topic title: Ethernet connection problem
Posts: 177
rmcellig
Joined: 04 Mar 2014
#1
From time to time, my Ethernet connection disconnects. The only way I can get it back is by restarting my computer. The Ethernet cable is fine. I have another computer next to this one that works fine with a wired Ethernet connection as well.

Any ideas why this happens?

I'm running MX-14.2

BTW, I am really liking MX-14!!
Posts: 4,164
rokytnji
Joined: 20 Feb 2009
#2
Run

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dmesg | tail
Posts: 21
Jon_J
Joined: 21 Jan 2014
#3
I have the same problem with ethernet.
I'm running MX-14.4
Right now ethernet is working, but sometimes it is not connected when booting MX-14.4
Here is dmesg | tail for this boot. I'll need to save a copy of dmesg | tail when my ethernet fails to connect,

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$ dmesg | tail
[   15.066313] FS-Cache: Netfs 'nfs' registered for caching
[   15.119674] Installing knfsd (copyright (C) 1996 okir@monad.swb.de).
[   15.221283] r8169 0000:03:00.0 eth0: link down
[   15.221291] r8169 0000:03:00.0 eth0: link down
[   15.221307] IPv6: ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready
[   16.912997] r8169 0000:03:00.0 eth0: link up
[   16.913008] IPv6: ADDRCONF(NETDEV_CHANGE): eth0: link becomes ready
[   18.029799] input: ACPI Virtual Keyboard Device as /devices/virtual/input/input13
[   20.362729] lp: driver loaded but no devices found
[   20.542079] ppdev: user-space parallel port driver
bill@mx1:~
Posts: 177
rmcellig
Joined: 04 Mar 2014
#4
Here are my results:

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randy@mx14:~
$ dmesg | tail
[   28.252437] r8169 0000:03:00.0 eth0: link up
[   28.252451] IPv6: ADDRCONF(NETDEV_CHANGE): eth0: link becomes ready
[   37.101750] fuse init (API version 7.22)
[   43.101435] Key type dns_resolver registered
[   43.124590] FS-Cache: Netfs 'cifs' registered for caching
[   43.124628] Key type cifs.spnego registered
[   43.124638] Key type cifs.idmap registered
[ 1171.880249] perf samples too long (2501 > 2500), lowering kernel.perf_event_max_sample_rate to 50000
[ 1841.457468] r8169 0000:03:00.0 eth0: link down
[ 1846.331791] r8169 0000:03:00.0 eth0: link up
randy@mx14:~
Posts: 2,238
dolphin_oracle
Joined: 16 Dec 2007
#5
hmmm...both with the same realtek r8169 chipset. doing some quick google-fu leads me to believe that kernels after 3.12 sometimes have a problem with that particular driver. (reports noted from 3.13 up to 3.16)

so if you have a 3.12 kernel, or maybe a later kernel, you could try that.
Posts: 325
male
Joined: 04 Nov 2011
#6
as root

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ethtool eth0
...
...
Link detected: yes / no
live in the terminal:

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mii-tool --watch eth0
supplementary to D.O.

========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"http://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/Installation_des_r8168-Treibers/en"
linktext was:"http://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/Instal ... reibers/en"
====================================
Posts: 177
rmcellig
Joined: 04 Mar 2014
#7

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$ sudo ethtool eth0
Settings for eth0:
    Supported ports: [ TP MII ]
    Supported link modes:   10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 
                            100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 
                            1000baseT/Half 1000baseT/Full 
    Supported pause frame use: No
    Supports auto-negotiation: Yes
    Advertised link modes:  10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 
                            100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 
                            1000baseT/Half 1000baseT/Full 
    Advertised pause frame use: Symmetric Receive-only
    Advertised auto-negotiation: Yes
    Link partner advertised link modes:  10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 
                                         100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 
    Link partner advertised pause frame use: Symmetric Receive-only
    Link partner advertised auto-negotiation: Yes
    Speed: 100Mb/s
    Duplex: Full
    Port: MII
    PHYAD: 0
    Transceiver: internal
    Auto-negotiation: on
    Supports Wake-on: pumbg
    Wake-on: g
    Current message level: 0x00000033 (51)
                   drv probe ifdown ifup
    Link detected: yes
randy@mx14:~
Posts: 177
rmcellig
Joined: 04 Mar 2014
#8
dolphin_oracle wrote:hmmm...both with the same realtek r8169 chipset. doing some quick google-fu leads me to believe that kernels after 3.12 sometimes have a problem with that particular driver. (reports noted from 3.13 up to 3.16)

so if you have a 3.12 kernel, or maybe a later kernel, you could try that.
Where can I install the 3.12 kernel from? The current repos that come with MX-14? So after installing this kernel I can just reboot and select that one from the Grub menu? I just want to make sure before I proceed.
Posts: 2,238
dolphin_oracle
Joined: 16 Dec 2007
#9
well....there is no longer a 3.12 kernel available. apparently it was a wheezy-backports kernel. You could try one of the antiX kernels. 3.7.10-antix-7-pae is the one I use on my antiX install and I don't have any problems with it. There is a 3.11 available as well. Just don't get the"gnu" versions as they might not work with proprietary firmwares.

Here's a video I did on antiX sometime ago. The process is just about the same, except that grub in antix is grub-legacy and the grub in MX is grub2, so the editing menu.lst info is not applicable but the"update-grub" command is the same.
========= SCRAPER REMOVED AN EMBEDDED LINK HERE ===========
url was:"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yaNXF9ZffM"
linktext was:"Antix 13 Stable - Install a different kernel"
====================================


at any rate, don't remove your current kernel until (unless) you find a better working option for your situation. you can always pick the older one from boot if need be.
Posts: 88
kmathern
Joined: 25 Aug 2012
#10
dolphin_oracle wrote:well....there is no longer a 3.12 kernel available. apparently it was a wheezy-backports kernel. ...
The 3.12 series kernel that the first couple MX-14 releases used was from the Debian wheezy-backports repo, but it was removed from the wheezy-backports repo last fall.

You can still get it from a snapshot.debian.org repo, like this one for instance:

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deb http://snapshot.debian.org/archive/debian/20140825T100206Z/ wheezy-backports main contrib non-free
When doing a 'apt-get update' with that repo enabled you also need to add '-o Acquire::Check-Valid-Until=false' to the update command or the repo will be ignored, because it's release file expired a week after the snapshot. So use the following to update:

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sudo apt-get -o Acquire::Check-Valid-Until=false update
After you install the 3.12 kernel, I would disable or remove the snapshot repo, so you don't need to keep using the '-o Acquire::Check-Valid-Until=false' option when updating.


Btw the 3.14 kernel that's currently being used was also originally from the Debian wheezy-backports repo, and was also removed from it. Tim downloaded the 3.14 kernel packages from snapshot.debian.org and added them to MX-14's xfce-4.10/main CR repo. If you ask him he might do the same with the 3.12 kernel packages.
Posts: 667
jdmeaux1952
Joined: 01 Nov 2013
#11
dolphin_oracle wrote:well.... There is a 3.11 available as well. Just don't get the"gnu" versions as they might not work with proprietary firmwares.
.
The"gnu" versions do not work on some of the older ethernet chipsets like the r8169 since Debian kind of dropped the ball there. The"gnu" versions do help with the wireless connection but failed with the wired.