On Tue, Feb 06, 2024 at 07:58:40PM -0500, Peter King via talk wrote: > Hello all, > > I have a computer located in the University of Toronto network which shows > some odd network behaviour. For one, I have run speedtest-cli on it > numerous times at various times of the day, and it consistently returns > around 93Mbit upload/download. For comparison, a laptop in the same LAN > seems to get 700Mbit, while a computer in a different part of the UofT > network gets 900Mb/570Mb. > > The NIC has a RealTek chip and uses the r8169 kernel module. Ethtool, which > gives a live report, does list the card as running at 1Gb/s. But that sure > isn't the speed I am getting. > > This same slow computer also has problems if I reboot it remotely: most of > the time it doesn't come up, though dmesg has the card detected. If I start > from a cold boot rather than restart, it comes up correctly most of the > time. In either case just typing in #netctl start <ethernet> starts it up > just fine. I was trying to solve this problem and saw that there are > several complaints along just these lines having to do with the r8169 > module. Some people suggested downgrading to r8101 but that module is even > older. > > If the module isn't working well, that might account for the slower speeds. > > Is there any way to tell? Obviously I can buy another NIC with a different > chipset but don't really want to go to the trouble if there is an easier way > to diagnose the difficulties. > > All advice appreciated! Thanks.
Well if you search for it you will find well over a decade of people complaining about bed throughput on that chip. Some people claim it is a problem with the power management in the driver. I even saw one claiming a recent 6.5 kernel has finally fixed the performance for them. I remember the dlink DGE530T used to be popular because it used a marvell yukon chip with great performance (codeveloped with 3com). Then rev C1 came out. Same model name, same packaging, revision only difference. Used a rebranded realtek 8169. Different driver, much worse performance. Many people stopped specing the 530T since it went from good to garbage because someone made a cost saving revision. I remember it well, and not in a good way. I suggest finding another network card. Cards with an intel chip usually behave well. commit 93a3aa25933461d76141179fc94aa32d5f9d954a Author: Lennart Sorensen <[email protected]> Date: Thu Jul 28 13:18:11 2011 +0000 r8169: Add support for D-Link 530T rev C1 (Kernel Bug 38862) The D-Link DGE-530T rev C1 is a re-badged Realtek 8169 named DLG10028C, unlike the previous revisions which were skge based. It is probably the same as the discontinued DGE-528T (0x4300) other than the PCI ID. The PCI ID is 0x1186:0x4302. Adding it to r8169.c where 0x1186:0x4300 is already found makes the card be detected and work. This fixes https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=38862 Signed-off-by: Len Sorensen <[email protected]> Signed-off-by: David S. Miller <[email protected]> -- Len Sorensen --- Post to this mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe from this mailing list https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk
