I have a DE205 ISA card, sticking it into a Compaq Deskpro. SUSE can't use it via the ewrk3 driver (this is the correct driver as other distro's can use it fine).
It keeps referencing ewrk3.ko but so far I've only ever seen .o files on Red Hat, Knoppix

I want to know how a .ko file differs from a .o file.
I'm hoping it will give me some insight as to why it's not working - I get an Input/Output error when I modprobe it using SUSE, but if I boot Knoppix I can do it ok, although I haven't used Knoppix to network it yet to see if there are further problems.

I may be wrong but it's a kernel module

So it's just a naming convention ?
There's no real difference between .ko and .o ?

From kernel 2.6 naming is .ko

The_JinJ is right, it's a kernel module. and the ko is a 2.6 thing

If you can't get it running, make sure that either 1) it was compiled for your kernel, or 2) your kernel doesn't care about versioning. of course 3) that you re-installed it post kernel upgrade, goes without saying.

Finally, not all modules are compatible with all kernels, so make sure if there is some conflict between the two (google is your friend).

1. I was using with SUSE Personal 9.2, so I figured the distro maintainers would include only modules that where compiled explicitly for it.
2. Dunno, I've never looked into this.
3. No kernel upgrade.

The machine has since had other problems, partway through an install of Mandrake 9.2 it complained it couldn't find the hdlist.
So it got half installed and wouldn't boot. As it's a Compaq it has some proprietry BIOS stuff that complained that the drive was screwy, and I haven't been able to get past that.
There's a Compaq system configuration floppy set that I tried, but it crashes out ;p
If I had gotten past this problem, I was also going to try Debian (it was to be a web server, and I wanted to go with something fairly hardened, tried and true).

Thanks for the answers and tips.
I do plan on trying this again later using a different machine (to be aquired). This beast is going in for recycling.

I managed to find this:

http://groups.google.com.au/groups?h...53Dalt.linux.*

So if I had been able to resolve the BIOS crap, I might have had a chance.
I doubt I'll be touching Compaq again with ISA stuff.

I decided not to scap it, and came back to it a few days later.
The error messages are misleading (eg Disk controller failer if the disk is not found), but there's definitely something odd with the system.
Been troubleshooting it again tonight.
If I want to configure IRQ's etc, the Compaq F10 Setup feature is the only way to do it, but I've since blown that partition away.
Apparently it's possible to use some setup boots disks and do it that way without creating the partition, but the disks I've created from Compaq don't work - I get a CSW crash when I try it out.
The Diagnostic disk works ok.

So far, I've been able to install SUSE Personal on it as indicated above.
The ewrk3 doesn't work with it, and that's with only the network card and the video card installed.
Mandrake 10.1 installed on it, and it doesn't like the ewrk3 either.
Mandrake Move 9.2 loaded fine, and it likes the ewrk3 ok. I didn't go on to check the connectivity any further.
The common element is the 2.6 kernel. Mandrake Move uses 2.4, the other distro's use 2.6.

I'm trying a full install of Debian now, and if I get it running, I'll post the results with respect to the network.
FWIW, the machine is a Compaq Deskpro EB/SP. That's what it says at boot up.

It appears the network card is faulty
kernel 2.4 is able to insmod the ewrk3 driver, but it doesn't actually do anything.
kernel 2.6 simply refuses to do it.
Neither card at either end lights up when I used it. This would also explain why my IPCop box didn't like it.

So now I'm looking at getting another network card, but I'd like it to be compatible with debian 3.0r1 if possible.
No point bothering with this thread anymore, given I've figured out what's happening.