Mandrake and NICs

Make sure that your DHCP client is installed. Here is some documentation from RedHat:
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RedHat 6.x and Mandrake 6.x
DHCPcd configuration under RedHat 6.0+ is really easy. All you need to do is start the Control Panel by typing control-panel.

Select "Network Configuration"

Click on Interfaces

Click Add

Select Ethernet

In the Edit Ethernet/Bus Interface select "Activate interface at boot time" as well as select "DHCP" as "Interface configuration protocol"

Please note that in RedHat 6.x Redhat as default includes a DHCP client called pump instead of above mentioned dhcpcd. CD-ROM does include dhcpcd RPM so if you have no luck with pump try with dhcpcd. After you install dhcpcd (e.g. rpm -i dhcpcd-1.3.17pl2-1.i386.rpm) you will have to make some changes.

Additional notes from Alexander Stevenson :

I had no luck with DHCPcd. What finally worked for me was "pump", which comes with Linux Mandrake 6.0 (and so I assume it is included with RedHat as well). The command I used was:

pump -i eth0 -h hostname

It didn't matter what "hostname" was, but without it the server would not respond.

I then changed the line in my /sbin/ifup script to reflect the change; the default version does not have the -h switch, and so didn't work for me.

Basically, if you're using linuxconf, and after setting the adapter to "DHCP" it still doesn't work, try adding a "-h hostname" to the pump line in the /sbin/ifup script. My script now looks like this:

...
if [ -n "$PUMP" ]; then
echo -n "Determining IP information for $DEVICE..."
if /sbin/pump -i $DEVICE -h hostname; then
echo " done."
else
echo " failed."
exit 1
fi
else ...

Another more elegant way to add hostname field is provided by Aad van der Klaauw:

Currently i'm configuring a gateway system at home, needed to set the MAC address and use the '-h hostname' workaround. So I decided to *not* change the script but to use the configure file. In my /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 I have added the following

DEVICE="eth0"
MACADDR="00:11:22:33:44:55"
DHCP_HOSTNAME="trigger_for_terayon"

Which will survive upgrades, and is imho a "cleaner" way.

That is it. Reboot your machine or type /sbin/ifup eth0 on the command line.
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Another good source is Cablemodeminfo.

The Linksys router acts as a DHCP server, your computer will be a DHCP client. For some reason, during install sometimes the DHCP client is not installed.

Hope this helps.

Thanks, I'll get back to my box right after I eat.
I'll let you know how it goes.

Thanks!

Good news: Box was ok.. router firmware was 0.0.5 versions behind. Upgraded it, and the thing started working.

I had my cousin come over, and his box stopped working, so we knew something was wrong with the network. We checked my router, and he noticed that my firmware wasnt up to date.

Bad news: here