Almost Broke My New T42P: Problem Ejecting Type 3 PC Card

[RogerBlake]

Well, I nearly broke my new T42P today :-( A serious problem with a new Intel Pro/100 SR Network Card - which jammed rock solid in the PC Card socket. This was the type 3 card with integrated RJ45. I'm not such whether the problem is with this particular card, or the T42P, or with type 3 cards in general ?.

Has anyone else had a similar experience ? I had to pull out the card with pliers and in the process damaged the RJ45 connector - luckily this £60-£70 card cost me only £10 on ebay. There is virtually nothing to grip to extract this card if the T42P ejector does not have enough leverage.

The intel card is made of plastic and not nearly as solid as two other type 2 3COM cards I acquired recently. However I'm also a bit concerned about the plastic card ejectors used in the T42P - possibly these are bending internally under the force. Better if they were made of metal ?

Has anyone else had a similar mishap, and what type 3 cards have folks used with no problem in the T42P ? (The metal cased 3Com type 2 cards eject with no problem at all)

Apart from this one really bad experience I'm generally enjoying using the T42P - My other really big moan is the lack of a decent hardcopy manual. At £2230 I think IBM could run to including some decent documentation. ("discharge the battery" says the online manual not very helpfully - yeh right, and what button is that ? ... but, believe it or not, there is actually a menu option to do that ! - and I'd bet not many people knew it ! ) It's generally a very impressive system if IBM would only tell you about all the goodies they've put in.

[sktn77a]

Just for curiosity, why did you need a PCMCIA card when the T4x comes with a built-in ethernet port?

[lfeagan]

I have the same card as you do, mine is Xircom labeled, but it is the same form factor, and I tried plugging it into my T42 and it was a more snug fit than I am used to, but it did go in all the way and popped out just fine using the blue ejector thingies. All I can say is I suggest being gentle but still using force to get it out. Make sure you don't do anything but push straight in and out.

As for the two ethernet cards question, I have a lot of good reasons such as using your computer as a bridge and then analyzing the traffic passing through it. Or wanting to be on two typically physically seperate networks simultaneously for some sort of analysis.

[RogerBlake]

thanks for the replies. Interesting that the the Xircom card is fine.
Perhaps that's why my card was reduced to only £10 on ebay :-)

I actually wanted three wired ports ! Plan to use the laptop
partly as a network diagnostics device and unfortunately I'll need to hot-swap between wired and wireless - since the built-in mini-pci Centrino 2200 doesn't yet support monitoring mode under Linux.