pcn(7D) Devices pcn(7D)NAMEpcn - AMD PCnet Ethernet controller device driver
SYNOPSIS
/dev/pcn
DESCRIPTION
The pcn Ethernet driver is a multi-threaded, loadable, clonable
driver for the AMD PCnet family of Ethernet controllers that use the
Generic LAN Driver (GLD) facility to implement the required STREAMS
and Data Link Provider (see dlpi(7P)) interfaces.
This driver supports a number of integrated motherboards and add-in
adapters based on the AMD PCnet-ISA, PCnet-PCI, and PCnet-32 con‐
troller chips. The pcn driver functions include controller initializa‐
tion, frame transmit and receive, functional addresses, promiscuous
and multicast support, and error recovery and reporting.
APPLICATION PROGRAMMING INTERFACE
The cloning character-special device, /dev/pcn, is used to access all
PCnet devices installed in the system.
pcn and DLPI
The pcn driver uses the Solaris GLD module which handles all the
STREAMS and DLPI specific functions of the driver. It is a style 2 DLPI
driver and therefore supports only the connectionless mode of data
transfer. Thus, a DLPI user should issue a DL_ATTACH_REQ primitive to
select the device to be used. Valid DLPI primitives are defined in
<sys/dlpi.h>. Refer to dlpi(7P) for more information.
The device is initialized on the first attach and de-initialized
(stopped) on the last detach.
The values returned by the driver in the DL_INFO_ACK primitive in
response to a DL_INFO_REQ from the user are:
· Maximum SDU is 1500 (ETHERMTU - defined in <sys/ethernet.h>).
· Minimum SDU is 0.
· DLSAP address length is 8.
· MAC type is DL_ETHER.
· sap length value is −2, meaning the physical address component is
followed immediately by a 2-byte sap component within the DLSAP
address.
· Service mode is DL_CLDLS.
· No optional quality of service (QOS) support is included at
present, accordingly, the QOS fields are 0.
· Provider style is DL_STYLE2.
· Version is DL_VERSION_2.
· Broadcast address value is the Ethernet/IEEE broadcast address
(FF:FF:FF:FF:FF:FF).
Once in the DL_ATTACHED state, the user must send a DL_BIND_REQ to as‐
sociate a particular Service Access Point (SAP) with the stream.
Known Problems and Limitations
· Occasional data corruption has occurred when pcn and pcscsi driv‐
ers in HP Vectra XU 5/90 and Compaq Deskpro XL systems are used
under high network and SCSI loads. These drivers do not perform
well in a production server. A possible workaround is to disable
the pcn device with the system BIOS and use a separate add-in
network interface.
· The Solaris pcn driver does not support IRQ 4.
FILES
/dev/pcn Character special device
/kernel/drv/pcn.conf Configuration file
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:
┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
│ ATTRIBUTE TYPE │ ATTRIBUTE VALUE │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Architecture │x86 │
└─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
SEE ALSOattributes(5), standards(5), dlpi(7P), streamio(7I)
Writing Device Drivers
STREAMS Programming Guide
SunOS 5.10 20 Oct 2000 pcn(7D)
