kne100tx problems

[jon@brightconsulting.com]

hi.
i just installed redhat 5.2 on my celeron 400 processor with abit bx_6 revision 2 motherboard,
with a kingston kne100tx ethernet adapter.
but it doesn't work.  i always get an error message like no default root to host when
i try telneting to another machine on my lan (giving its static ip address).
as a boot nears completion, right before the loging prompt, my hug shows a lot
of activity.  after a while, my hub partitions my linux machine off the network.
i've disabled all of the networking based services that i know about (samba, named, one or two more),
so i don't know what initiates the activity.
i tried leaving the linux machine off the network until the boot was finshed, and
when i plug it back in, i no longer get all of the activity, but the telnets still don't work.
just for fun, i just switch ip address with another linux machine that i have, and after
rebooting, the other one is ok, and my celeron isn't so it has nothing to do with that.

anyway, during bootup, the kernel refers to my adapter as a digial ds21142/3 model tulip
at 0xe400, 00 c0 f0 3b ae 84 IRQ 12.

tulip-diag adds something about
port select is 100mbps SYM/PCS 100baseTx scrambler halfduplex
transmit started, rx process state "waiting for packets" tx process state idle.

i could gather more info, but in don't know what to gather.

so, question 1, is this likely a hardware problem, device driver problem, or linux problem.
and what step should i take next to either fix or diagnose the problem.
and would i be better off just shelling out another $100 for a card that will work with no problems?
(card recommendations please).

thanks,
jon bright