gentoo dhcp/eth0 problem

[theWall]

I've just installed Gentoo Linux, and everything went fine according to the manual, until I reboot with my new kernel. This same problem seemed to be several places in the forums, but I could not find a solution. When it comes to "Bringing eth0 up via DHCP" it pauses, then just fails (times out I guess). I have used several other distributions, like Mandrake, Debian and Suse, but I have never had this problem. I also have configured some kernels before, so I know what drivers to use

My network card is a VIA VT6102 [RHINE II], (as it says in lspci) and I use the module via_rhine. It has worked on every other distro. I've tried hotplug and coldplug in default and boot runtime. I've even tried genkernel. Nothing helps!
I think it gets detected, and works, since "ifconfig eth0 up" brings up the interface (without any ip information.)

Any clues?

[amdocer]

I had the same problem with mine, because I installed my eth0 drivers as a module. When I went back and recompiled the kernel and included them as a kernel driver, everything was fine. Maybe that's just me.

[lordnothing]

make sure you installed dhcpcd

[theWall]

i'm pretty sure I've got dhcpcd, because when I "dhcpcd eth0" i get the same result, 60 seconds then timeout. The same when I "/etc/init.d/net.eth0 restart"

I will try compiling it as a kernel driver now.

I guess I could just go back to debian, but I really like the gentoo idea of building everything myself

[theWall]

I just suddenly works!

I built a new kernel (for about the fifth or sixth time) starting with mrproper, and went through everything very carefully. I compiled the driver for the nic with the kernel instead of as a module, and now it just works.

Strange, because I have already tried that before, I guess it was some other kernel option, not quite sure what.

Thanks for all your help anyway

[sarumont]

Just a note: It's usually better to compile stuff like your NIC driver, root FS driver, etc. into the kernel as you will be using it all the time. This makes it a tad quicker and usually prevents problems like this.

[zdawg]

Not to mention generally a quicker boot time.

[midnightlightning]

I compiled the driver for the nic with the kernel instead of as a module, and now it just works.

Could someone point me to a good reference (or just explain it to me yourself) for a recently switched Linux user the differences between installing as a driver vs. module and how it's done? Thanks!

[sarumont]

I compiled the driver for the nic with the kernel instead of as a module, and now it just works.

Could someone point me to a good reference (or just explain it to me yourself) for a recently switched Linux user the differences between installing as a driver vs. module and how it's done? Thanks!

Your terminology is a bit mucked up there. You would be referring to a module vs. 'built-in'. 'Built-in' refers to compiling the driver for a particular piece of hardware (or really pretty much anything that the kernel provides) either into the kernel, which is one file always run at boot.

A module is the same thing, but it is built as a separate file (i.e.-not into the kernel). This allows you to use modprobe to insert and remove it. This is handy for stuff you don't use that often, developing drivers, etc.

[midnightlightning]

Your terminology is a bit mucked up there. You would be referring to a module vs. 'built-in'.

Okay, module vs. built in; I'm having a similar problem to what was decribed above:

'ifconfig eth0 up' yieds an 'unknown device' error, but 'dhcpcd' doesn't give any errors, nor does 'dhcpcd eth0'. Is there any solution other than recompiling my kernel (not that it's a tragedy, I'm just trying to get this to work for the first time, but I'd like to troubleshoot rather than reformat and start over)