  Cable-Modem-mini-HOWTO
  Vladimir Vuksan, vuksan@veus.hr
  v2.6, 26th February 1998

  This document attempts to answer basic questions on how to connect
  your Linux box to cable modem or cable Internet provider.

  1.  Introduction

  The main goal of this document is to get your system running with your
  cable modem, and cable internet provider. Unfortunately, many ISPs
  that provide cable modem services, give you Windows and Macintosh
  software only.

  This document attempts to explain how to setup some cable modems and
  internet providers in Linux, the tricks to get them working correctly,
  and the traps not to fall down. It is hoped that this document will
  assist you, however we make no claims for the validity of the
  information contained within.

  1.1.  New Versions of this Document

  New versions of this document will be periodically posted to
  comp.os.linux.answers.  They will also be added to the various
  anonymous FTP sites who archive such information, including:

  ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO

  In addition, you should generally be able to find this document on the
  Linux Documentation Project page via:

  http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP/

  1.2.  Feedback

  Feedback is most certaintly welcome for this document. Without your
  submissions and input, this document wouldn't exist. So, please post
  your additions, comments and criticisms to vuksan@veus.hr.

  1.3.  Contributors

  The following people have contributed to this mini-HOWTO.

    Dan Sullivan, dsulli@home.com

    Andrew Novick

    Michael Strates

  1.4.  Standard Disclaimer

  No liability for the contents of this documents can be accepted.  Use
  the concepts, examples and other content at your own risk.  As this is
  a new edition of this document, there may be errors and inaccuracies,
  that may of course be damaging to your system.  Proceed with caution,
  and although this is highly unlikely, I don't take any responsibility
  for that.

  Also bear in mind that this is NOT official information.  Obtaining
  official information is usually an impossibility with many ISPs. Much
  content in this document are assumptions, which appear to work for
  people. Use the information at your own risk.

  1.5.  Copyright Information

  This document is copyrighted (c)1998 Vladimir Vuksan and distributed
  under the following terms:

    Linux HOWTO documents may be reproduced and distributed in whole or
     in part, in any medium physical or electronic, as long as this
     copyright notice is retained on all copies. Commercial
     redistribution is allowed and encouraged; however, the author would
     like to be notified of any such distributions.

    All translations, derivative works, or aggregate works
     incorporating any Linux HOWTO documents must be covered under this
     copyright notice.  That is, you may not produce a derivative work
     from a HOWTO and impose additional restrictions on its
     distribution. Exceptions to these rules may be granted under
     certain conditions; please contact the Linux HOWTO coordinator at
     the address given below.

    If you have questions, please contact Greg Hankins, the Linux HOWTO
     coordinator, at

     gregh@sunsite.unc.edu

  2.  The Ethernet Card

  All of the setups below use ethernet cards (network cards) to connect
  you somehow to the Internet. That is why first we need to check if
  your ethernet card is working and most importantly can be used (read
  is supported) in Linux. There is a comprehensive Ethernet HOWTO at
  http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP/HOWTO/Ethernet-HOWTO.html if you would like
  to read it otherwise try this.

  Boot into Linux, During boot up a message like this should appear...

   eth0: 3c509 at 0x300 tag 1, 10baseT port, address  00 20 af ee 01 23,
  IRQ 10.
  3c509.c:1.07 6/15/95 becker@cesdis.gsfc.nasa.gov

  If you missed it type dmesg.

  If you see a message like that you are set and you can go to the next
  section. If you can't see a message like this there are two possible
  explanations, your ethernet card is PNP (plug-n-play) and you need to
  use tools such as isapnptools to get it recognized (I am not quite
  sure on this because I don't have a single PNP card so correct me if I
  am wrong). The other explanation is that you need to set up your card.

  Most cards today come with DOS programs that are used to setup your
  card. For example to get my 3COM 3c509 to work all I needed to do is
  boot into DOS and use a utility to configure my card. There is usually
  a Auto Configure option. If that does not solve your problem try
  changing the IRQ for the card using the same utility. I find that
  usually IRQs 10,11 and 12 work well. If none of this solves your
  problem please read the Ethernet HOWTO referenced above or post to a
  newsgroup such as comp.os.linux.setup or comp.os.linux.networking.
  3.  Your ISP

  If you think you have the card recognized you have to now look at the
  entry for your ISP. I have sorted the information according to a
  provider because setups are mostly ISP specific.

    MediaOne Express

    @Home

    RoadRunner

    Rogers Wave

    Sunflower Cablevision

    Jones Intercable

    GTE Worldwind

    Telstra Bigpond Cable, Australia

    Fibertel, Buenos Aires, Argentina

    Videotron, Montreal, Canada

  3.1.  MediaOne Express

  MediaOne Express is a Internet cable service provided by MediaOne. The
  hardware setup consists of a cable modem produced by LanCity or
  General Instruments which plugs into an ethernet card using a 10BaseT
  (UTP-45) cable. Assignment of IP addresses and other networking
  information is done using DHCP which stands for Dynamic Host
  Configuration Protocol. The only thing you need to do is read the
  DHCPcd mini-HOWTO and configure your system appropriately. There is no
  other necessary configuration. DHCPcd mini-HOWTO can be found at
  http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP/HOWTO/mini/DHCPcd.html

  Information about MediaOne Service can be found at their Web site at
  http://www.mediaone.com.

