Mac IIsi Nubus Asante MacCon MCiNB-10T

[NoTrueSpaceman]

In the on-going saga of my IIsi refurb, I picked up a new-in-box, still-in-shrink-wrap Asante MacCon MCiNB-10T. It's plugged into the IIsi's Nubus adapter card.

No matter what I do, I can't get the link light on the switch to light up. I've tried every switch, new and old. I've tried going directly into other machines where I've set the physical format to 10baseT. Nothing.

As for the card, it's green light blinks all the time. It's yellow light will very rarely occasionally blink.

I feel like I've got all the software ends chased down. I'm running System 7.5.3 and using the combined Asante drivers that correctly auto-detect the FPU adapter card and that the network card is a Nubus card.

The Asante ADLS tool shows "sent" packets ticking up when you think they would (when trying to open pages in Netscape, trying to FTP with Fetch, when using MacPing...). The "received" packet count never budges.

I'm wondering:
1. is there some sort of driver I'm missing that maybe somehow switches from the AUI port to the 10baseT/UTP port?

2. I don't have the fancy bracket for my Nubus adapter card so... it's kinda all just hanging around in there. I'm going to 3D print some brackets to hold it stable, but does that bracket do something else? Some sort of really critical electrical grounding?

3. Is there anything else I can try? All I can think to do is go find a really ancient 10baseT hub or switch and hope that the whole thing is just a physical layer weirdness, but it's not even easy to find those at this point. (Normally I'd go thrifting or visiting the local recyclers but that's hard right now.)

The date on the box for this card is "08-03-1994". That seems late enough in the game that use with a IIsi wouldn't be unheard of.

 

[cheesestraws]

is there some sort of driver I'm missing that maybe somehow switches from the AUI port to the 10baseT/UTP port

There may be a physical jumper on the card.  I don't know this precise board, but I have a number of other T/AUI and T/BNC cards, and nearly all of them have either a jumper or a switch.

I've tried going directly into other machines where I've set the physical format to 10baseT.

Did you do this with a crossover cable?

 

[cheesestraws]

is there some sort of driver I'm missing that maybe somehow switches from the AUI port to the 10baseT/UTP port?

Excuse double post, but here's the manual for the card: https://manualsbrain.com/en/manuals/969374/download/

If you look on p. 13, looks like you might want to check JP1.

 

[NoTrueSpaceman]

I checked for a physical jumper, and there is not one.

Yes I used a cross-over cable. Thouuughhh I better go check that cable. I haven't used it in ages and maybe I'm getting mixed up which one is my crossover.

 

[NoTrueSpaceman]

Oh crap. Did I miss that jumper? I actually checked twice. Ok well I'll try that. Derp.

 

[cheesestraws]

Oh crap. Did I miss that jumper? I actually checked twice. Ok well I'll try that. Derp.

It's an on/off type jumper by the look of it rather than a "switch between two positions" one, which is unusual, because it's just forcing AUI.  So, if it's any consolation, I probably would have missed it too.

Other thing to try: does it work with an AUI->10BT dongle, if you happen to have one?

 

[NoTrueSpaceman]

Well the jumper didn't seem to change the situation. I'll go and try all the various routers and switches again.

I don't have any AUI-to-10BT adapter any more. I know I had one a long time ago but I think it didn't survive a move or three.

Also... the "crossover" is not a crossover. So this is just a comedy of errors on my part. It's 3:30am here so maybe I should just sleep on this.

 

[cheesestraws]

Also... the "crossover" is not a crossover. So this is just a comedy of errors on my part. It's 3:30am here so maybe I should just sleep on this.

This sounds like a good time to sleep on it .  If I'm reading the manual right, I think in the morning you want to make sure that JP1 is open, then I'd probably try to find/make a crossover cable and try to bring up a computer <-> computer link, preferably to something of a similar age.

 

[NoTrueSpaceman]

I found the crossover cable and plugged the Mac IIsi into a c1992 Compaq 486 with one of those venerable 3Com cards (3c50x something or other).

Partial success! I was able to get a few packets received by the Mac by pinging from the Compaq to the Mac IIsi. It isn't reliable, and I got MacPing to report a few good packets through once, but I can't figure out why. I think I'll try flipping the jumper mentioned above. It's left "on" from last night, IIRC. MacPing seems dog-slow. I don't know what it's doing but it almost locks my system up its so slow.

Unfortunately the Linux I'm running on the Compaq is a barebones Slackware 4.0 floppy rescue disk, so I don't have a lot of network utilities at my disposal to figure out what is going on.

So chalk this up as another confirmation that these old Asante cards _really really_ don't want to work with anything other than an old, non-autosensing, 10baseT-only interface.

At this point I'm wondering if it'd be better to just go with a PPP connection to the RPi emulating the SCSI drives. I'll pick up an old hub next time I'm at the recyclers or if a good one comes up on eBay. Did they ever make 10baseT-only switches? I can only ever remember using hubs back then. I don't think it'd matter for what it'll be doing, but if I'm going to buy something, I'd rather have a nicer one.

Thanks for your help and patience, @cheesestraws !

 

[cheesestraws]

You are very welcome.  Network nerdery is what I do , and it's nice to get machines talking to each other!

I think I'll try flipping the jumper mentioned above. It's left "on" from last night, IIRC

There seemed to be two different sets of instructions involving the same jumper in the manual that, to my eyes, were mutually incompatible.  That said, regardless of which one was correct, the correct setting I think is "off"... it either allows autosensing or pays attention to link integrity.  It honestly looks like this card is a pretty early one, because it's talking about talking to pre-standardised 10BaseT ethernet networks, which is... a long time ago, and suggests a decidedly crufty implementation.  You might be better off keeping an eye out for a more recent Nubus Ethernet card; they still seem to be reasonably available, and I'd expect it to play nicer all over.

Did they ever make 10baseT-only switches? I can only ever remember using hubs back then

They did!  I had a 10mbit managed one as my first switch, a couple of generations old when I got it.  It was loud and picky and had a horrible telnet menu interface.  But before you run out and try to find one:

An easier option might be to get a modern managed/smart switch and just disable auto sensing and set the port to 10mbit half-duplex manually.  I've got a Netgear one here and it plays fine with the older Ethernet cards I've thrown at it.  That way there's no process of negotiation, and it ought to Just Work™.

 

[NoTrueSpaceman]

Success!



I found a Netgear GS105Ev2 managed switch and configured a port to 10baseT. I also had to move the MacCon's jumper _off_ to _enable_ link integrity, as you suggested. In this screen shot, it is configured at half-duplex, but it also works at full-duplex, at least for simple stuff like ICMP pings.



I was able to load up some random pages in Netscape 2.0, so everything looks good. Thanks again for your help, @cheesestraws !  :-D

 

[cheesestraws]

You're very welcome!  Glad to see it alive