Network Mystery Blank

[scarecrow]

I'm setting up a server for a school project using Slackware 8.1. It's almost done, except for one thing.... it won't connect to the network.

When I try to ping somebody, it says:

PING 142.231.8.1 (142.231.8.1): 56 octets data.

And then it just sits there. No 'network is unreachable', nothing. It doesn't say if the pings have made it, it doesn't say if they've failed. When I crtl-c it, it says:

--142.231.8.1 Ping Statistics--
80 packets sent, 0 packets recieved, 100% packet loss.

Whenever somebody else tries to ping me, the same thing happens to them. I can ping localhost, 127.0.0.1, and 142.231.8.88 (the assigned IP number for my server) fine. I've checked the gateway, netmask, and name server several times: they're the right numbers.

My ethernet card is an 3com Etherlink II. What's really strange is that it's worked before under Slackware 8.1.

And yes, the cable is plugged into the wall.

If anyone can figure out this mystery, they'll be my hero.

[cloverm]

Hello and welcome to the board.

Could you post the output you get when type in: /sbin/ifconfig

[scarecrow]

I typed in "cat /sbin/ifconfig"...

And pages of gibberish came out on the screen. Boxes, intersecting lines, and the word 'GNU'. Now my command line is gibberish too.

Help?

[cloverm]

No, no! Not "cat /sbin/ifconfig" just "/sbin/ifconfig"!

[scarecrow]

Oh.... I thought it was a config file.

(Yeah, I'm a bit slow.)

Here's the output:

[tt]
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWadd 00:A0:24:7F:E1:6E
inet addr:142.231.8.88 Bcast:142.231.9.254 Mask:255.255.254.0
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric: 1
RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:100
RX bytes: 0 (0.0 b) TX bytes: 0 (0.0 b)
Interrupt:10 Base address:0x300

lo Link encap: Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX bytes:0 (0.0 b) TX bytes:0 (0.0 b)
[/tt]

[Blaqb0x]

are you sure the subnet mask is

255.255.254.0

and not

255.255.255.0

###--

ping loop back - check

ping your own IP - check

ping router - ?

check firewall(try disabling it completely first) - ?

link light on NIC - ?

check physical connection(again) - ?

can other machines ping router - ?
(remote possibility whole network down)

## Now were getting desperate

Not using Cross-over cable are you?

Replace your machine w/ another using the same IP config and run
the steps above.

[Schotty]

And broadcast too -- see the .254 -- shouldnt the broadcast be .255 ?

[scarecrow]

I'm pretty sure that the subnet mask should be 255.255.224.0. See, my school has control over the 142.231.8.* and 142.231.9.* IP addresses.

The link light on the NIC is on. Green constantly, no flickering or anything.

I checked the cable eariler: it's not a cross-over one, it's just a regular ethernet cable.

The computer next to me, having the same settings (except for the IP number) is able to get onto the network. It's running Linux From Scratch with support put into the kernel, though.

As for the other suggestions, I'll check it tomorrow. Thanks for the help, everyone. ;D

[cloverm]

Are you getting the IP settings automatically from a DHCP server are they manually entered? If they are manually entered, you might be dealing with a bad NIC (I've seen this before). Any chance you could test your computer with a known good NIC or test this one in another computer?

[tolstoy]

Check your netmask, as everyone has already pointed out. You have it listed as .254, and in a later post, claim it to be .224. Both netmasks are valid for a class B network. The correct one just depends on how your network is segmented.

With the .254 netmask, your network will have hosts ranging from 142.231.8.1 to 142.213.9.254. Your network address will be 142.231.8.0 and your broadcast address will be 142.231.9.255. Right now, your 'ifconfig' output shows an illegal broadcast address.

Keep this in mind, you will still be able to ping yourself at both 127.0.0.1 and at 142.231.8.88, even if your netcard is malfunctioning (and even if ifconfig shows it as having an ip address). Just because your card has an ip address and claims to be up, and can ping itself, does not mean that the packets are actually being transmitted to the wire. I ran into that illusion on RH 6.2.

Do an lsmod to see if the modules for the card are in fact loaded.