex/autonegotiation 'off' network configuration on the ethernet device. I enable this option temporarily via the following command:

ethtool -s eth0 autoneg off duplex full

To enable this option permanently, I can add the following line to the /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 file:

ETHTOOL_OPTS="speed 10 duplex full autoneg off"

I've made this permanent change to a couple of Dell workstations (one is i686/FC6, the other x86_64/Centos5) running Toolkit VenueServer and it works fine.

However, when I do this on a Dell PowerEdge 1750 (RHEL3) the network device doesn't initialise on bootup. Having searched the boot.log files, it seems that kudzu stalls on bootup, and fails to initialise device eth0. As soon as I remove the above line from the ifcfg-eth0 file, kudzu is OK and the eth0 device initialises fine.

I don't have any spare RHEL machines to test this on, but can't imagine this would be an OS dependant configuration.

Regards, Ben.

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Ben Green

Access Grid Support Centre
Research Computing Services
University of Manchester
Room G49-H, Kilburn Building
Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL
 
tel: +44 (0)161 306 6621
fax: +44 (0)161 275 0637
email - ben.green at manchester.ac.uk
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