[Info-vax] DNFS1ACP using 100% of CPU

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2013-10-16 11:44:18 +0000, Sum1 said:

> On 2013-10-16 11:27:51 +0000, Volker Halle said:
> 
>> What is your Switch port set to ? If it's a non-managed Switch, 
>> consider setting your EWA Interface to AUTO as well. Autonegotiation on 
>> OpenVMS works fine since at least V7.3-2 !
>> 
>> Also check for LAN Driver Messages with MC LANCP SHOW DEV/INTERN EWA
>> 
>> Volker.
> 
> It is unmanaged.  All I read is about never setting AUTO as either VMS 
> and/or the card were bad at it :(


Bad at negotiation?   So are some switches.  Some unmanaged switches 
and some managed switches can and do misnegotiate, even including the 
vaunted Cisco switches.

With a managed switch, you can usually see the other end of the 
connection; what the results of the autonegotiation were.  With an 
unmanaged switch, you have no insight into the settings.

Compounding the problems, typical Alpha-vintage ancient hardware 
variously also includes occasionally-flaky network hardware and 
firmware.

Gigabit-capable hardware generally negotiates better than previous 
generations, and newer network controller firmware and newer host 
software and firmware generally does better than older firmware, too.

Yes, the (now former) maintainer of the VMS network stacks recommended 
fixed settings for Alpha NICs, and auto-negotiate settings for Itanium 
NICs.  But if your particular switch doesn't work with those settings, 
you're left with bad choices.

>                00001080  Device type <DC21143, DE500BA>

DE500-BA is ancient, and I've hit autonegotiate problems 
<http://labs.hoffmanlabs.com/node/1805> with that series.  Most 
recently, I locked the switch ports to deal with that NIC, where I 
couldn't replace the whole box.

Try changing the NIC settings, or maybe scrounging either a newer NIC 
or a managed switch.

-- 
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