i could not log in to ipp004

i logged onto the ipp004 channel for ippcon.  ipp004 was still up.  i was able to log in.  

<pre>
dmesg said

eth0: too many iterations (6) in nv_nic_irq.
eth0: too many iterations (6) in nv_nic_irq.

ifconfig: 
eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:E0:81:76:28:D4  
          inet addr:166.122.172.18  Bcast:166.122.172.63  Mask:255.255.255.192
          inet6 addr: fe80::2e0:81ff:fe76:28d4/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:4178011097 errors:5071 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:5071
          TX packets:3121207917 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 
          RX bytes:1817354043204 (1733163.8 Mb)  TX bytes:6615798657614 (6309317.2 Mb)
          Interrupt:17 Base address:0xe000 
ifconfig eth0 down
ifconfig eth0 up

eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:E0:81:76:28:D4  
          inet addr:166.122.172.18  Bcast:166.122.172.63  Mask:255.255.255.192
          BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:4178011666 errors:5071 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:5071
          TX packets:3121208036 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 
          RX bytes:1817354098344 (1733163.9 Mb)  TX bytes:6615798667466 (6309317.2 Mb)
          Interrupt:17 Base address:0xe000 

i was able to log into other machines -- looks like nfs unmount requests were suddenly being honors (see /var/log/messages).  sshd still not working on ipp004:

shutting down and restarting sshd:
Aug 30 16:17:23 ipp004 sshd[28291]: Server listening on :: port 22.
Aug 30 16:17:23 ipp004 sshd[28291]: error: Bind to port 22 on 0.0.0.0 failed: Address already in use.
Aug 30 16:17:47 ipp004 sshd[28291]: Received signal 15; terminating.

tried to restart eth0: /etc/init.d/net.eth0 stop, start

eth0: too many iterations (6) in nv_nic_irq.
eth0: no IPv6 routers present
eth0: no IPv6 routers present</pre>