OSPF and VIA

[klyne]

Hey all,

I have just installed a new link using VIA 1GHz 1 Eth and one PCI miniITX boards. Im running a 12 mile link in A using CM9.

Here is the problem, the 2 boards can see each other on the wireless side no problem, but on either wired (100 TX) side OSPF is not working. The Cisco router that the one board connects to sees the hellos from the VIA but it stays in init mode. a TCP dump shows no hellos from the cisco. I have 7 other WRAP boards faceing the same router using the same subnet and they have no prob.

On the other side of the link the VIA goes directly into a WRAP, and again the WRAP sees the VIA but not the other way around. Is there something special about the VIA Ethernet Driver in StarOS? Could you please give me a hint on how to make it work. I have specified neighboe routers and tried non-broadcast... no good.

Regards,

Martin Madsen
Bel Air Internet

[klyne]

I know this has been posted a million times, and the solution is usally config related, but this problem cannot be config.

Im using the same config for these new boards as for lots of WRAPs with no problems. The problem is simply that the ethernet port (or the chipset supporting it) on the VIA does not see the hello broadcasts from the other OSPF enabled WRAPs and cisco routers.

The network is all 100Bit/s Ethernet. the switch connecting the devices is not doing any broadcast direct.

The Cisco shows:
10.2.5.57 1 INIT/DROTHER 00:00:33 10.1.5.8 FastEthernet0/1

The StarOS (running on VIA) shows only the neighbors it sees on the wireless (CM9) interface.

If i configure NON-Broadcast (last resort) on that segment, the starOS will Attempt connection for 120 sec, then even the attempt disappers.
While the cisco will keep trying and renewing the timeout.

Is there something special about the VIA Ethernet implementation?

Something even more weird is that the other end of the link also has the same VIA board, but it connects directly to a WRAP. Here there is again no luck getting OSPF to work via broadcast, but if i specify the neighbor and set non-broadcast they associate and start sharing routes.

There HAS to be something wrong with these VIA boards running StarOS with OSPF. A dump on "net 224.0.0.0/24" shows:

The box has ip 10.1.5.8 on eth0 and 10.2.5.57 on wpci0

When no router-id set:

17:36:58.690131 10.1.5.8 > 224.0.0.5: OSPFv2-hello 44: rtrid 10.2.5.57 backbone dr 10.1.5.8 [tos 0xc0] [ttl 1]
17:37:08.700147 10.1.5.8 > 224.0.0.5: OSPFv2-hello 44: rtrid 10.2.5.57 backbone dr 10.1.5.8 [tos 0xc0] [ttl 1]
17:37:18.710130 10.1.5.8 > 224.0.0.5: OSPFv2-hello 44: rtrid 10.2.5.57 backbone dr 10.1.5.8 [tos 0xc0] [ttl 1]
17:37:28.720127 10.1.5.8 > 224.0.0.5: OSPFv2-hello 44: rtrid 10.2.5.57 backbone dr 10.1.5.8 [tos 0xc0] [ttl 1]

With router-id set:
17:37:38.730148 10.1.5.8 > 224.0.0.5: OSPFv2-hello 44: backbone dr 10.1.5.8 [tos 0xc0] [ttl 1]
17:37:48.740135 10.1.5.8 > 224.0.0.5: OSPFv2-hello 44: backbone dr 10.1.5.8 [tos 0xc0] [ttl 1]
17:37:58.750190 10.1.5.8 > 224.0.0.5: OSPFv2-hello 44: backbone dr 10.1.5.8 [tos 0xc0] [ttl 1]
17:38:08.760149 10.1.5.8 > 224.0.0.5: OSPFv2-hello 44: backbone dr 10.1.5.8 [tos 0xc0] [ttl 1]

The board is a VIA EPIA M10000, and it uses a VIA VT6103 10/100 Base-T Ethernet PHY. Running build 4693


Help, it is chaotic keeping track of all those routes staticly... not to mention no auto redundancy.



Regards,

Martin Madsen
Bel Air Internet

[klyne]

i downgraded to build 4636, now not even the wireless side shows neighbors... once i upgraded to 4693 the wireless neigbors showed up again, but still no luck on the ethernet side.

Lonnie i would give you access to this unit as well... if you need it.

Regards,

Martin Madsen
Bel Air Internet

[lonnie]

I can take a look. Send me the IP and password.

[klyne]

I called Tony and gave him the login info. Please make sure you get it.

Martin Madsen
Bel Air Internet

[lonnie]

I'll check on Monday.

[kpenland]

We have seen the very same problem on two different boxes with the same VIA chipset.
Epia motherboards. If we take a regular RTL8139 NIC card in the pci slot, OSPF will work like a charm. The onboard ethernet will not. We sure would like a fix for it.

[kpenland]

We just loaded Mikrotik on the box with a VIA chipset and it will run OSPF in broadcast mode and Star-OS will not.
I have not been able to get Star-OS to run OSPF on this and one other box that uses the VIA chipset on Epia motherboard.

[tony]

There is a deficiency with the VIA Ethernet drivers that we will look into updating for the next BETA.