[conspire] quiet , and mepis 6.5

[Rick Moen]

I wrote:

>   RHEL3
>   RHEL3U5/64: failed on "forcedeth" ethernet driver
>   RHEL3U5/64: failed on "forcedeth" ethernet driver
>   RHEL3U1/64: failed on "forcedeth" ethernet driver
>   RHEL3U1/64: failed on "forcedeth" ethernet driver

That looked slightly wrong, and I just realised that I got the update
levels wrong.  (I was substituting RH's numbering system for one that's
used locally within a firm.)  Those were actually:

RHEL3U8 (_latest_) and RHEL3U5.  Which is pretty eyebrow-raising.

Now, nobody's saying that Nvidia shouldn't keep improving it ethernet
circuitry in its NForce southbridge chipsets, but a _little_ cooperation
with the open source community will ensure that distribution kernels
aren't perennially playing catchup.  When I see that I'm getting a
motherboard with Intel NICs, I don't worry.  When they're Nvidia NICs
(and especially when they are on recently introduced motherboards), I
have to expect nothing but trouble.

In fact, the firms obliged to run RHEL3 on such units for reasons of
compatibility with old software build systems, etc. get driven to fix
them by _adding_ Intel NICs in the PCI-E slots.  How pathetic is that?
They literally have to pretend that the onboard ethernet circuitry isn't
there at all, and buy / install / configure replacements at extra cost.