General

1. Do you have a network adapter installation guide for Windows 2000?

2. How do I determine which version of the driver is installed?

3. I have misplaced the floppy disk that contains the DFE-530TX+ drivers. Can I download them from your website?

4. What are the driver filenames for the DFE-530TX+?

1. The instructions say that the DFE-530TX+ card must be installed into a PCI slot with "bus mastering." What is bus mastering and how do I know if my PCI slots have this capability?

2. Does the DFE-530TX+ support "promiscuous mode" operation?

3. Which protocols do I need to install?

4. Typically, which components, or which clients, services, adapters, and protocols should I have installed in Network Properties, under the Configuration Tab?

5. I installed the network adapter card and then the Windows NT 4.0 network services. Now I'm getting error messages when I restart. What happened?

6. I upgraded from Windows 95/98 to Windows NT 4.0 and now my network no longer works. What should I do?

1. How can I tell if the network adapter card is installed properly?

2. When I open the Network Neighborhood (or My Network Places) all I see is Entire Network. I do not even see my own computer. What should I do next?

3. Can I run the network adapter diagnostic or the configuration utility from a DOS prompt within Windows 95/98 or Windows NT/2000?

4. My network adapter card appears to be firmly seated in its slot and there are no resource conflicts displayed in Device Manager; however, neither the Link light nor the Activity light is illuminated. Is this normal?

5. I installed the network adapter card and I was able to see the icons for my computer and the other computers in the Network Neighborhood window. Then I restarted my computer and now I can't see any computers in the Network Neighborhood window. I am able to locate these computers by using the Windows Start -> Find -> Computer utility. What went wrong?

6. I installed the network adapter card and restarted my computer; however, Windows never detected the card. I ran the Add New Hardware wizard and Windows 95/98 still did not detect the card. What is causing this?

7. I installed the network adapter card and now my computer locks-up when I try to restart it. What is causing this problem and what should I do?

General

1. Do you have a network adapter installation guide for Windows 2000? (Back to top)

There is an installation and configuration guide that is intended specifically for installing and networking two PCs that use the DFE-530TX+ network adapter card. The guide is available in the Technical Resources section of our WEB site. For your convenience, you may use this link to get there quickly and locate the file: Tech Resources.

Note: You will need the Adobe Acrobat Reader to view and print this guide. You can download the Acrobat Reader from http://www.adobe.com/.

If you received the driver on a floppy diskette, the driver version number and/or date will usually appear on the disk’s label. This number and/or date, however, may only provide part of the information you need. A better method is to use the Windows 95/98/2000 Device Manager to display the version information of the installed driver files. You can do this in Windows 95/98 by going to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> System -> Device Manager or in Windows 2000 by going to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management -> Device Manager. Once in Device Manager, expand the Network adapters category by clicking on the plus (+) sign next to it, select the network adapter, and click on the Properties button.

When the following dialog box appears, click on the Driver tab and another box will open with the Description, Provider, and Date for the driver INF file.

Note: If your network adapter card contains a different chip and/or is using a different driver, the information displayed in this dialog box (and in the one that follows) may be different.

Next, click on the button labeled Driver File Details… The following window will open and display all of the driver files that the Windows operating system associates with this device.

Single-click on the name of the first file with the .sys extension. The file version number for this driver file is displayed in the gray area below the window.

Yes. If you click on the following link it will take you to the Driver Download section of our WEB site where you can download drivers for any of our products. Here is the link: Driver Download

• For Windows 95B(OSR2)/95C/98/98SE, the two filenames are NETDLKRT.INF and DLKRTS.SYS. The NETDLKRT.INF file is stored in the \WINDOWS\INF folder and the DLKRTS.SYS file is stored in the \WINDOWS\SYSTEM folder.

• For Windows NT 4.0, the filenames are OEMSETUP.INF and DLKRTS.SYS.

• For Windows 2000, the driver are built-in to the operating system and is located at \WINNT\System32\DRIVERS\RTL8139.SYS. The adapter card will register as a Realtek RTL8139(A) PCI Ethernet Adapter.

Note: If your network adapter card contains a different chip and/or is using a different driver, the driver filenames may differ from the ones listed here.

Advanced

1. The instructions say that the DFE-530TX+ card must be installed into a PCI slot with “bus mastering.” What is bus mastering and how do I know if my PCI slots have this capability? (Back to top)

A “bus mastering” device is one that can take control of the system bus for the purpose of accessing the computer’s memory and other I/O devices without having to interrupt the CPU to perform the task. This feature, in conjunction with the built-in FIFO buffers, allows the network adapter card to process packet data more quickly. In the case of the DFE-530TX, the card will not install correctly if the PCI slot in which it resides does not support bus mastering.

