DHCP problem

[boppen]

Hello folks!

I have some problems with getting the vomp-dongle to my MVP - I got it working a few times (but it took a long time - maybe like 30 minutes until the MVP has finished loading the dongle?)
But after a restart of the machine I cant get it working! :-( /var/log/messages just says

Sep 18 21:12:27 digestive dhcpd: DHCPDISCOVER from 00:0d:fe:00:3f:f6 via eth0
Sep 18 21:12:27 digestive dhcpd: DHCPOFFER on 192.168.0.41 to 00:0d:fe:00:3f:f6 via eth0
Sep 18 21:12:54 digestive dhcpd: DHCPDISCOVER from 00:0d:fe:00:3f:f6 via eth0
Sep 18 21:12:54 digestive dhcpd: DHCPOFFER on 192.168.0.41 to 00:0d:fe:00:3f:f6 via eth0

And so on, and so on ... I cant understand what went wrong - I've tried to fetch the dongle from the tftp-server (tftp-hpa) with some windows client and that worked.

Maybe someone can post a working dhcpd.conf if that is the problem - mine is loking like this:

ddns-update-style ad-hoc;

default-lease-time 600;
max-lease-time 7200;
option subnet-mask 255.255.255.0;
option broadcast-address 192.168.0.255;
option routers 192.168.0.1;
option domain-name-servers 192.168.0.1;

subnet 192.168.0.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {
        range 192.168.0.10 192.168.0.29;
}
host MVP {
        hardware ethernet 00:0D:FE:00:3F:F6;
        filename vomp-dongle;
        fixed-address 192.168.0.41;
}


But - what I saw of vomp-server before the restart was really nice - I had some problem with the quality of live-tv and recordings (really "choppy" and block artefacs all the time) but I will try with a vanilla VDR instead and I think it might work better! (if I just get that bloody dongle to my MVP

/Boppen

[davep]

This is my dhcpd.conf. Some of the settings are Mandriva defaults, so I don't claim that everything is essential. The obvious difference is the "next-server" line, though the dhcpd man page states that one is not necessary if the TFTP server is on the same machine.

ddns-update-style none;
subnet 10.0.0.0 netmask 255.0.0.0 {
   option routers 10.0.0.1;
   option subnet-mask 255.0.0.0;

   default-lease-time 21600;
   max-lease-time 43200;

group {
  next-server 10.0.0.1;          # IP address of your TFTP server

  host mvp {
           hardware ethernet 00:0d:fe:00:16:fe;
           fixed-address 10.0.0.127;
           filename "dongle.bin";
      }

}

}

[Chris]

Yeah, the only thing that could make a difference I am seeing here between the two configs posted here and my own is that there are quotes around the tftp file name. But if dhcpd doesn't complain about that I doubt it's a problem. In between the two DHCP requests and offers does your MVP reboot? How many blue blocks does it display before rebooting?

Just for info, the log looks ok as far as it goes, the next line in your system log should be a tftp server log line. I'm surprised it's not there. Is your distro a debian based one? If so there might be more detail in /var/log/syslog rather than messages.

[boppen]

Hi!

Thanks for the replies, I will try this configs instead.

Bto start up?ut sometime last night I think the MVP got a IP and downloaded the dongle, I can't see anything in messages about it but in vompserver.log I can see that it got up and running! Quite strange that it takes this time to get the IP-address?
But I'm at a customer at the moment so I can't check if it really works until in the evening.

I'm running gentoo with syslogng I think so I only have /var/log/messages.

About the blue blocks so is it pending between one and two blocks - and I don't think there are any restarts of the MVP, it flickers a little, little (like for 0,5 s) when it goes back from two to one block but that can't be a restart?

/boppen

[Chris]

It certainly sounds like there is something strange going on there. And yes, you are right it isn't a full reboot, it just restarts the process of getting an IP/TFTP etc. The number of blocks tells where the MVP is in the process, not that I can remember what they all mean...

Do you have another DHCP server on your LAN? A broadband router for example? Any strange firewalling going on with the Linux box? Did the Windows software work properly?

I'm scraping for answers now......!

[boppen]

Hi!

As I said tonight the MVP got the IP and dongle correctly - so when I came I could use the MVP to watch TV. But then I saw that 0.0.12 was released and I wanted to test that, so ... I modified my dhcpd.conf a little so it looked a bit more like the configs I've got, and restarted the MVP ... and it was up and running in a few seconds with the new dongle (well, maybe a minute)! So I restared it again and again and again and it worked all times! Great!

Might it have been some problems with my old dhcpd.conf? From the beginning I didn't have any default-lease time or such in it, can that be the problem? But now it seems to work!

And the Windows software worked for me and I dont have any other DHCP-server or any firewall on my Linux box - but now it works and I'm really happy!

Btw, the OSD feels a lot faster in 0.0.12 - Great!

Thanks all for the help!

[Chris]

Glad it's working!

I don't really see how those extra lines could make much difference in the dhcpd.conf but hey, if it works now...

[AronSira]

I originally used the following lines in dhcpd.conf before I switched to mvploader:

host mvp {
    fixed-address 192.168.0.50;
    hardware ethernet 00:0d:fe:xx:xx:xx;
    allow bootp;
    server-name "192.168.0.3";
    filename "dongle.bin";
}

And for the server itself it might be necessary to have an entry in /etc/hosts like
127.0.0.1 localhost
192.168.0.3 server

But if it works now ...

Greets,
Robert

[boppen]

Does fixed-address mean the same as server-name? E.g. is it the TFTP-server?

/Lars

[Chris]

No, fixed-address is the address given out to the MVP. Server address is something different, it is the next server for the client.