PRELIMINARY
PCnet-FASTPLUS-KT
Am79C972-Based Evaluation Kit for PCI Systems
DISTINCTIVE CHARACTERISTICS
n
Based on the 10/100 Mbps PCnet-FAST+
(Am79C972) highly integrated Ethernet
Controller
n
Implements a fully functional 10/100 Mbps
Ethernet node using a Peripheral Component
Interconnect (PCI)-based system
n
Supports OnNow power management and
Magic Packet鈩?remote wake-up and power-on
n
Software compatible with all PCnet Family
members
n
Software drivers support all popular Network
Operating Systems
n
Includes Evaluation Board, software driver
diskettes, and supporting documentation
GENERAL DESCRIPTION
The PCnet-FAST+ evaluation kit is a design evaluation
troller. The kit includes an evaluation board with the
Am79C972 Ethernet controller and is designed for
10BASE-T or 100BASE-TX media.
The evaluation board, when installed in a PCI-based
host system, provides a platform for demonstrating the
high performance of the PCnet-FAST+ device, the low
manufacturing cost of a PCnet-FAST+-based solution,
and the overall ease of design. The platform further al-
lows the user to evaluate the network hardware and to
develop software for an Ethernet node based on the
PCnet-FAST+ device.
In addition to the evaluation board, the kit comes with
the AMD Networking CD-ROM, a hardware user鈥檚
manual, the
PCnet Family Network Driver Installation
Guide,
the Am79C972 data sheet, board schematics
and Bill of Materials, and instructions for testing the
Magic Packet remote wake-up technology.
The software includes driver object codes for Novell
NetWare ODI DOS and OS/2, NetWare Server, Mi-
crosoft Windows NT, Windows 95, Window for Work-
groups, LAN Manager, Banyan VINES Client, IBM LAN
Server, SCO UNIX, Artisoft LANtastic/AI, DEC Path-
works, and Packet Driver. Also included are utility pro-
grams for con鏗乬uration of the network adapter card
and software drivers installation, EEPROM con鏗乬ura-
tion, diagnostics, and Magic Packet wake-up.
No hardware jumpers are required for con鏗乬uration.
The PCI system BIOS automatically con鏗乬ures on
power up, the I/O Base Address, interrupt channel, and
DMA channel for the PCnet-FAST+-based Ethernet
adapter card. In addition, AMD provides a low-level
evaluation program to establish connections, and send
and receive messages. The evaluation program allows
the user to view and change the contents of the PCnet-
FAST+
registers, the memory resident Initialization
Block, and the data buffer Descriptor Rings. The pro-
gram also allows the designer to establish loops for
hardware probing.
The PCnet Family Con鏗乬uration and Installation utility
program,
AMINSTAL,
provides an easy user interface
to view the con鏗乬uration of the PCnet-FAST+ evalua-
tion board. The utility program will automatically scan
the system bus(es), which may include IDA, VL, and
PCI to SA+, PCnet-ISA II, PCnet-32, PCnet-PCI,
PCnet-PCI II, PCnet-FAST, and PCnet-FAST+ devices.
With the con鏗乬uration portion of the program, the utility
will 鏗乶d and report to the user, the I/O address, IRQ
channel and DMA channel, assigned to the PCnet-
FAST+
device by the system BIOS. After con鏗乬uration,
the user may use the installation portion of the utility to
install a selected driver and create or modify the CON-
FIG.SYS, AUTOEXEC.BAT, and PROTOCOL.INI OR
NET.CFG 鏗乴es on the user鈥檚 system.
The PCnet-FAST+ evaluation board stores the unique
IEEE physical address in the serial EEPROM. Once
powered up, the Am79C972 device reads the node鈥檚
IEEE physical address from the EEPROM through the
Microwire interface protocol. For more details about the
PCnet-
FAST+
Ethernet Controller also refer to the
Am79C972 PCnet-FAST+
data sheet (PID #21485B)
and the
PCnet Family Technical Manual
(PID #18216).
Publication # 22162 Rev:
A
Amendment/0
Issue Date:
April 1998
This document contains information on a product under development at Advanced Micro Devices. The information
is intended to help you evaluate this product. AMD reserves the right to change or discontinue work on this proposed
product without notice.
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