# HCF PCI Modem

## gfunkmonk

I have  Conexant HCF modem, and I downloaded the drivers from http://www.mbsi.ca/cnxtlindrv/hcf/ and built them, they worked fine under Debian, but in Gentoo the modem will work untill a reboot, then then the modem won't be found, and I have to reboot and re-compile the modules to connect again. How can I get the modules to automatically load?

----------

## delta407

 *gfunkmonk wrote:*   

> How can I get the modules to automatically load?

 

Assuming you put the driver name in /etc/modules.autoload and the driver is installed somewhere inside /lib/modules/kernel-version/, everything should be peachy.

----------

## gfunkmonk

Now I get this error when trying to run wvdial without re-compiling the modules first.

```

Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 00000043

 printing eip:

c022a100

*pde = 00000000

Oops: 0000

CPU:    0

EIP:    0010:[<c022a100>]    Tainted: P 

EFLAGS: 00010256

eax: 00000003   ebx: 00000000   ecx: 00000000   edx: ffffffff

esi: ffffffff   edi: c6c07d94   ebp: c6c07d9b   esp: c6c07d30

ds: 0018   es: 0018   ss: 0018

Process modprobe (pid: 29454, stackpage=c6c07000)

Stack: 00030002 00030001 00000202 c891c997 ffffffff c6c07d90 c6c07d94 c022a21b 

       ffffffff 00000000 ffffffff c88c989f ffffffff c89ae720 00000035 c89b1664 

       00000000 c89a23c0 c899f700 c890a71e ffffffff c6c07d90 c6c07d94 c6c07d9b 

Call Trace: [<c891c997>] [<c022a21b>] [<c88c989f>] [<c899f700>] [<c890a71e>] 

   [<c899f700>] [<c8904d11>] [<c88f13c3>] [<c88e89f2>] [<c88e9366>] [<c88e8ea8>] 

   [<c899f5e0>] [<c88e8713>] [<c88e7240>] [<c899f5e0>] [<c88cd566>] [<c892b880>] 

   [<c899f560>] [<c899b8e0>] [<c88cd2b7>] [<c899b380>] [<c899f560>] [<c899f560>] 

   [<c899b928>] [<c899f560>] [<c8966fc0>] [<c899f560>] [<c899e093>] [<c899f560>] 

   [<c899f640>] [<c899e372>] [<c899f5e0>] [<c899ba3f>] [<c899f5e0>] [<c01174db>] 

   [<c899b060>] [<c899f4cc>] [<c899b060>] [<c0109143>] 

Code: 8b 46 44 e9 be fe ff ff 90 8d b4 26 00 00 00 00 57 56 53 83 

 

```

----------

## Hypnos

I am having similar problem.  The modules don't disappear or anything, but the "hsfserial" module hangs on startup, causing a segfault in modprobe, with a dump similar to this (my laptop has a Conexant HSFi modem).  When I do an "lsmod" I see that the "hsfserial" modules i stuck "initializing."  To clear the module I have to reboot.

I've written the driver developer (Marc Boucher) and I'm waiting to hear back.  I've tried just about everything to get it to work ... no luck.

If there's a kernel hacker out there interested in the problem I can forward/post dmesg output, etc.

----------

## mwahl

Hi there,

I have exactly the same problem.  At the moment I'm trying to understand if the problem arises because Gentoo's update-modules kills the module info in modules.conf.

Have a look in your modules.conf right after you have rebuild the modules with hcfpciconfig.

bye..

----------

## gfunkmonk

Well I kinda solved my problem, I had another Distro installed and I used the same drivers under it, and foudn that it added entries to /etc/modules.d/aliases , so I copied them over to Gentoo, and now it works, and the modules load without crashing each start up, just now every now and then Wvdail will just hang, and if i terminate it the modem gets stuck and won't respond untill I reboot...

----------

## mwahl

I kind of tried to get it work differently:

Immediately after compiling the driver modules with hcfpciconfig I copied the last few lines of modules.conf to /etc/modules.d/hcfpci or whatever name you want to give it. Each time update-modules is started it copies the contents of all the files in /etc/modules.d together an builds up modules.conf.

First problem solved. Now when I do

```
cd /dev/ttySHCF0
```

just to see if the device is there, the driver should be loaded.

But ... sometimes it hangs on loading the modules sometimes not...

----------

## Hypnos

 *gfunkmonk wrote:*   

> Well I kinda solved my problem, I had another Distro installed and I used the same drivers under it, and foudn that it added entries to /etc/modules.d/aliases , so I copied them over to Gentoo, and now it works, and the modules load without crashing each start up, just now every now and then Wvdail will just hang, and if i terminate it the modem gets stuck and won't respond untill I reboot...

 

Same here -- happened last night.  Are you on a laptop?  If so, have you found a correlation with suspending?

----------

## gfunkmonk

 *Quote:*   

> 
> 
> Same here -- happened last night. Are you on a laptop? If so, have you found a correlation with suspending?

 

Nope I'm not on a Laptop, and actually I think this problem just started when I updated PPP....

----------

## Hypnos

 *gfunkmonk wrote:*   

> Nope I'm not on a Laptop, and actually I think this problem just started when I updated PPP....

 

Yeah, I think you're right -- the problem started after I did a world update and ppp got replaced.

How to fix it?

----------

## Hypnos

I _think_ I fixed it ....

I surmised that the ppp update broke something in the config.  After a little trial and error, I turned off "async" in /etc/init.d/net.ppp0, and things are working swimmingly so far.

I only have one data point right now ... I'll write back if I turn out to be wrong.

----------

## gfunkmonk

 *Quote:*   

> 
> 
> I _think_ I fixed it ....
> 
> I surmised that the ppp update broke something in the config. After a little trial and error, I turned off "async" in /etc/init.d/net.ppp0, and things are working swimmingly so far.
> ...

 

Sadly this didn't do much for me, it actually made the strange behavior more frequent...

----------

## gfunkmonk

I think I figured it out, I checked through all of my system logs and i've come to the conclusion, that the modules have a problem with the Preemptive Kernel patch that is included in the gentoo-sources. So, I emerged the vanilla-sources and recompiled the kernel, and viola!, problem gone.    :Very Happy: 

----------

## mwahl

What is the Preemptive Kernel patch and is it also included in the XFS sources?

Anyhow, strange enough I can't reproduce the error at module startup anymore...

I don't know what I've changed but it seems to work now.

----------

## Hypnos

That's remarkable, that you even got the model modules to load with 2.4.19+preemption.  Another Gentoo user and I who have the same laptop would have the modules lock up, necessitating a reboot in order to unload them.

I fixed the problem by moving to vanilla 2.4.18.

----------

## steelrose

hi .i also have a conexant/rockwell hcf 56k modem and i downloaded the driver from the url mentioned above.the problem is that i can get this modem work with gentoo 1.2 kernel 2.4.19 r-5.can u tell me exactly what to do to get it work?

----------

## gfunkmonk

tar xvfz hcf*

cd hcf*

make install

hcfpciconfig

then your modem should be avaliable under /dev/ttyHCF0

----------

## steelrose

i successfully installed the driver and connected to the net.but after i reboot the module dissappears.how can i fix it?what is the name of the driver and what files do i have to edit?

----------

