I am aware of the fact that RH9 is no no longer supported but I have this problem for a while that can't seems to be resolved. NIC RTL8169 showed up in /sbin/lspci but is not listed when i am trying configure it. fromthe GUI. I am able to set the ip address using /sbin/ifconfig -a eth0 ip netmask ***.when I tried to configure the gateway got a message saying unreachable.I know the network cable is good because I interchange it and it does work on another pc on the network.I am really trying to get this pc on the internet that's what really stalling my linux progress right now.thanks in advance for any assistance

With this message you could be trying to add a gateway that is not on your network, check that
the gatway address is on the same ip network as your host.

ALso;

Try pinging yourself and the gateway to make sure your ip settings are correct (assuming no firewalls blocking icmp)

lspci will work no matter what, make sure the ip address you are setting is working for your actual ethernat card and not some other device by checking the file /etc/modules.conf or maybe /etc/modprobe.conf to verify that your nic is the device you are confiruring (shown in ifconfig)


(all these assume that the card has a driver detected, if not you may have to compile one, run kudzu or modprobe and then use your card (off the top of my head i dont think rh9 will detect this card)

Good Luck

Thanks for the response endoe and congrat on the Aussie performance in the ashes..the gateway ip address is the one that connects my router to my cable modem so so i sure it's correct 192.168.1.1 my NIC is connected to a Hub I am not sure if that makes and difference. when type this command /etc/modules.conf i get the message bash: /etc/modules permission denied and for this command /etc/modprobe.conf no such file or directory i was able to ping the NIC using loopback but again gateway unreachable

I think what you mean to say is "Network is Unreachable", not "Gateway is Unreachable". /etc/modules.conf is not a command. It's a text file, as is /etc/modprobe.conf. I'm pretty sure your NIC isn't supported in RH9, so you would need to update the kernel; or get the module, compile it, and insert it in the running kernel. After you have the correct module, type "iface eth0 inet dhcp" into the file /etc/network/interfaces. Then, do "ifup eth0" from a terminal.

Now this is where linux becomes really interesting. Now I must do some research about upgrading and compiling the kerne, and the other things you mentioned.