Bug#726142: Info received (Bug#726142: Realtek NIC (r8169 driver) won't work at gigabit speed, must be forced to 100MB)
On 10/13/2013 11:42 AM, Ben Hutchings wrote:
> - There is no firmware patch for your LAN-on-motherboard chip
> (RTL8168B).
>
> - There is a firmware patch for the chip on the PCIe card (RTL8168D),
> but this was never included in the driver in Debian kernels (except in
> some experimental versions).
>
> The firmware files are patches to the PHY firmware on newer chips that
> generally improve link stability. The driver can and does work without
> them (since 2.6.32-3) but the chip will be less likely to maintain a
> stable gigabit link if the requested patch is not available. Which is
> why I asked...
I think the bug can now be closed. A different cable has fixed it. At
first I thought it was a combination of a different cable and purging
the firmware, plus rebuilding the initramfs, but now I have re-added the
firmware and it still works.
I didn't think the cable was the issue because I had *tried* swapping
the cable out back when the issue first appeared in 2010. I was very
methodical about the troubleshooting and saw zero difference with four
different cables.
I hate wasting people's time, so I'm very careful with troubleshooting.
I am so very sorry!
There is one related but different issue that I noticed. Because I
don't use wake-on-lan, it doesn't affect me right now. When the OS
shuts down and powers the machine off, link is gone. Power must be
completely removed from the power supply to re-establish link while the
computer is off and allow wake-on-lan to work. Is this a bug, or
expected behavior? Is there something that someone could add to
/etc/network/interfaces to re-enable link after deconfiguring the interface?
Thanks,
Shawn
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