Getting a DHCP Address in a Red Hat Linux 9.0 Virtual Machine
When a Red Hat Linux 9.0 guest operating system tries to get a DHCP address, the attempt may fail with an error message that states the link is down. On ESX Server, this happens only if you are using the vlance driver for your network connection.
To work around this problem, become root (su -) and use a text editor to edit the following files in the guest operating system. If only one of these files exist, make the change for that file only.
/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth[n]
/etc/sysconfig/networking/devices/ifcfg-eth[n]
In both cases, [n] is the number of the Ethernet adapter — for example, eth0.
Add the following section to each of these two files:
check_link_down () {
return 1;
}

Then run the command ifup eth[n] (where [n] is the number of the Ethernet adapter) or restart the guest operating system.