  3.2.  @Home

  @Home uses a similar setup to MediaOne. However, there are a few
  fundamental differences, outlined by a contributor.

  Before you try anything, go to control panel, network, and properties
  for your network card. Write down all of the information. You will
  need it later.

  TCI, the company that runs @Home issues a Etherlink III 3c509b NIC for
  all of their customers. What TCI does not tell you is that when they
  install your ethernet card, it is in PnP mode. Now in Slakware, if you
  uncomment the proper line for this card, everything will appear to be
  working fine. There will be no system problems, but the 'PC' light on
  your CyberSURFR modem will never turn on. If you are using Slakware,
  and are having this problem, reboot in DOS and skip the next
  paragraph.
  In RedHat5, your system will have some trouble autodetecting the card.
  If you try to pass the paramaters manually, the system will hang. This
  should be obvious that your card is not setup properly. Before wasting
  anymore time, reboot in DOS (This is a must because as of 12/25/97,
  there is no utility written for Linux to turn off PnP and turn on
  ISA.)

  TCI does not give out a utility disk for your ethernet card, so you
  must download the utility from one of 3Com's sites. Here is a direct
  link to the file you need:

  ftp://ftp.3com.com/pub/network-interface-cards/shipping-
  drivers/3c509x.exe

  Once you have downloaded that file, put it in a temporary (or
  permanent) directory. Run it (self-extracting).

  There is a file that will be extracted called 'Pnpdsabl.bat'. You will
  need to run this batch file. Once that is out of the way, your card
  will be set to ISA not PnP. Fortunately, the ISA works in Linux.

  What you've now done has made your ethernet card 'broken' in Windows
  95. You'll need to go to Control Panel, Network, and remove the
  network card and the adapter. Reboot your computer, and again go back
  to control panel. Go to add/remove new hardware, and have it
  autodetect. It will automatically setup the correct i/o address for
  you. You will most likely need to reboot again. Now you should be in
  Windows 95, with the 'PC' light on your cable modem on. You will also
  notice that none of your internet applications seem to work, you can't
  ping, and you can't resolve DNS. You now must go back to control
  panels, network, and click on properties for your network card (not
  the adapter). Re-enter all the data you wrote down, and reboot.

  With a little luck, your ethernet card should be working in Windows
  95, and ready to rock in Linux.

  If you live Hampton Roads, VA you should read a little note from Mark
  Solomon

  With the @home service in Hampton Roads, VA, it is absolutly
  neccessary to run dhcpcd-0.70 (or higher) that supports the "-h"
  option to specify the hostname of your computer.  Without this switch
  the @home dhcpcd server will not assign addresses.

  Information about @Home Service can be found at their Web site at
  http://www.home.com.

  3.3.  RoadRunner

  RoadRunner is an Internet cable service provided by Excalibur Group
  (Time Warner). The hardware setup consists of a cable modem produced
  by Motorola and Toshiba which plugs into an ethernet card using a
  10BaseT (UTP-45) cable. From what I can gather RR uses DHCP for IP
  assignment. In order to set up Linux to use DHCP you need to read the
  DHCPcd mini-HOWTO and configure your system appropriately. DHCPcd
  mini-HOWTO can be found at
  http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP/HOWTO/mini/DHCPcd.html.  If that works out
  for you great, otherwise if it doesn't and you live in San Diego area
  his page might be of help
  http://people.qualcomm.com/karn/rr/index.html.

  Information about RoadRunner Service can be found at their Web site at
  http://www.rr.com.

  3.4.  Rogers Wave

  The hardware setup consists of a cable modem produced by LanCity which
  plugs into an ethernet card using a 10BaseT (UTP-45) cable.

  When the cable modem is installed by Rogers Wave technicians you are
  assigned a static IP address. They should also provide you with
  information on your subnet mask, router (gateway) numbers and DNS
  numbers.  For additional info please visit
  http://home.on.rogers.wave.ca/mreid/rogwave/index.html.

  Other information about Rogers Wave Service can be found at their Web
  site at http://www.rogerswave.ca

  3.5.  Sunflower Cablevision

  This information is provided by Andrew Novick:

  "I recently saw your cable modem howto and I have an addition.
  Sunflower Cable is a company stricly in Lawrence KS, however we have a
  rather large Linux community because of the University of Kansas. On
  our local LUG mailing list, we are starting to get more and more
  questions on how to configure their linux machine for the cable modem.
  It is just regular static addressing, and the modem is made by
  Zenith."