Some Intel 80486-based computers and most Pentium class computers, built after 1998, have PCI slots that support bus mastering. On computers running Windows 98, you may be able to determine whether the PCI slots support bus mastering by reading the description beside the PCI IDE controller in the Computer Properties window. To do this, go to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> System -> Device Manager -> Computer -> Properties, browse through the list of in-use IRQs for IRQ 14 or 15, and read the description to see if the words “Bus Master” appear therein. Please keep in mind that some computers with bus mastering slots will not contain the words “Bus Master” in this description.

Another way to verify the presence of this feature is to browse through the BIOS/CMOS Setup area of your computer for references to bus mastering. Oftentimes, there is a category in the BIOS provided for configuring the PCI slots. Typically, you will find an entry therein that allows you to enable or disable bus mastering for all of the slots or for each slot, individually. If you believe your computer provides bus mastering but you are not sure which PCI slots support it, choose the first PCI slot.

Finally, read any documentation that came with your PC to see if the motherboard’s PCI slots are called “bus mastering” slots or contact the manufacturer of the PC or the PC's motherboard for this information.

2. Does the DFE-530TX+ support “promiscuous mode” operation? (Back to top)

Yes, it does. Promiscuous mode, also referred to as “indiscriminate mode,” refers to a node on a network that recognizes all network traffic that passes through the node, i.e., any packet regardless of its destination address. Both the DFE-530TX+ and its driver support promiscuous mode operation Promiscuous mode operation is essential if the node is to be used in conjunction with packet filtering and/or network firewall software.

3. Which protocols do I need to install? (Back to top)

If you are running a small Windows–based, peer-to-peer network and you do not intend to share Internet access among the computers on the network, then you only need a single, name–based protocol such as Microsoft’s NetBEUI. This protocol works by broadcasting the names of the computers (or devices) across the network each time you initiate a request for access to the resources of another computer or device (e.g., printer) in your workgroup. If you have a device such as a print server that requires the IPX/SPX protocol, you will need to install that protocol as well.

If you intend to share Internet access among the computers on your network, you will need to add the TCP/IP protocol to each PC. Subsequently, you must configure the TCP/IP Properties on each PC for either a manually–assigned or automatically–assigned IP address. If you are running a Client/Server network, at the very least, you will need to install the TCP/IP protocol. Your network may also require IPX/SPX as well. If you are in doubt as to which protocols you need, install all of them. This is sometimes referred to as being, fully–networked. On a small network you will see little, if any, performance degradation as the result of installing all of these protocol. On large networks, however, you may degrade performance by installing unnecessary protocols.

4. Typically, which components, or which clients, services, adapters, and protocols should I have installed in Network Properties, under the Configuration Tab? (Back to top)

A typical, fully–networked Windows 95/98 Configuration Tab would look as follows.

Your configuration may differ from this one, especially if you have different or additional networking clients or adapter components installed, e.g., a dial-up adapter.

5. I installed the network adapter card and then the Windows NT 4.0 network services. Now I’m getting error messages when I restart. What happened? (Back to top)

If you installed network services from the original Windows NT 4.0 installation files, you may have inadvertently installed an older version of the srv.sys file. Reapply the NT Service Pack in order to update this file and then restart your computer. If you continue to get errors during startup, try relocating the card to a different slot. Additionally, if you have a DOS Boot Disk, restart your computer in DOS and run the diagnostic program from the floppy disk that came with the card.

6. I upgraded from Windows 95/98 to Windows NT 4.0 and now my network no longer works. What should I do? (Back to top)

First, uninstall and reinstall the network adapter card. Then, reapply the NT Service Pack and restart your computer.

Troubleshooting

1. How can I tell if the network adapter card is installed properly? (Back to top)

In Windows 95, 98 and 2000, you use the system Device Manger as the primary tool to determine whether the card is installed properly. To open the Device Manager in Windows 95/98, go to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> System -> Device Manager.

Note: To access the Device Manager in Windows 2000 go to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management -> Device Manager.

Ideally, when you open the Device Manager window in Windows 95/98, none of the individual device categories should be open (expanded) and you should not see any yellow-colored symbols (markers) preceding any of the devices within the individual categories. For example, the presence of a yellow exclamation mark (!) preceding a device usually means that the device has a resource conflict, typically an IRQ conflict or an I/O address range conflict. The presence of a yellow question mark (?) usually means that for some reason the device driver for that device did not install correctly. Additionally, the presence of a red X over an icon means that Windows installed the device and then determined that it was necessary to disable the device to prevent it from causing problems with another installed device. A red X could also be the result of someone deliberately disabling the device from within its Properties box.

In the case of a network adapter card, you are primarily concerned with those devices listed under the category called, Network adapters. For instance, with the Network adapters category expanded, if you see a yellow exclamation mark preceding a device named DFE-530TX+ 10/100 Fast Ethernet NIC, then single-click on the name of the device, click on the Properties button, and select the General tab to view the device’s status. Note: A properly installed device will have a status that reads, “This device is working properly.”

