Ethernet adapters vary greatly in performance. In general the newer the
design the better. Some very old cards like the 3Com 3C501 are only useful
because they can be found in junk heaps for $5 a time. Be careful
with clones, not all are good clones and bad clones often cause erratic
lockups under Linux. Read the Ethernet HOWTO for detailed descriptions
of various cards.
Ethernet
- 3Com 3C501 - ``avoid like the plague''
- 3Com 3C503, 3C505, 3C507, 3C509/3C509B (ISA) / 3C579 (EISA)
- AMD LANCE (79C960) / PCnet-ISA/PCI (AT1500, HP J2405A, NE1500/NE2100)
- AT&T GIS WaveLAN
- Allied Telesis AT1700
- Ansel Communications AC3200 EISA
- Apricot Xen-II
- Cabletron E21xx
- DEC DE425 (EISA) / DE434/DE435 (PCI)
- DEC DEPCA and EtherWORKS
- HP PCLAN (27245 and 27xxx series)
- HP PCLAN PLUS (27247B and 27252A)
- HP 10/100VG PCLAN (ISA/EISA/PCI)
- Intel EtherExpress
- Intel EtherExpress Pro
- NE2000/NE1000 (be careful with clones)
- New Media Ethernet
- Racal-Interlan NI5210 (i82586 Ethernet chip)
- Racal-Interlan NI6510 (am7990 lance chip) - doesn't work with more than 16 megs RAM
- PureData PDUC8028, PDI8023
- SEEQ 8005
- SMC Ultra
- Schneider & Koch G16
- Western Digital WD80x3
- Zenith Z-Note / IBM ThinkPad 300 built-in adapter
Pocket and portable adapters
- AT-Lan-Tec/RealTek parallel port adapter
- D-Link DE600/DE620 parallel port adapter
Slotless
- SLIP/CSLIP/PPP (serial port)
- EQL (serial IP load balancing)
- PLIP (parallel port) - using ``LapLink cable'' or bi-directional cable
ARCnet
- works with all ARCnet cards
Token Ring
Amateur radio (AX.25)
- Ottawa PI/PI2
- Most generic 8530 based HDLC boards
Ethernet
ISDN
ISDN cards that emulate standard modems or common Ethernet adapters don't need any special drivers to work.
PCMCIA cards
- See Appendix B for complete list
ATM
Frame Relay
- Xircom adapters (PCMCIA and parallel port) are not supported.