# [SOLVED] r8169 doesn't work on Asus A6T Nb. with 2.6.24-rc3

## all-inc.

Hi,

As I read on http://www.mail-archive.com/debian-kernel@lists.debian.org/msg33169.html I'm not the only one with this Problem.

With 2.6.23 it worked for me. I'm on a amd64 machine.

Some cuts:

***dmesg(from syslog)***

```
Mar  1 17:13:55 [kernel] r8169 Gigabit Ethernet driver 2.2LK loaded

Mar  1 17:13:55 [kernel] eth0: RTL8168b/8111b at 0xffffc20000012000, 00:17:31:e6:39:23, XID 38000000 IRQ 317

Mar  1 17:14:59 [kernel] r8169: eth0: link up

Mar  1 17:16:06 [kernel] NETDEV WATCHDOG: eth0: transmit timed out

Mar  1 17:16:06 [kernel] r8169: eth0: link up

Mar  1 17:18:24 [kernel] NETDEV WATCHDOG: eth0: transmit timed out

Mar  1 17:18:24 [kernel] r8169: eth0: link up
```

the watchdog errors came when I ping'd my router with several packets.

***ifcofig eth0***

```
eth0      Protokoll:Ethernet  Hardware Adresse 00:17:31:E6:39:23  

          inet Adresse:192.168.2.4  Bcast:192.168.2.255  Maske:255.255.255.0

          inet6 Adresse: fe80::217:31ff:fee6:3923/64 Gültigkeitsbereich:Verbindung

          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1

          RX packets:89 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0

          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:92 overruns:0 carrier:0

          Kollisionen:0 Sendewarteschlangenlänge:1000 

          RX bytes:5745 (5.6 Kb)  TX bytes:0 (0.0 b)

          Interrupt:61 Basisadresse:0x2000
```

interesting, all transfer packets get dropped...

I really prefer to use 2.6.24 because wlan support via b43 got improved in this kernel-version...

I hope someone will help me. If you need further information, just ask!

all-inc.

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## Monkeh

It's probably an MSI problem. Boot with pci=nomsi and see what happens.

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## all-inc.

WOW...it works! Thanks.

Please, you have to explain me what this bootparam exactly does and why it helped  :Wink: 

google didn't tell me (well, I didn't spend much time with the search results).

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## Monkeh

It disables Message Signalled Interrupts. Usually they're a good thing, but sometimes they do silly things (like break 8169s.. not that working 8169s are particularly good).

It's probably a chipset bug somewhere, I need to look into it on my laptop a bit further when I get it back.

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## Balage

 *Monkeh wrote:*   

> It's probably an MSI problem. Boot with pci=nomsi and see what happens.

 

You solved my almost half year old problem! Thank you very much!  :Smile: 

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## Monkeh

 *Balage wrote:*   

>  *Monkeh wrote:*   It's probably an MSI problem. Boot with pci=nomsi and see what happens. 
> 
> You solved my almost half year old problem! Thank you very much! 

 

It took me over a year and much manual debugging of the driver to sort it myself.  :Sad: 

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## alienvenom

Confirmed on a ASUS A8JS laptop with kernel 2.6.25. It was freezing at random times when I was doing a remote emerge, couldn't figure out why all dmesg said was that eth0 timed out. Seems to be working now!

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