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    Special Linux issues

    Thinkpad 600E
    One of my Thinkpads (a very old one, indeed, used for special purposes) is running a 2.4.x kernel and XFree86 4.0, based on a S.u.S.E Version 8.1. Before you ask: No, the 600 is not my only laptop, but is is still of good use for certain purposes. However, newer Thinkpads run current distributions out of the box, so there ist nothing special to tell about them.

    PCMCIA Network adapters
    Changing the burnt-in hardware address of an ancient PCMCIA network adapter prior to DHCP is often needed in a corporate environment. See below for how to do it.

Changing a PCMCIA adapters burnt in network address
This info is only meant for VERY old Linux versions with a 2.2 Kernel: When using DHCP it is sometimes needed to change the burnt-in hardware address of a network adapter to something different (many companies use their own mac address ranges for reasons of maneagability)

The change of the adapter to a preset hardware address with ifconfig prior to calling DHCP works great for me. I tested it with a Compaq Netelligent Ethernet and an IBM Auto Token Ring adapter. My version of DHCP does not seem to work for Token Ring, but that's another story and does not have anything to do with the address change.

I tweaked David's network script (many thanks to David for discussing the stuff and giving hints) a little and added a new variable NEW_HWADDR to network.config and here we are. If network.opts sets this variable, the network script will try to change the adapters address to NEW_HWADDR. The version of David's scrip is: # network 1.63 2000/02/09 03:12:42 (David Hinds) See the pcmcia scrips below for the necessary changes:

network.optsnetwork

Further Information
For more info about running linux on certain exotic hardware (old laptops, microchannel boxes, token ring etc.) see the link page.

Last edited by Andreas Hotz at 12/22/2017 10:19 AM