Problem with X-Surf 3cc Ethernet Card

[salocinx]

Hi folks

I've got a X-Surf 3cc ethernet card and tried to use within my A3000 with A3640 and a Cybervision 64. There's Classic Workbench 3.9 with Boing Bags 1-3 installed. I connected the the X-Surf card with a "straight" ethernet/10baseT cable to my cable modem. Both LEDs (green & orange) are flickering resp. glowing as soon as I start the Amiga. I already tried AmiTCP, Genesis and MiamiDX, but without success, I always get problems when the driver tries to connect the card (Could not open x-surf.device (Genesis) / Could not query x-surf.device / etc.). I installed the x-surf040.device to DEVS:Networks/x-surf.device and have put x-surf.config to ENVARC:sana2/x-surf.config.

In early boot menu, the card is detected correctly by the system and has "working" state. I also tried the card on all Zorro III slots (these are all working, tested with other cards) and even tried it in my A4000D with the same problems. I also re-soldered the bridge-contacts and cleaned all contacts.

Finally I ran the test program from the developer Jens Schönefeld called "xsurftest" which gave me the following result:

    xsurf testprg V1.2 (13.12.1999)

    Searching for xsurf card (VEN_ID=4626, PROD_ID=23)....found
    Board address = 0xe90000

    ISA Plug and Pray [ähm] Play setup...
    No PnP card found!!

    Searching for RTL8019 at 0x300...not found!

Unfortunately, the new website of Jens Schönefeld currently doesn't allow me to open a support ticket...

Does somebody has any idea how to solve the problem ? Many thanks in advance!

[danbeaver]

The card sounds fine, but you are not using the easiest TCP/IP stacks to configure -- well Miami is easy if you play with it.  As for AmiTCP, that is why Amigakit came out with EasyNet.  Roadshow 68k is dead easy with 1) install, 2) copy 1 file, 3) reboot and it is working! Unless you are using the wrong surf.device file or in the wrong location.  The other stacks work if you know how to configure them.

You mileage may vary.

[Thomas]

I don't think the card is fine. The xsurftest output indicates that the card is broken. The Zorro bridge is working, but the network card itself is not recognised.

[Matt_H]

@ salocinx

I agree with Thomas. Something is wrong with the network card.

In case you're not aware, the X-Surf is actually a single-slot Zorro-to-ISA bridge with an ISA network card soldered in place. The "good news" about your problem is that it can probably be fixed by disassembling the board and replacing the ISA card. Will require soldering, though. I don't know whether it has to be the exact same card or just any card with the RTL8019 chipset, but Jens can probably tell you. I'm sure there's some way to contact him through his website. He might even be able to do the replacement for you, but expect to pay for it - the X-Surf 3 is looooong out of production and warranty.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

If that's the case, probably cheaper to just buy one of the new X-Surf 100's.  Faster, more reliable, better supported, blah blah, but I know how most Amiga users don't like spending money on new stuff, so I'll shut up now.  :rofl:

[servitus]

removed

[salocinx]

Thanks for the numerous replies. Indeed, AmiTCP was the most challenging stack to install and took me an hour by following a well written guide (link at bottom of post). MiamiDX worked fine so far and had no problems with setting up an Ariadne II and Wireless PCMCIA NICs on A600 and A1200, all with no problems at all.

About the the probably defective card... I also cleaned all the contacts of the surface mounted PLCC chip on the bridge board, but as the card is recognized correctly as "working", I also don't think that the problem is on the "amiga-side" of the card. By the way, I am using the new driver version 1.4 from Jens website (renamed x-surf040.device to x-surf.device according to my A3640 setup). I will try to contact Jens by the shop e-mail address on his website.

Where would I find an ISA network card with the RTL8019 chipset these days for replacement ;-) ?


* Link: http://www.wiwi.uni-frankfurt.de/~andreas/amitcp/index.htm

[salocinx]

I found a replacement ISA ethernet card with the Realtek 8019AS chipset on e-Bay for 1€. I let you know if the card is working after exchanging the PC-side of the card. Thanks so far for your help.

[Matt_H]

I advise talking to Jens before going ahead with the replacement...

[salocinx]

Meanwhile I replaced the ISA part with a 1 Euro card from e-bay. Worked straightaway :-) ! Thanks for your help!

[Matt_H]

Nice! How was the repair from a difficulty perspective? E.g., was the soldering easy/hard/moderate?

[guest11527]

Sorry to resurrect this old thread, just one extension from my side as I just accquired an X-surf 100 and was seeing the same error message.  The problem with the non-detected RTL8019 chip is simply that the card is a 100MBit card, and hence it simply does not have a 8019 on it, which is a T10 (10MBit) network chip. You'll find details on the X-100 in the wiki, and the corresponding I/O area where the RTL chip would be is blank.  The other problem I had was that the DHCP protocol implementation of AmiTCP (the stack under Genesis) is apparently not quite working correctly, but after selecting a static IP address, the card runs fine.   Merry Christmas!