Re: Severe Modem/Parallel Zip Drive problems.

[Kevin Colby <kevinc grainsystems com>]

Wow.  What an ordeal.

Did you try browsing through kernel config for a weird board
support issue with your I/O controller or something?
The only thing I can think of as to why 5.2 would have
previously worked and now doesn't is that you previously
were running a custom kernel.

Sound plausible?

	- Kevin Colby
	  kevinc grainsystems com



Mike Abney wrote:
> 
> First things first, please don't tell me I have a "winmodem" or
> something like that without reading the whole message.  Also, sorry for
> the length of the message, but I've had this problem for a while and I
> really need it fixed or Linux on my system will be completely useless.
> The two best methods I have for getting new packages and such to my box
> are out of commission and I can't read email or otherwise communicate
> with other netizens from my Linux install.  Also, since this machine was
> also acting as a gateway for my other box...  but enough whining.
> 
> Basically, I get nothing when I try to use minicom to talk to the
> modem.  I try "at" and I get no "ok" or anything else for that matter.
> I'm pretty sure I'm talking to the right serial port.  Regardless, I've
> tried ttyS0-4 and since I only really have one....  Also, KPPP just
> tells me that the "modem is busy".  The other problem is that when I try
> to 'modprobe ppa' to get my Zip drive working I get a "device or
> resource busy" error.
> 
> As far as I can tell, setserial reports the right settings for the
> serial port for the modem and the 'modprobe ppa' in RH 5.2 at least,
> reports searching the right addresses for where the device should be.
> (I'm getting my ideas for what "right" is by looking at what Win '95
> reports for the devices.)
> 
> Both devices still work in Win '95.  I've had RH 5.0 and 5.2 installed
> on this machine without seeing these problems.  It first cropped up when
> I tried to install Mandrake 6.0 just to check it out.  I then tried RH
> 6.0 and got the same problem.  I figured it was just a 6.0 (or maybe a
> kernel 2.2) based thing so I tried re-installing RH 5.2.  Well, the
> problem is still there.
> 
> I'm completely clueless at this point as to what could have changed in
> between having a working RH 5.2 system and now not being able to get RH
> 5.2 to work.  (I.E. no new hardware since 5.2 was working.)  I find it
> hard to believe that installing Mandrake 6.0 could have actually
> *caused* this.
> 
> BTW, each Linux OS install was from scratch -- that is, ext2fs
> partitions on hdb and the swap on hda were ditched and then re-created
> each time.  That is one reason for the hda ext2fs partition.  It holds
> /home and /etc data and such that I need.  I usually mount it as /backup
> or something similar.
> 
> Any ideas?  Here's all the additional information I can think to give
> out:
>   Dell Dimension PC
>     300 MHz PII
>     On-board Yamaha OPLSA3 sound (overridden)
>     One serial port
>   Add-on boards
>     Creative Graphics Blaster Riva TNT AGP
>     Sound Blaster AWE 64
>     Linksys EtherLink 10-baseT PCI card (NE2000 PCI-compatible)
>   Internal devices
>     Default (not sure of brand) 6.4Gb Hard drive (hda)
>     Western Digital 8Gb hard drive (hdb)
>     3.5" floppy drive
>     Sony ATAPI Cd-Rom drive
>     HP 8110i CD-RW drive
>   External devices
>     MS Intellimouse
>     MS Natural Keyboard
>     **Parallel Port ZIP drive (old, needs ppa, not imm)
>     **Zoom 56K modem
>   OSs
>     Win '95 -- On two hda partitions and one partition on hdb
>     RH 5.2 or 6.0 or Mandrake 6.0 -- On hdb in several partitions and
>         the swap and one extra partition (not usually mounted) on hda.
> 
> ** These two are the only things that don't work.  Even the X Server
> works (although I have to upgrade in RH 5.2 to get a Riva TNT-compatible
> SVGA server).
> 
> ~Mike
> 
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