PXI ethernet activation requires initializing motion control?

[pmartin]

On a PXI with multiple 7344 motion control cards and an ethernet LAN connection, ethernet does not become active (e.g., flickering LED on the PXI controller connector) until the 7344 card is initialized. Shouldn't ethernet become active as part of booting up?

[jws]

Would you mind giving some details about the controller you are using and the operating system?

I presume that w/ the 7344 cards removed the ethernet connection works well.

[pmartin]

The behavior is no longer reproducible, although several combinations of booting and plugging in the Ethernet cable were explored. LAN access is now available promptly upon booting or connecting the cable, as expected. A residual explanation might be that Win2K on the PXI 8175 controller did not fully respond when DHCP on the local router/firewall changed the PXI's IP address, due to changes in the network configuration. In this case, initializing the 7344 cards is taken as an event that caused the OS to complete LAN activation. Many other events with other hardware might have had the same effect.