Your must first be able to see your own computer on the network before you can expect to see the other computer(s) on the network. Toward this goal there are four things you can try:

1) Try pressing the F5 function key to refresh (update) the window.

2) For Windows 95/98 (the procedure for Windows 2000 differs slightly), click on the Windows Start button and go to Find (Search). Select Computer… and enter the name of your computer in the box labeled Named. Be sure to type the name exactly as it appears under the Identification tab in the Network Properties window. Click on the Find Now button and wait to see if your computer is located. If it is found then you know that the network adapter has basic functionality. If it is not found then try the following test.

3) Click on the Windows Start button and go to Run. In the box labeled Open, type the word “command” and press the <Enter> key. This will open a DOS window. At the DOS prompt type “ping localhost” and press the <Enter> key. If the TCP/IP protocol is installed, you should get several lines of text that read similarly as follows,

Pinging {yourcomputername} [127.0.0.1] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 127.0.0.1: bytes=32 time<10ms TTL=128
Reply from 127.0.0.1: bytes=32 time<10ms TTL=128
Reply from 127.0.0.1: bytes=32 time<10ms TTL=128
Reply from 127.0.0.1: bytes=32 time<10ms TTL=128

Ping statistics for 127.0.0.1:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 0ms, Maximum = 0ms, Average = 0ms

If, instead, you get a reply that indicates a timeout or some other failure, then you know that the network adapter cannot find the computer in which it is installed. In either case, proceed to the next test.

Note: “PING” or “ping” is an acronym for “Packet Internet Groper,” a utility used to determine if a specific IP address is accessible. It works by sending a packet to an address, which you specify, and by waiting for a reply.

4) Click on the Windows Start button and go to Run. In the box labeled Open, type the word “winipcfg” (or “ipconfig /all” in Windows NT and Windows 2000) and press the <Enter> key. This will open the IP Configuration window. Note: The Windows 2000 display differs from the following.

When the window opens, the name of the adapter or the name of its driver appears in the selector box. Click on the down arrow and select the network adapter. In most instances, this will be a PCI Ethernet Adapter, NDIS 4.0 driver, or NDIS 5.0 driver. Immediately below this box is another one labeled Adapter Address (a.k.a. Node ID). This box should contain six hyphenated, hexadecimal bytes, (i.e., alpha-numeric character pairs). ). Examples of the first three pairs might be, 00-50-BA or 00-80-C8 or 00-E0-98. If you see something like A5-A5-A5, 00-00-00, FF-FF-FF, A5-FF-A5, or any other combination of alternating repetitious pairs, then you know that the network adapter card has an illegal address and is probably defective. If the address is “good,” the only other thing to do is run the adapter’s diagnostic program. This diagnostic program is usually on the floppy diskette that came with the adapter; otherwise, it may be on a CD-ROM disc.

Note: If you do not have the TCP/IP protocol installed, when you run the command “winipcfg” (or “ipconfig” in NT) you will get an error message box saying, “Fatal Error — Cannot read IP configuration.”

The diagnostic program will execute from a DOS prompt within Windows; however, the configuration information displayed and/or the test results will not be accurate. Additionally, your computer may lock-up and need to be restarted. To run these utilities reliably, you must reboot your PC, enter the Microsoft Windows 95/98/2000 Startup Menu, and select the option that says, “Safe mode command prompt only.” Next, insert the network adapter card's floppy disk into the floppy drive and, at the DOS command prompt, enter “a:” followed by the <Enter> key. Then follow the procedures for running the diagnostic program as you normally would.
For Windows NT 4.0 you must restart you computer with a DOS Boot Disk. Next, remove the DOS Boot Disk and insert the floppy disk containing the network adapter diagnostics program. At the DOS command prompt, enter “a:” followed by the <Enter> key. Then follow the procedures for running the diagnostic program as you normally would.

4. My network adapter card appears to be firmly seated in its slot and there are no resource conflicts displayed in Device Manager; however, neither the Link light nor the Activity light is illuminated. Is this normal? (Back to top)

The Link light illuminates when you connect the computer to another active Ethernet device, such as a hub, switch, cable modem, DSL modem, or the network adapter card in another PC. This tells you that you have a “good” connection between the two devices. The Activity light illuminates whenever the network adapter card senses network “traffic,” as defined by the Ethernet specification. If, for instance, you turn off power to all the devices on your network, except of course your PC, both lights on the network adapter card will turn off.

