> I've had this problem with SMC PCI ethernet cards in Windows NT
> and UNIX (BSDI, Linux). They would change the chipset revision
> and it would require some driver changes. SMC uses the Digital
> Ethernet chipset....
Err...`used.' Even then, drivers written for step 1 21140 chips
won't work with step 2 chips. The newest SMC 10/100 cards use an
SMC chip. And, of course, there were errata (otherwise known as
bugs) to be dealt with even between the various step 1.x 21140s.
I can say from personal experience that this sort of crap does not
make writing drivers for Ethernet cards a very pleasant experience. :-)
I've finally given up on both the 3com and the DEC chips and am
now using Intel cards, which I'm pretty happy with. Also, the Intel
chip is probably the best of the lot; it's got nifty features like
padding the Ethernet header out by two bytes, which saves a copy
in order to align the IP header on those machines (such as Alphas)
with alignment restrictions. Not that this probably makes much
difference to the average user....
cjs
Curt Sampson cjs@portal.ca Info at http://www.portal.ca/
Internet Portal Services, Inc. Through infinite mist, software reverberates
Vancouver, BC (604) 257-9400 In code possess'd of invisible folly.