Another Mac SE Networking Post (Specific Questions)

[funkytoad]

Hello everyone. I apologize for yet another Mac SE networking post. I did a lot of searching and reading before posting these questions, I promise.

Like many others at this time, I've been staying in and working on some projects. I've got an SE FDHD running System 6.0.8 with two floppy drives, 40MB HD and Floppy Emu. Recently, I installed a Farallon EtherMac SE-C PDS ethernet card. I got a lot of help from Mk.558's Classic Mac Networking Guide and several forum posts here to get the correct software, drivers and settings. Good news, it works! (Well, kind of...)
 

• The Mac SE is seemingly not connected to the network until I ping the router. I cannot ping the Mac SE with another machine until after the Mac SE has pinged the router. The Mac SE doesn't show up in my router's web GUI device table until after I ping the router.
  

• I can ping the router from the Mac SE, but it always takes three to four requests and timeouts before the ping becomes successful. While ultimately successful, the timeout rate is still between 40-60% on subsequent attempts.
  

• I can ping the router from the Mac SE, but I cannot ping other devices on the same router. However, I can ping the Mac SE from other devices on the same router. I realize this might be an issue with the router itself.
  

• The Mac SE freezes 30 seconds to a minute after the last ping, regardless of what software I am running or what I am doing.
  

I am hopeful that someone here might have a suggestion of some next steps to try. I would greatly appreciate anybody's ideas and suggestions. Thank you very much.

 

[cheesestraws]

The Mac SE is seemingly not connected to the network until I ping the router. I cannot ping the Mac SE with another machine until after the Mac SE has pinged the router. The Mac SE doesn't show up in my router's web GUI device table until after I ping the router. 

I suspect this is because MacTCP doesn't start working until it's opened for the first time.  On my headless LC, I fire up MacTCP Watcher (I think that's what it's called) at startup to force the IP stack to start and get an address.

I can ping the router from the Mac SE, but it always takes three to four requests and timeouts before the ping becomes successful. While ultimately successful, the timeout rate is still between 40-60% on subsequent attempts.

There's a thing where speed / port autonegotiation fails on some SE network cards.  You might need to force the port to 10BaseT/Full Duplex on your network device, or if your network device can't do that, put a 10mbit hub between the SE and the router.

The Mac SE freezes 30 seconds to a minute after the last ping, regardless of what software I am running or what I am doing. 

No idea on this one, I'm afraid...