Paul Fuchs <paulfuchs@porkain'tkosher.oink> wrote:
> I have a back-up Pismo running 10.4.11 that is still vaguely functional.
> I had been running it as an adjunct computer off of my wifi router. But
> I want to place it in an outbuilding out of range of the wifi. A friend
> gave me 200 feet of 4 pair twisted T5 and I have a bag of clips and a
> quality crimper.
>
> But my eyes and dexterity aren't that great any more, and I found
> getting the 8 wires in the right order and verifying it for certain to
> be very challenging. So finally I did both ends and they seemed right,
> and I plugged one end into my ethernet hub and the other into the Pismo.
> It didn't work and when I checked it in Network Diagnostics the
> eithernet ball was red. Ethernet won't show up in sys pref>network. It
> does show up in sys profiler>locations and seems to have normal info.
> The airport card still works fine. I hadn't tried to use the ethernet
> in a long time on this machine.
>
> I have two questions:
>
> 1. Could I have fried the Pismo ethernet if all the wires were not
> clipped into the jack in the right order? The ethernet hub is still
> fine.
Physical damage to the Pismo is unlikely. UTP Ethernet sockets have
electrical isolation between the socket and the chips which control the
physical interface and implement the framing protocol (PHY and MAC).
Even if you managed to damage the hardware components on the socket side
of the isolation barrier, the computer would still think it had
Ethernet.
Feeding high voltages or currents into the port might damage it, and
high enough voltages might break through the isolation barrier and
damage other components, but the voltages which are generated by another
Ethernet socket are fine. I expect UTP Ethernet is specifically designed
to cope with miswired cables without damaging the hardware.
Lack of an Ethernet entry in System Preferences is more likely to be a
software issue. It is possible to delete or disable network interfaces
so they don't appear in System Preferences. Try creating a new
"Location" in System Preferences and see whether Ethernet appears in
that location.
What do you see if you go into Terminal and use the "ifconfig" command?
The section of interest will start with "en0". Here is what mine looks
like when the port is connected (IP addresses and Ethernet MAC address
hidden):
en0: flags=8863<UP,BROADCAST,SMART,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULT ICAST> mtu 1500
inet6 fe80::21b:63ff:fe95:3fff%en0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x4
inet XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast
XXX.XXX.XXX.255
ether XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
media: autoselect (100baseTX <full-duplex,flow-control>) status:
active
supported media: autoselect 10baseT/UTP <half-duplex>
10baseT/UTP <full-duplex> 10baseT/UTP <full-duplex,hw-loopback>
10baseT/UTP <full-duplex,flow-control> 100baseTX <half-duplex> 100baseTX
<full-duplex> 100baseTX <full-duplex,hw-loopback> 100baseTX
<full-duplex,flow-control> 1000baseT <full-duplex> 1000baseT
<full-duplex,hw-loopback> 1000baseT <full-duplex,flow-control> none
Your Pismo doesn't support Gigabit Ethernet, so it will have somewhat
fewer items in "supported media".
If I unplug the cable, mine looks like this:
en0: flags=8863<UP,BROADCAST,SMART,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULT ICAST> mtu 1500
ether XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
media: autoselect status: inactive
supported media: autoselect 10baseT/UTP <half-duplex>
10baseT/UTP <full-duplex> 10baseT/UTP <full-duplex,hw-loopback>
10baseT/UTP <full-duplex,flow-control> 100baseTX <half-duplex> 100baseTX
<full-duplex> 100baseTX <full-duplex,hw-loopback> 100baseTX
<full-duplex,flow-control> 1000baseT <full-duplex> 1000baseT
<full-duplex,hw-loopback> 1000baseT <full-duplex,flow-control> none
> If the ethernet is dead on the Pismo, I could still use it if I
> connected the cable to a cheap wireless router in the outbuilding.
>
> 2) Could I fry a router if the wires are not in the right order?
Also unlikely, for the same reasons as above.
--
David Empson
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