Pardon me if I leave out any important info. I'm fairly new to using Netware and have just been messing around with it recently.

I'm installing netware 5.1 from a bootable CD. Everything goes fine until it goes to setup the NIC driver. BTW the NIC is an AirLink 101 (shows it has driver compatiblity for netware 5x on the box). Here is what happens:

It goes to a screen where it has Netowrk Boards and Netware Loadable Modules.

I go up to network boards and select that. Then it goes to the Driver name/device name screen. I press Insert from there and it gives me a list of drivers in its database. I press insert again to install from a disk. It scans the floppy drive and detects a driver, which is "RTTSRV.LAN Realtek RTL8139 PCI Fast Ethernet Nic", so I press enter with that selected.

Then it goes to a screen to select a slot, node address, medium type. I have the NIC on slot 1 so I press 1 for slot (also tried 4 incase I was counting from the wrong way), the Node address I select different options (and left it blank once) and for medium type I select Auto.

I go back to the first initial screen where it now says network boards: RTSSRV. I select continue and it says "Loading driver please wait" for several minutes. after 3-8 minutes (varies each time) I get this message:

"The following driver instance failed to load and will be deleted: c:\NWUPDATE\sys\system\RTDSSRV.LAN Slot=1, node=1 mediumtype=auto frame=ethernet_802.2 Name=rtssrv_1_e82 (The device supported by this driver may be disabled)

Any tips on how I can get this NIC installed?

I did the same myself when starting out with Netware (not too long ago).

One would think that slots are arranged commonsensically. Slot 1-4 for example. Unfortunately they aren't. The motherboard or BIOS maker gives each slot a number. In the windows plug and play world we usually do not see this number.

At the moment Netware is trying to discover a card on slot 1, but there is no card there.

So you need to find out the correct slot.

Try this:

1. Try to see if Netware will suggest a device driver for this NIC. Accept this and get Netware up and running. Then at the console type "EDIT AUTOEXEC.NCF" Somewhere in the list of commands you will see the slot for the NIC. Write this down and the other information. Then use NWCONFIG to add your device driver.

If that doesn't work...

2. Before installing Netware, add the driver files to C:\NWUPDATE. Use DOS commands to do this. Then during the install, Netware will use these device drivers to recognize the NIC.

If that doesn't work...

3. Call the NIC maker and see if you can get past the front line of call centre techs, to someone who has dealt with Netware before.

Hope this helps!

"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure." - BILL CLINTON