5. I installed the network adapter card and I was able to see the icons for my computer and the other computers in the Network Neighborhood window. Then I restarted my computer and now I can’t see any computers in the Network Neighborhood window. I am able to locate these computers by using the Windows Start -> Find ->Computer utility. What went wrong? (Back to top)

The most common cause of this problem is due to someone clicking on the Cancel button when prompted by Windows 95/98 Logon for a user name and password. Clicking on the Cancel button results in your being able to access everything on the computer as you normally would, with the following exception — your view of the Network Neighborhood will be hidden from you. The solution is to restart your computer, enter a name when prompted, and then click on the OK button. Note: Pick a name that you think has never been used so you don’t have to bother with entering a correct password.

One of three things may be causing this.

1) You may have the Plug and Play (PnP) featured disabled for the slot in which the network adapter card is installed. This can only be verified by entering the CMOS Setup area of your computer's BIOS and, if necessary, re-enabling PnP for that slot.

2) The network adapter card could be defective. Run the diagnostic program that is on the floppy disk that came with your card.

3) There could be a resource conflict that is interfering with the installation of this Plug and Play card. The most likely type of resource conflict is an IRQ conflict, in which two or more devices are not able to share the same IRQ number for some reason.

Try the following things:

a) If you have not already done so, shutdown your computer and ensure that the card is firmly seated in the PCI slot.

b) Restart the computer in Windows “Safe mode command prompt only” and run the adapter diagnostics. If the adapter diagnostic program cannot “find” the card, likewise, Windows will not be able to “find” the card. At that point, you should relocate the card to a different PCI slot and try again. As a last resort, you can try installing the card in another PC, if available.

c) If the adapter diagnostic is successful, restart the computer in Windows “Normal” mode and see if Windows detects the card and begins to search for the driver. If it does, then proceed with the installation. If it still does not detect the card, then proceed to the next step.

d) From the Windows desktop, go to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> System -> Device. If there are no resource conflicts showing in the Device Manager window, then select the first category named Computers, and click on the Properties button.

e) Browse through the list of in-use IRQ numbers to see if there are any numbers missing from the sequence. Any number that is missing is an IRQ number that is available for use by another device. If all the IRQ numbers between 00 and 15 are in-use, that means there are no “free” IRQs available for the network adapter card to use. Although PCI devices, such as this network adapter, are supposed to be able to share an IRQ, sometimes they cannot do so. In such cases, the card will not install and Windows will not be able to detect it, and subsequently, install its driver. If possible, try to locate an IRQ that has only one device using it and see if you can reassign that device to another IRQ; otherwise, you may have to physically remove one of the other devices in order to free an IRQ for the network adapter card to use.

As a side note, when you see IRQ Holder for PCI Steering or ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering beside an IRQ number, understand that this is not an additional device assigned to this IRQ. IRQ Holder for PCI Steering is a tag that indicates the IRQ is to be used only for PCI devices and not for ISA devices. In other words, Windows has reserved that IRQ solely for use with Plug and Play devices, not for so-called legacy devices. ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering is a tag that indicates the electrical power to this device can be managed in accordance with the Advanced Configuration and Power Interface specification. This feature enables Windows to control the amount of power supplied to the device, e.g., to reduce power to the device (low-power mode) when it is not in use.

f) Again, as a last resort, you can relocate the network adapter card to a different PCI slot, thereby, providing Windows with an opportunity to reassign the card a different IRQ number.

Note: The BIOS in some computers allows you to disable the Plug and Play feature for a particular PCI slot. This, in turn, allows you to manually select the IRQ and I/O base address for the network adapter card. As another possibility, if you are using a PS/2 mouse instead of a serial mouse that requires a Com port, you may be able to disable the unneeded Com port (in the BIOS) and, thereby, make its IRQ available for the network adapter card. Please contact your PC’s hardware manufacturer for directions on how to do this.

Probably, there is a resource conflict between the newly installed adapter card and another device in your computer. Restart you computer, enter the Windows Startup menu, and select “Safe mode command prompt only.” To reach this menu in Windows 98 or Windows 2000, you must press the <F8> key repeatedly as soon as your computer begins to boot. In Windows 95, you can actually wait until you see a message on the screen saying that your hard drive has been detected, before you begin pressing the <F5> key repeatedly. In either case, the goal is to be pressing the <function> key when the message, “Starting Windows 95…” or “Starting Windows 98…” appears on the screen.

When you reach the Windows 95/98 desktop, go to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> System -> Device Manager (in Windows 2000 go to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management ->Device Manager). In the Device Manager window, locate the Network adapters category and expand it. (Note: It may already be expanded if Windows 95/98 has detected problems with the installation of the card). Select the network adapter, click on the Remove button, and click on the OK button to confirm the removal of this device.

Note: If your network adapter card contains a different chip and/or is using a different driver, the device name and description may be different.

Reboot your computer and follow the procedures detailed in the answer to the previous question, #5, regarding IRQ resource conflicts.