My 3c905 doesn't work

Situation:

The 3c905 and 3c905b can appear to work in the BeOS but not actually communicate with the outside world.

The card seems to be fine and can ping its IP address, but nobody can ping it and it can't ping anything else.

The 3Com cards we have drivers for are the 3c503, 3c900, 3c900(b), 3c905, and 3c905(b or c). Some people with problems have the 3c*509* and a touch of dyslexia. There is nothing wrong with these cards, but there are not drivers from Be for them.

Things to try:

1. First and foremost, turn the computer off for 15 seconds and boot from the BeOS boot floppy. There are Windows drivers that can leave the card in a partially initialized state that can cause this.
2. Set the card to IRQ 5, port 300.
3. Fix the card to 10 base T (versus AutoDetect).
4. Turn off the Full Duplex option.
5. Set driver optimization to the maximum setting.
6. Enable the boot PROM.

We are aware of this and are working on it, watch for future updates of the BeOS to address this.

The 3c905 driver also drives the 3c900, so don't be surprised if you don't see a separate driver for each.

Another more advanced resource is an article published in this Be Newsletter.