From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1753441Ab0ILTE7 (ORCPT ); Sun, 12 Sep 2010 15:04:59 -0400 Received: from lo.gmane.org ([80.91.229.12]:53153 "EHLO lo.gmane.org" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751913Ab0ILTE6 convert rfc822-to-8bit (ORCPT ); Sun, 12 Sep 2010 15:04:58 -0400 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org From: Heiko Bauke Subject: Realtek Ethernet drivers Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2010 21:04:44 +0200 Message-ID: <20100912210444.76ebeee6@tron.localdomain> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8BIT X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: p54abac24.dip.t-dialin.net X-Newsreader: Claws Mail 3.7.4 (GTK+ 2.20.1; i486-pc-linux-gnu) Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Dear Kernel-Developers, in the last few weeks I spend quite some time trying to fix a network problem on my home server which has two Realtek onboard ethernet cards, lspci-output: 00:0c.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8110SC/8169SC Gigabit Ethernet (rev 10) 00:0d.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8110SC/8169SC Gigabit Ethernet (rev 10) The problem was that sometimes one of the two cards or both obtained «no link» status while all cables where pugged in correctly. After unplugging the power supply and rebooting or after removing the module r8169 and reloading it all links where up again (or maybe not). Searching the web I found that many other users have or had the same or similar problems with this kind of ethernet card. Some users suggested workarounds but none of these did work for me. Only after installing drivers [1] as provided by Realtek my «no link» problems disappeared. Taking into account that the Realtek divers for RT8168 [2] and RT8169 [3] cards seem to be more reliable than the drivers in the Linux kernel tree and that the Realtek drivers [2, 3] are distributed under the terms of the GPL I wonder is there any good reason not to include these drivers into the Linux main source tree? Regrads, Heiko P.S. I am running 2.6.32-24-generic on a 32-bit Ubuntu 10.04.1 LTS box. [1] http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads [3] http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=13&PFid=4&Level=5&Conn=4&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false&Downloads=true [2] http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=13&PFid=5&Level=5&Conn=4&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false -- -- Man könnte viele Beispiele für unsinnige Ausgaben nennen, aber keines -- ist treffender als die Errichtung einer Friedhofsmauer. Die, die -- drinnen sind, können sowieso nicht hinaus, und die, die draußen sind, -- wollen nicht hinein. (Mark Twain, am. Schriftsteller, 1835-1903)