cable modem install on Linux

[chriscl]

Hi,

Although you can get it to work via USB on some linux distros, you could initially struggle with Slackware. While Slack has all the usual USB modules available in it's kernel source tree, if you've installed Slack with one of the 'vanilla' kernels, you will have some USB services (USB Storage, for example) you may find that the USB driver support for 'external' cable-modems isn't compiled in by default. (I'm currently running Slack 9.1)

If you wanted, you could recompile to include support for your USB CM (as it's in the kernel source somewhere I'm sure!) but in all honesty, the better option is as discussed above - use a Network Card. If you don't want to use an NIC, or have an NIC in your linux box in use already, consider a cheap router (which you can pick up for around £70-odd) which will also do as you wish, and makes it much easier to share your BB connection.

I have a Netgear wireless router plugged in to my cable modem, and my Slackware boxes connect to that to share the broadband connection. Simple and easy to set up, and also somewhat more secure than plugging your 'box directly in to the internet!!

HTH!

[Jonboy]

i agree just wack in a nic card and linux will sort the rest

[dropoffpoint]

Using slackware, although admittedly on freeserve dsl now - usb speedtouch modem which won't be the same as yours I guess.

You could try a search on

http://sourceforge.net

or

http://freshmeat.net

for whatever modem you've got and see if it comes up with anything, of course though banging in a £15 network card into your computer is an even easier option.

[molvistan]

ok, heres the million pound question.

how the hell do i set the modem up using a net card. my computer has an onboard NIC (intel). the NIC is detected by all linux distros (obviously) its assigned eth0, i plugged the ethernet cable into my computer and modem. then ran the command:
dhcpcd -d

the console window hung for a while then back to the prompt, but no net service.

i tried booting using a knoppix CD (USB modem works on knoppix cuz its smart), but ethernet didnt.

By the way my NIC is definately working cuz i've tested it.

Help me Please!

[philip.j.fry]

Originally Posted by molvistan

Help me Please!

The way I'd do it is thus (BTW I haven't tried this, I set it all up at install time):

Turn off your pc
Turn off the CM
Plug the CM into the NIC
Turn the CM back on
Turn the pc on
Log on as root or go superuser (same thing really)
run netconfig and follow the instructions, use anything you like as hostname domain name, set it to use dhcp on you nic (eth0).
Restart the pc, and hopefully you've got a working connection

[dropoffpoint]

And if you are choosing to run dhcpcd manually you should pass the appropriate interface to it ( as an aside -d parameter means log output from to syslog)

dhcpcd -d eth0

or whatever the interface number is