[salik119]

I'm a Linux newbie, and have just installed LBA-Linux r1 from SOT. The install uses a GUI, and is pretty straightforward. Now I've got a desktop and lots of Apps, but can't connect to the Internet. When I go into the hardware browser it detects two network devices: the onboard Ethernet Pro 100 device and a Network Everywhere card I installed recently because of other problems (since resolved). These appear elsewhere as eth0 and eth1 I think. However... when I go into Control Center and try to configure Internet and Network, an error message appears saying "No network interface cards found". I'm also running Windows XP, and the dual boot set up just fine. No problem with Internet access in Windows btw. Any help resolving this strangeness would be greatly appreciated.

[Whiteskin]

Is this a dhcp connection, and if so, have you tried manaual configuration (running dhclient eth0 as root from the console)

[salik119]

Thanks for your response. I really am a newbie with Linux, so I'm not confident in what I'm doing yet. I suspect the problem is somewhere in my configuration process. Because LBA-Linux runs from a GUI I'm not sure how to pursue your suggestion. It is a DHCP connection. LBA appears to have set up the system automagically, and there isn't any help about doing things manually. I can get into a configuration window for the network cards, and tried editing the configuration with the IRQ, MEM and IO parameters from Windows XP system resource report, but it just seems to be getting more confused. Now there are three ethernet cards showing, where there should only be two. Should I try starting over with a re-install?

[saikee]

I have avoided pulling my hair out on the Ethernet card by installing a few distros in the PC, 5Gb per Linux.

I found there will be a few distro having a problem with the Ethernet car but as I could use the hardware in the majority of the other distros it doesn't seem worthwhile to get any deeper.

I arrived this view after finding the same distro, which fails to connect to the Internet in Computer A, would have no problem to kick start the Ethernet card of computer B. Also those distros that can't cope with the Ethernet card of Computer B may work fine in Computer A.

Sometime a distro would be honest enough to tell me the Ethernet card it has found is not supported.

Another way to overcome the Internet connection problem is to install a mainstream Ethernet card, like the cheapest Realtek (£4 in UK), that every Linux would support.

[I Fix 4 U]

thats what i would do saikee. if linux doesnt support your audio or ethernet, just go ahead and buy a cheap one, not some expensive soundblaster or an expensive 3com, but some cheap thing that linux is sure to detect nonetheless.

[salik119]

Thanks for your suggestions, Neon and Saikee. I did try a re-install, and that was where the problem originated - I hadn't configured the network correctly. It was not, however, smooth sailing. I could only configure the onboard network device (eth0). Trying to configure eth1 froze the entire process. After getting into the main desktop screen, I then got an arcane message "Could not look up Internet address for S01060007e9ef5cc4 "etc. I also have a cheap Ethernet card installed (eth1) (the one causing the system to freeze when I attempted to configure the network), but which I was able to access through the desktop once I got there via the eth0 route. I configured eth1, set it to be activated on boot, and set eth0 not to be activated on boot. With some qualification that worked, and I now have an Internet connection working, it seems. What's happening since then is that, when the system boots, the KUDZU screen pops up (this is the hardware detection and removal tool), telling me that the network card has been removed (!) and giving me three options.
1. Remove existing configuration.
2. Keep existing configuration, and stop any futher messages about missing hardware.
3. Do nothing.
I've settled on choice number 2 (after a few reboots with "Do nothing"), so now the boot process appears to complete normally without the Kudzu screen popping up. I have this nagging suspicion that something still isn't right. Why is Kudzu saying that the network card has been removed? Should I be worried? I must confess I don't really understand what's happening yet.
I've got more questions, but they can wait till this issue is sorted out.

[I Fix 4 U]

If you are getting your internet and able to use it w/out a messed up boot sequence, since you are using linux i'd say let it go. Unless you need to cards than i wouldn't worry. Thats why i'm happy with linux like that. if something in windows gave me messages and wouldn't detect i'd be worried but not here. I think you shouldn't worry unless other devices start being undetectable. The easiest way to figure out if its hardware or software/OS, just use a different operating system like a linux livecd, that should say whether its ur distro or ur computer, keep in mind that is not always tho since some things linux kernel just can't handle or all in all won't work with linux. Most the time its as simple of seeing if knoppix can use it tho, since i really like its detection and autoconfig.