  To configure your Linux box make sure you get all the pertinent
  information from the Cablevision tech support or use these.

    IP address: Assigned by SunFlower Cablevision

    Subnet mask: 255.255.255.0

    Gateway (router) address: 24.124.11.254

    Hostname: Assigned by SunFlower Cablevision

    Domain name: lawrence.ks.us

    Primary DNS server (nameserver): 24.124.0.1

    Secondary DNS server (nameserver): 24.124.0.6

  Have all those numbers written down before you proceed.  To register,
  visit
  http://www.sunflower.com

  To register in the lawrence.ks.us domain contact Stephen Spencer at

  gladiatr@artorius.sunflower.com

  Under RedHat use Control Panel and Network Configuration to put in
  these numbers. Just say Add Interface, Device type=Ethernet, Device
  name=eth0 (this is zero not O in eth0) then fill out all the fields.
  Then click activate.

  In Slackware type netconfig. When you are finished reboot and you
  should be up and running.

  If this doesn't work make sure you do network card troubleshooting
  from the beginning of this document.

  3.6.  Jones Intercable

  This information is provided by Bob Kimble:

  Jones Internet Cable supplies a Hybrid cable modem that connects to
  your machine / network via 10BaseT ethernet. They provide you with a
  static IP address for your machine, and another static IP address for
  the modem. The modem acts as a gateway to their network. Your IP
  address and the modem IP address are on the same network and have the
  same network mask (in my case 255.255.255.0 -- 24 bits). They also
  provide two DNS IP addresses which you enter into your configuration.
  I just entered the numbers when I installed Red Hat Linux 5 and it
  worked like a champ from the beginning.  Since then I have configured
  my Linux machine to enable IP masquerading and domain name services,
  and it now acts as a router for my entire private network. My other
  machines are connected via a private network using the addresses
  192.168.0.x. They are running Windows 95, Windows NT (Intel and Alpha)
  and OS/2. My Linux machine has two IP addresses -- the one from the
  cable company and one from the 192.168.0.x private network. Everything
  works like a champ. All six machines can browse the web
  simultaneously. My kids are even able to connect to their favorite
  game site, "The Realm" from Sierra.

  3.7.  GTE Worldwind

  This information is provided by Mike Hughes:

  The information you provided for Rogers Wave works for GTE WorldWind
  cable modem services also.  However, GTE's service is EXTREMELY slow,
  barely faster than ISDN.  more information at

  http://www.psilord.com

  3.8.  Telstra Bigpond Cable, Australia

  According to Douglas Garstang Linux cannot be used on Telstra's
  network due to proprietory software Telstra is using. Everyone should
  be advised to contact Telstra and demand that they make a Linux port
  of their access software :-). You can e-mail their Helpdesk at
  helpdesk@c3.telstra-mm.net.au

  More details in Douglas' e-mail:

  We have a Cable network here in Australia. It was launched officially
  to the public in May this year and its called "Telstra Big Pond
  Cable".  Telstra, and its daughter company, Telstra Multimedia (who
  run the service) are the main communications carrier here.

  The network uses Motorola Cybersufr cable modems, over HFC available
  to a few million homes in the Sydney and Melbourne areas. Apparently,
  it was the biggest cable rollout ever. (sorry if I sound like a
  salesman...  I used to work for them). The server complexes run
  Hewlett Packard software/hardware primarily I believe. The end user
  software is by NetManage.

  Unfortunately however, the connection between client systems and the
  server complex is partly proprietary and uses some form of internal
  "heartbeat" of some sort with Kerberos authentication. I'd tried with
  Kerberos on Linux, and dhcp but couldnt get any further than
  authenticating with the server complex. There are also all sorts of
  nasty firewalls in place and pretty horrific pricing.

  In short, Linux won't run with the network yet. The powers that be are
  promising big things for early next year.. (this is 1998) so I have my
  fingers crossed!

  3.9.  Fibertel, Buenos Aires, Argentina

  This information is provided by Pablo Godel

  My name is Pablo Godel and want report that I'm using the cable
  service of Fibertel in Buenos Aires, Argentina and it works perfectly
  with Linux.

  They gave me a static IP. The brand of the cablemodem is COM21 and the
  model is ComPort.

  I connect it to the nic properly configured in Linux and worked
  perfectly.

  More information about Fibertel can be found at

  http://www.fibertel.com.ar

  3.10.  Videotron, Montreal, Canada

  I don't have much information about Videotron except the fact that
  they use DHCP for the assignment of IP addresses and other networking
  information. Just read the DHCPcd mini-HOWTO and configure your system
  appropriately. There is no other necessary configuration. DHCPcd mini-
  HOWTO can be found at

  http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP/HOWTO/mini/DHCPcd.html

  Information about Videotron can be found at their Web site at
  http://www.videotron.ca

