The r8168 ethernet issues and Welcome (experimental)

General system EndeavourOS installation
1

Just added a new button into Welcome (version 3.2.10-1) that removes the r8168 package. That button appears under tab After Install only if:

  • r8168 is installed
  • there’s no internet connection

When you start Welcome, it checks for the internet connection as usual. The check can take about a minute at most. If the connection doesn’t exist, then you’ll see this window:

noconn

Now you can click the Continue anyway button. If you have r8168 installed, you’ll see the new button:

r8168

If you are sure your network hardware is otherwise OK, you can click the Remove r8168 button to remove the package. Afterwards reboot and check if that helped.

Note that is still experimental, and no guarantees about it.

23 Likes
2

Neat idea! Hope it tests clean…

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3

will it handle module unloading and loading? may happen automatic but will need testing :wink:
Great work again @manuel

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4

I’m not sure, I don’t have that kind of a machine available now. But I’m currently relying on the mother of all remedies: reboot.

So those who have r8168 on their machines, please test this as soon as possible.
Thanks in advance! :sweat_smile:

1 Like
5

i was thinking on prior installation, on live session, there rebooting will not do the trick …
but some like:

sudo pacman -R r8168
sudo rmmod r8168
sudo modprobe r8169

could do the trick may needs extra code to bring up the device…

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6

It is a kernel module (as far as I know) so I guess that sequence of commands will work.

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7

Though

I would suggest to install r8168 in gui

Instead of removing it

The people needing r8168
Is actually so tiny that they might be counted on finger

Using in kernel r8169 is best choice

So do not install r8168 by default

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8

Started to think, why do we install r8168? I remember some users had a problem without it, but is there another solution?

9

I think they had problem with r8169 included in specific kernel version

But its also possible that the problem is gone now
With new kernel

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10

This would support your statement: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Network_configuration/Ethernet#Realtek_RTL8111/8168B.

But Arch wiki is still not saying exactly which adapters need r8168 instead of r8169.

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11

modinfo r8168

But these adaptors are covered in r8169

So there is no real use for r8168

Unless you want to just because it exist

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12

Count me as pleased to see this r8168 issue given upfront attention by the EOS team.

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13

yes seems other way around is legit, but if user needs the r8168 modules and have no internet cause of this… we can not install it, only if we would have it as a package on the ISO.

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14

Thats does not happen

r8168 is only there just incase you have bad ethernet speed

But as of late
r8168 is the one performing worse than r8169

r8168

Causes

Other ethernet cards suported by r8169 stop working

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15

I can use r8168 but when i installed BtrfsonLUKS and am using hibernation and suspend the r8168 would not connect so i uninstalled it and rebooted to the r8169 because both modules were on my system.

16

so hopefully r8168 is not needed on current kernels ?

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Maybe at the install phase we simply install r8168 but don’t use it (rmmod r8168 and remove r8169 blacklisting) by default?
It would still be available in the package cache if needed.

2 Likes
18

Hate to say so, but I just hit a machine that needed it and would not work with the r8169. Installed EOS with no problems, added the LTS kernel after install. When I rebooted to the LTS kernel, no internet connection. I had to add the r8168-lts module to get the internet connection to work with the LTS kernel.

I’ll have to look next time I’m there to see what the motherboard is - its not all that new, but works fine, so long as the r8168 module is available…

19

Could you show the output of:

lspci -vnn | grep Ethernet
1 Like
20

What happens with hibernation and suspend if you

  • install r8168 again
  • run this command:
        sed -i /usr/lib/modprobe.d/r8168.conf -e 's|r8169|r8168|'
  • reboot

If it doesn’t work, then simply uninstall r8168.