From: "Cameron Spitzer" Subject: Re: 3Com 509 won't go (detailed!) Date: 1999/03/23 Message-ID: <7d8f2j$lrs$1@samba.rahul.net>#1/1 References: <7d6vgt$74a$1@news.inficad.com> <36f78dc0.97392753@d2o201.telia.com> Organization: a2i communications, San Jose NNTP-Posting-User: cameron Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.networking In article <36f78dc0.97392753@d2o201.telia.com>, Robert Eliassen wrote: > >I have the same type of card (a combo 3C509B actually) and it doesn't >work either. It doesn't work in DOS, Win9x, WinNT or Linux. The config >utility (3C5X9CFG.EXE) tells me the same storry: "You are running an >ISA card configured in EISA mode..." etc. etc. > >My problem is that I doesn't have a EISA computer so I guess my card >is either stuck in EISA mode (for the rest of it's life) or faulty. Once a 3C509B is programmed for EISA mode I/O addressing, there are two ways to put it back in ISA mode. 1. Stick it in an EISA machine and run the diagnostic. 2. Short the factory configuration test point to ground during power-up, which will put the card in its factory test mode, and run the diagnostic. On most versions of the 3C509 and 509B, the factory configuration test point is visible as a pair of tinned rectangles with a paint outline around them, labeled E1. One of the rectangles is ground and the other is the signal that needs temporary grounding, so you bridge them during power-up (actually, during bus reset). On late-production 10Base-T only versions of 3C509B-TPO, the test point is a little round pad on the solder side, with a trace that feeds through and connects to the end of R12 that faces away from the big chip and towards the RJ-45 connector. The safest way to activate it is with a test lead clipped to the backplate (chassis ground on the PC and a sharp probe held tightly against either the round pad or the end of R12, depending on which is easier to reach in your system. Early versions of the manual that came with the card described this recovery procedure. Later on, as EISA became irrlevant, the risk of folks dropping whatever it was they were shorting E1 with into their PCs was considered greater than the risk of people returning EISA-mode cards as bad, and it disappeared from the documentation and the fab, as far as end-users were concerned. I do not work for 3Com. 3Com did not authorize this message. I do not speak for 3Com. Recovering your 3C509B from its EISA-addressing condition will probably void your lifetime warranty. There may be 3C509B models I don't know about where the test point is labeled differently or it's not R12. You assume all risk of this procedure. 3Com will not be liable for your losses and neither will I. I claim copyright (c) 1999 on this message, and you are not allowed to reproduce it without this paragraph intact. Cameron