[Cialug] Meaning of ethernet connectivity light

[Dave Weis]

On Thu, 27 Oct 2005, Tim Wilson wrote:
> A couple months ago, I had the lan port go bad on my motherboard.  I
> looked at the hub, and it had a link light for my port.  Yet I
> couldn't ping anything.  I put in my old network card, and it worked
> fine.  Which leads me to believe a link light means diddly.

There is two pairs of wire, one is transmit and one is receive. You can 
have link on one side but not the other if transmit is working but receive 
is not, or vice versa. Those are a pain to troubleshoot if you don't think 
to look at the lights immediately, or you have link at the desktop and 
don't think to look at the switch side.

> On 10/27/05, Dave J. Hala Jr. <dave at 58ghz.net> wrote:
>> If I remember right, isn't one pair of the wires used for the link?
>> I think you can have a link light a bad cable.
>>
>> I'd switch with a known good cable as a first step. If you are sure you
>> have a hardware problem then all that is left is your nic, and the port
>> ethernet port on the actiontec... If your nic used to work, then it
>> would be safe to assume that the problems lies with ethernet port in the
>> actiontec.
>>
>> I believe that it is not uncommon to get a bad actiontec modem.
>>
>>
>> :) Dave
>>
>> On Thu, 2005-10-27 at 08:48, Nathan C. Smith wrote:
>>> That's an interesting question.
>>>
>>> I always thought it meant a link at the physical layer - which could still
>>> probably happen in a "bad-card" situation, but certainly it varies based on
>>> card implementations.  Some cards will present a link light before drivers
>>> are loaded while others will not.
>>>
>>> -Nate
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Andrew Vick [mailto:avick at remote-print.com]
>>> Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2005 8:45 AM
>>> To: Central Iowa Linux Users Group
>>> Subject: [Cialug] Meaning of ethernet connectivity light
>>>
>>>
>>> I've been on the phone with Qwest tech support because I can't connect my
>>> home computer to the internet; it seems that my computer cannot communicate
>>> with the Actiontec modem.  The modem is connected via an ethernet cable, and
>>> the little ethernet light shows green, but tech support is suggesting that
>>> the ethernet card is bad.
>>>
>>> Does anyone know how much needs to be working with the card/cable/modem in
>>> order to get the ethernet connection light to go on, or how much can be
>>> wrong before it goes off?  I'm curious about the general case as much as
>>> anything specific to my setup.  How much functionality does that light
>>> indicate?
>>>
>>> -Andrew V.
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>> --
>>
>> Open Source Information Systems, Inc. (OSIS)
>> Dave J. Hala Jr., President <dave at osis.us>
>> 641.485.1606
>>
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>>
>
>
> --
> Tim
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-- 
Dave Weis             "I believe there are more instances of the abridgment
djweis at sjdjweis.com   of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent
                       encroachments of those in power than by violent
                       and sudden usurpations."- James Madison