Hello,

I've never encountered such a problem and I am awestruck. I installed Ubuntu 7.10 on a desktop PC and everything works fine, except... even though the network cable is plugged in, Ubuntu won't connect to the network. Even with static IP it won't connect.
I am using a SIS 900 PCI Fast Ethernet card that is on-board.

Please anyone, help me.

Yours sincerely,
Karloman

What else have you tried so far? Two easy things to play with are ethtool and ifconfig, just enter them in a terminal as root and see what happens. ifconfig should give you the device number assigned to your ethernet device:

Then you can see what it supports:
There's plenty more but this might get you going.

I remember that in Windows, it couldn't receive an ip from my dhcp-server unless the card was set to half duplex at 10 mbps.
So I've did this with
and it changes (after ifdown and ifup), but ethtool eth0 says there's no link. So I reconnect the cables, now ethtool says it has a link, but when I try to contact my dhcp server it goes back to link. think the card is rubbish?

I have the same ethernet controller and never had any problems with it. Ubuntu should support it 100%. What kind of network are you trying to connect to?

just regular 4 port router/dls-modem.

And the cables you're using? Length? The reason why I'm asking this is because I think it's an external factor that is causing your network connection problems. The SIS 900 PCI Fast Ethernet card should work out of the box. I have to admit I never installed Ubuntu on my box so it could be an Ubuntu issue but you're also referring to Windows having problems with it. My Windows installation works flawlessly with the SIS 900 PCI Fast Ethernet card also.

custom cables length about 3metres...

First things first, DHCP can be a bit touchy and you don't need it so configure a static IP address, then try pinging the gateway to see if that works.

distro, ubuntu edgy, sis900 (onboard ethernet)

I had a problem where the network card wouldn't acquire an IP address from the router, something to do with the card's designated mac address.
A bit of google scratching fixed it (see below).

this worked for me

(using 2 lines in terminal)

http://www.irongeek.com/i.php?page=security/changemac
===============================
then I made it more permanent. Opened a terminal window , edited the interfaces file

commented out the 1st line & added a 3rd

(3rd line might need indenting)
saved and closed. then via terminal typed
sis900 card worked after restart

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/ubunt...ess-on-ubuntu/

Another possibility for anyone who is experiencing a similar problem is that the OS has placed your SIS900 ethernet device at eth1 instead of eth0. So edit /etc/networking/interfaces with and add the lines: then save and close and in a terminal type This change will survive a reboot.