Network Card Failed
 

Hello.

I came across something weird: All over a sudden my LAN connections just failed. I looked in the syslog file and I found this:

Dec 2 10:57:13 debian-test kernel: eth1: Link changed: 100Mbps, full duplex
Dec 2 10:57:13 debian-test kernel: eth1: Something Wicked happened! ffff.
Dec 2 10:57:13 debian-test kernel: eth1 : reset not completed !!
Dec 2 10:57:13 debian-test last message repeated 33 times

I did not disconnected the NIC, I didn't have a power failure, the switch connected to the the server (eth1) didn't get disconnected.

What can cause this?

Hi,

Several things can cause this. Possible cable or RJ45 Plug or receptacle failure. A switch failure or power supply glitch. I'm just shooting in the dark but I would swap the cable first or just reset the connectors to see if that helps.

How often does this occur?

Thanks for replying.

This is the first time this happened. I swapped cables and still the same problem. I think the NIC is busted. I put it in another box and that box now won't even boot up.

I tried replacing it with another one but can't get the new one configured. The new NIC (eth1) gets detected:

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:12.0[A] -> GSI 23 (level, low) -> IRQ 233
eth0: VIA Rhine II at 0x1d000, 00:e0:4d:83:4a:9d, IRQ 233.
eth0: MII PHY found at address 1, status 0x786d advertising 01e1 Link 45e1.
ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:04:03.0[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 50
tulip0: MII transceiver #1 config 1000 status 786d advertising 05e1.
eth1: ADMtek Comet rev 17 at 00019c00, 00:E0:4C:0B:22:E3, IRQ 50.


but, when I try to ifconfig eth1 up:

test:~# ifconfig eth1 up
eth1: ERROR while getting interface flags: No such device

test:~# /etc/init.d/networking restart
Reconfiguring network interfaces...SIOCSIFADDR: No such device
eth1: ERROR while getting interface flags: No such device
SIOCSIFNETMASK: No such device
SIOCSIFBRDADDR: No such device
eth1: ERROR while getting interface flags: No such device
eth1: ERROR while getting interface flags: No such device
Failed to bring up eth1.
done.

Note:
The first NIC (damaged) installed was a Encore ENL832-TX-EN Ver2

I am trying to replace it with:
Nexxt NW122NXT13

[color=green]test:~# lspci -tv
-+-[0000:80]---01.0 VIA Technologies, Inc. VIA High Definition Audio Controller
\-[0000:00]-+-00.0 VIA Technologies, Inc. P4M900 Host Bridge
+-00.1 VIA Technologies, Inc. P4M900 Host Bridge
+-00.2 VIA Technologies, Inc. P4M900 Host Bridge
+-00.3 VIA Technologies, Inc. P4M900 Host Bridge
+-00.4 VIA Technologies, Inc. P4M900 Host Bridge
+-00.5 VIA Technologies, Inc. P4M900 I/O APIC Interrupt Controller
+-00.6 VIA Technologies, Inc. Unknown device 6364
+-00.7 VIA Technologies, Inc. P4M900 Host Bridge
+-01.0-[0000:01]----00.0 VIA Technologies, Inc. Unknown device 3371
+-02.0-[0000:02]--
+-03.0-[0000:03]--
+-0f.0 VIA Technologies, Inc. Unknown device 5337
+-0f.1 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82C586A/B/VT82C686/A/B/VT823x/A/C PIPC Bus Master IDE
+-10.0 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller
+-10.1 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller
+-10.2 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller
+-10.3 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller
+-10.4 VIA Technologies, Inc. USB 2.0
+-11.0 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8237A PCI to ISA Bridge
+-11.7 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8251 Ultra VLINK Controller
+-12.0 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6102 [Rhine-II]
+-13.0 VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8237A Host Bridge
\-13.1-[0000:04]--+-03.0 ADMtek NC100 Network Everywhere Fast Ethernet 10/100[ /color]


How can I set it up correctly?

Thanks in advanced for your help.

Hi,

What is assigned eth0?

Do you have the module loaded for the new NIC?

I don't know what was or is wrong with my system. Now, the card that wasn't communicating is now working. I disabled the ACPI Power Management in the BIOS and after that it worked. So, the suspected busted NIC card is now working after buying an additional NIC.

I never had this problem in the past. Has anyone experienced this before?

Is it recommended to enable ACPI on a server?

It could be some type of IRQ conflict or hardware issues with the motherboard, what kind of motherboard is it ?

I actually had such a thing happen on a Gigabyte board due to a JMicron IDE controller, the only way I could stop it is to disable it in the BIOS. It was very difficult to debug such a problem tho, it took several months of trying different things ... luckily I found the problem in the end.

The mother board used on that system is a BioStar P4900 M7FE with a Celeron Processor.

It took me the entire day yesterday to get it resolved.

As I see the SATA controller is integrated with the VIA southbridge, I haven't heard of problems with these, so it's probably something else.