menges@unc.UUCP (John Menges) (07/15/86)
We are experiencing frequent error messages on our SUN-3 consoles saying "ie0: no carrier". This happens infrequently on our SUN-2s as well, but not nearly as often. It happens on both file servers and clients. Our SUNs are attached to the ethernet using DELNIs. Can anyone shed light on this problem?
roy@phri.UUCP (07/16/86)
In article <15@unc.unc.UUCP> menges@unc.UUCP (John Menges) writes: > We are experiencing frequent error messages on our SUN-3 consoles > saying "ie0: no carrier". First guess, the tranciever cable is loose (a perpetual problem, due to the brain-damaged way the connectors are designed). We use a liberal number of nylon cable ties (attached to whatever) to secure the xceiver cables and take the strain off the connectors. On one 3/160, we went so far as to remove the blank panel next to the CPU board and replace it with a home-made angle-iron bracket to provide a secure attachment point. Second guess, a flakey tranciever, or cable. Try running the external ethernet loopback test (bring down Unix, hit BREAK to get the ">" prompt, then type "h <CR>" to get a help menu). Wiggling the cable and tranciever box while running the test is a good idea if you don't get static errors. You might try swapping trancievers with another machine and see if the problem moves with the tranciever. The trancievers we use (InterLAN NT-100's) have a green LED which lights when the tranciever has power. If the LED flickers, it's almost undoubtedly a bad tranciever cable or connection. -- Roy Smith, {allegra,philabs}!phri!roy System Administrator, Public Health Research Institute 455 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016
jdb@mordor.ARPA (John Bruner) (07/18/86)
We see a lot of "ie0: no carrier" messages here, too. They occur on multiple machines (perhaps all of our Sun 3's) at once. Our Sun 2's, VAXes, Integrated Solutions, VALIDs, LSI-11's, and miscellaneous other machines NEVER experience trouble with the Ethernet. For a while I suspected that the "no carrier" messages were correlated with "panic: ifree: freeing free inode" crashes that we experience on our Sun 3's (only) with annoying frequency. These crashes usually leave behind an inode with a too-small link count (the actual number of links is greater than the link count) and must be recovered manually. I'm no longer as suspicious of the role of the "no carrier" errors in these crashes, but I haven't ruled it out yet. -- John Bruner (S-1 Project, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory) MILNET: jdb@mordor [jdb@s1-c.ARPA] (415) 422-0758 UUCP: ...!ucbvax!decwrl!mordor!jdb ...!seismo!mordor!jdb
hitchens@godzilla.cs.utexas.edu (Ron Hitchens, Sun Wiz) (07/19/86)
> We are experiencing frequent error messages on our SUN-3 consoles > saying "ie0: no carrier". This happens infrequently on our SUN-2s > as well, but not nearly as often. It happens on both file servers > and clients. Our SUNs are attached to the ethernet using DELNIs. > Can anyone shed light on this problem? We've seen this on all of our Sun3s also, and similar messages on our Sun2s (usually iebark reset). My guess is that these are being caused by net collisions. When the ethernet is in a jammed state there is effectively no carrier on the wire. The specs specify a time frame in which the sender is supposed to detect collision and stop transmitting. On a network of any size at all it's quite common to have "massive collisions", caused by any number of factors, which can keep the net jammed for far longer than the specified time. It's my guess that the Sun board is noticing that carrier has been absent for too long and causing the "no carrier" message. This would also explain why the message is not "ethernet jammed". I believe the "jammed" message (which you'll get if the coax is unterminated) is caused when the signal in the coax goes out of spec. The collision state is a specific signal on the cable. This is my guess, I haven't done any investigation to verify it. I have observed getting flurries of these message at times when we know there are "rogue" machines on the net doing strange things. So long as you're only getting one or two a day, I'd say not to worry about it. It's unlikely to be a hardware or cable problem, since it happens on most Sun3s. Ron Hitchens hitchens@godzilla.cs.utexas.edu ...!ut-sally!hitchens
jim@moira.UUCP (Jim Thompson) (07/24/86)
In article <15@unc.unc.UUCP> menges@unc.UUCP (John Menges) writes: >We are experiencing frequent error messages on our SUN-3 consoles >saying "ie0: no carrier". This happens infrequently on our SUN-2s >as well, but not nearly as often. It happens on both file servers >and clients. Our SUNs are attached to the ethernet using DELNIs. >Can anyone shed light on this problem? The first thing to try is making sure that the ether-connections are both tight and are actulally good. (Conducting.) Sun uses cheap connectors. The connector can look plugged in, but not be 'making'.... Good luck. Jim Thompson {ihnp4,sdcrdcf}!otto!jim [ Usual disclamer: I have no opinion, therefore I don't exist .] -- Jim Thompson {ihnp4,sdcrdcf}!otto!jim [ Usual disclamer: I have no opinion, therefore I don't exist .]