LinuxQuestions.org - [SOLVED] New Intel DH55HC motherboard only 10Mb on Gigabit NIC.

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New Intel DH55HC motherboard only 10Mb on Gigabit NIC.

I just built a new system with an Intel DH55HC motherboard and i5 processor. I loaded Fedora 12 x64 on it but I am only getting 10Mb on the NIC. I haven't been able to find any way to get the full Gigabit that the NIC is capable of. It is plugged into a verified 10/100/Gigabit switch. The Intel site says that the Fedora 12 native network drivers should work.

What do I need to do to get the full Gigabit?

If necessary, how do I get the system to rediscover the card and load the correct driver?

Thanks.

There's only one Linux driver for your onboard NIC, and that's e1000e. If it's loaded, you're good to go in theory.
If the auto-negotaition of the NIC doesn't work properly, and it limits you to 10MBit with CSMA/CD, there's probably something wrong with your NIC, its cable, or your switch's port. You can use `mii-tool` to force other modes onto your NIC's PHY (consult its manpage to find out how), but that won't necessarily work, as your inter-networking device will have to agree to the media properties you set.

I'd check all the hardware involved first, or at least another distro with a different kernel version, and see if the problems persists. After all, it _may_ be a driver bug in that specific version of e1000e.

I forgot to report that when I go into the bios the switch does show a Gigabit connection so I am pretty sure all the hardware is good.

I am still finding my way around the guts parts of Fedora, so how do I check what driver is actually loaded? It took a couple of shots at loading the system because I had to change the bios for the SATA drives in order for Fedora to recognize there were any drives installed.

I will check the 'mii-tool' replacement 'ethtool' man pages.

The Intel site mentioned the e1000e driver on Sourceforge but only listed one distro (SLED) that needed to actually download it.

Since your NIC is talking to the rest of your system via the PCI(-Express)-Bus, you can list the driver your OS loaded for it by using `lspci -nnk`. Upgrading to Fedora 13 might solve your isse if it's indeed a driver problem.

The relevant section of output should look something like this:

Code:

00:19.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Intel Corporation 82567LF-2 Gigabit Network Connection [8086:10cd]

        Subsystem: Intel Corporation Device [8086:5002]

        Kernel driver in use: e1000e

        Kernel modules: e1000e

Just ran ethtool -i eth0 and got:
driver: e1000e
version: 1.0.2-k2

I see the Sourceforge site lists the current stable version as 1.1.19.

If I ethtool -s speed 1000 the switch lights drop and then comes back as 10Mb

If I ethtool -s autoneg off
ethtool -s speed 1000
the switch lights stays off. This is using verified good cables and swith using other systems.

Have you done gigabit transfers to whatever your problem box is connected to using that exact cable? I would reckon it's seeing a problem and defaulting back to a safe speed. Why not 100Mb? Often the kernel ~Documentation directory has options to give you a look in at each of these and list options for the modules.

This is weird because I have a similar NIC and I get more than 10 Mb, I don't have all the requirements for Gigabit anyway:

Code:

00:19.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82566DC-2 Gigabit Network Connection (rev 02)

        Subsystem: Intel Corporation Device 0001

        Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- DisINTx+

        Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B- ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR- INTx-

        Latency: 0

        Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 31

        Region 0: Memory at 93200000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=128K]

        Region 1: Memory at 93224000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]

        Region 2: I/O ports at 3400 [size=32]

        Capabilities: [c8] Power Management version 2

                Flags: PMEClk- DSI+ D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0+,D1-,D2-,D3hot+,D3cold+)

                Status: D0 NoSoftRst- PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=1 PME-

        Capabilities: [d0] MSI: Enable+ Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+

                Address: 00000000fee0f00c  Data: 41d1

        Capabilities: [e0] Vendor Specific Information <?>

        Kernel driver in use: e1000e

        Kernel modules: e1000e

Code:

bash-3.1# ethtool eth0

Settings for eth0:

        Supported ports: [ TP ]

        Supported link modes:  10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 

                                100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 

                                1000baseT/Full 

        Supports auto-negotiation: Yes

        Advertised link modes:  10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 

                                100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 

                                1000baseT/Full 

        Advertised auto-negotiation: Yes

        Speed: 100Mb/s

        Duplex: Full

        Port: Twisted Pair

        PHYAD: 1

        Transceiver: internal

        Auto-negotiation: on

        Supports Wake-on: pumbag

        Wake-on: g

        Current message level: 0x00000001 (1)

        Link detected: yes

However, I do usually have to get and compile the driver myself from Intel if I want it to work properly.

To get 1 gigabit, you will need a hub or switch that is capable of handling 1 gigabit. Also the computer that you are trying to connect to have a 1 gigabit NIC. If you connect to other computers with a 100 megabit NIC and you are using a switch and not a hub, your computer with 1 gigabit NIC will slow down to 100 megabits for only those computers that have a 100 megabit. Also the cable matters, so make sure you wire it correctly for 1 gigabit which means that all 4 pairs of wires are connected to the connector. Though not all switches are created equal, so a hub could be acting like a switch and this makes all computers network be set at the lowest speed possible.

The module or driver for Intel 82578DC from sourceforge is not just in SLED. It is also in tar.gz or open source format. You will need the source code for your kernel that you using and others to compile it. If you want to go with the pre-compile route, download the latest kernel version for your distribution. Check the changelogs to make sure it includes the fixes or the problem will still be there and cause other problems.

As a new box setup I wiped the system and switched to F13. Now have Gigabit connection. The problem must have been in F12's driver.

I would have started with F13 but hadn't seen that it was out when I downloaded the ISO for F12.