e1000 card problems

Message

omschaub · Post by **omschaub** » Wed Sep 06, 2006 12:33 pm

I have a relatively new Gentoo install that I am using as a router (Home Router Guide), also as a Samba server. I wanted a good network card for it so I got an Intel Gigabit card.

00:0b.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82541PI Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 05)

I compiled in the e1000 driver directly into the kernel and rebooted. Now, I am having some serious problems. Every time I try to transfer large files (30MB+) the network resets. Also, the internet periodically resets as well when using a computer behind the machine.

The real problem seems to be showing up in dmesg:

e1000: eth0: e1000_clean_tx_irq: Detected Tx Unit Hang
Tx Queue <0>
TDH <c9>
TDT <e4>
next_to_use <e4>
next_to_clean <c6>
buffer_info[next_to_clean]
time_stamp <210fd1>
next_to_watch <ca>
jiffies <21128d>
next_to_watch.status <0>
e1000: eth0: e1000_clean_tx_irq: Detected Tx Unit Hang
Tx Queue <0>
TDH <c9>
TDT <e4>
next_to_use <e4>
next_to_clean <c6>
buffer_info[next_to_clean]
time_stamp <210fd1>
next_to_watch <ca>
jiffies <211355>
next_to_watch.status <0>
e1000: eth0: e1000_clean_tx_irq: Detected Tx Unit Hang
Tx Queue <0>
TDH <c9>
TDT <e4>
next_to_use <e4>
next_to_clean <c6>
buffer_info[next_to_clean]
time_stamp <210fd1>
next_to_watch <ca>
jiffies <21141d>
next_to_watch.status <0>

This is repeated a LOT of times in dmesg.

Any ideas? Any help?

TIA!

Obligatory emerge --info

Portage 2.1-r2 (default-linux/x86/2006.0, gcc-3.4.6, glibc-2.4-r3, 2.6.17-gentoo-r6 i686)
=================================================================
System uname: 2.6.17-gentoo-r6 i686 AMD Sempron(tm) 2400+
Gentoo Base System version 1.12.4
ccache version 2.3 [enabled]
app-admin/eselect-compiler: [Not Present]
dev-lang/python: 2.4.3-r1
dev-python/pycrypto: 2.0.1-r5
dev-util/ccache: 2.3
dev-util/confcache: [Not Present]
sys-apps/sandbox: 1.2.17
sys-devel/autoconf: 2.13, 2.59-r7
sys-devel/automake: 1.4_p6, 1.5, 1.6.3, 1.7.9-r1, 1.8.5-r3, 1.9.6-r2
sys-devel/binutils: 2.16.1-r3
sys-devel/gcc-config: 1.3.13-r3
sys-devel/libtool: 1.5.22
virtual/os-headers: 2.6.11-r5
ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="x86"
AUTOCLEAN="yes"
CBUILD="i686-pc-linux-gnu"
CFLAGS="-O2 -march=athlon-xp -pipe"
CHOST="i686-pc-linux-gnu"
CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/kde/3.5/env /usr/kde/3.5/share/config /usr/kde/3.5/shutdown /usr/share/X11/xkb /usr/share/config"
CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/env.d /etc/env.d/java/ /etc/gconf /etc/java-config/vms/ /etc/terminfo"
CXXFLAGS="-O2 -march=athlon-xp -pipe"
DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles"
FEATURES="autoconfig ccache distlocks metadata-transfer parallel-fetch sandbox sfperms strict"
GENTOO_MIRRORS="ftp://distro.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/dist ... ns/gentoo/ http://distro.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/dis ... ns/gentoo/ ftp://ftp.gtlib.gatech.edu/pub/gentoo http://www.gtlib.gatech.edu/pub/gentoo ftp://mirror.iawnet.sandia.gov/pub/gentoo/ ftp://ftp.ussg.iu.edu/pub/linux/gentoo http://gentoo.chem.wisc.edu/gentoo/ ftp://gentoo.chem.wisc.edu/gentoo/ "
PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages"
PORTAGE_RSYNC_OPTS="--recursive --links --safe-links --perms --times --compress --force --whole-file --delete --delete-after --stats --timeout=180 --exclude='/distfiles' --exclude='/local' --exclude='/packages'"
PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp"
PORTDIR="/usr/portage"
SYNC="rsync://rsync.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage"
USE="x86 X alsa apache2 apm arts avi berkdb bitmap-fonts cli crypt cups dbus dlloader dri eds emboss encode esd firefox foomaticdb gdbm gif gnome gpm gstreamer gtk gtk2 hal imlib isdnlog jpeg kde libg++ libwww mad mikmod motif mp3 mpeg ncurses nls nptl nptlonly ogg opengl oss pam pcre pdflib perl png pppd python qt3 qt4 quicktime readline reflection sdl seamonkey session spell spl ssl svg tcpd truetype truetype-fonts type1-fonts udev unicode vorbis xml xmms xorg xv zlib elibc_glibc input_devices_keyboard input_devices_mouse input_devices_evdev kernel_linux userland_GNU video_cards_apm video_cards_ark video_cards_ati video_cards_chips video_cards_cirrus video_cards_cyrix video_cards_dummy video_cards_fbdev video_cards_glint video_cards_i128 video_cards_i740 video_cards_i810 video_cards_imstt video_cards_mga video_cards_neomagic video_cards_nsc video_cards_nv video_cards_rendition video_cards_s3 video_cards_s3virge video_cards_savage video_cards_siliconmotion video_cards_sis video_cards_sisusb video_cards_tdfx video_cards_tga video_cards_trident video_cards_tseng video_cards_v4l video_cards_vesa video_cards_vga video_cards_via video_cards_vmware video_cards_voodoo"
Unset: CTARGET, EMERGE_DEFAULT_OPTS, INSTALL_MASK, LANG, LC_ALL, LDFLAGS, LINGUAS, MAKEOPTS, PORTAGE_RSYNC_EXTRA_OPTS, PORTDIR_OVERLAY

schrippe · Post by **schrippe** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 4:26 pm

maybe a defect card; new? or a wrong cable (min. cat 6)

did you NAPI enabled?

omschaub · Post by **omschaub** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 5:27 pm

I am still playing the devil trying to get all of this to work. Windows was even tested out on this machine and is still getting some errors.. but I have replaced almost everything on the system in order to hunt this down with no luck.. I still agree with you, it is Hardware!

Things I have tried

- New MB/Processor
- New Network card (actually e1000 was second card tried)
- New memory and Memtest for 24hrs -- no errors!
- New Controller card for the 4 hard drives with new cables
- New Cat6 cables to replace the 5e ones
- Checked all the temps, etc.

I just don't know what else to try. I have essentially rebuilt the entire comp with exactly the same error -- on a hard read and high network load, the comp will time out -- the network card will show the errors above and the HD light is just 'on'

For now, I need to have the time to try one HD at a time and see if it is actually related to the HDs

I truly appreciate you digging up this post and attempting to answer my questions. In the time before you posted I have tried Ubuntu and Windows.. both with errors.. so it is definitely hardware.. now just to hunt it down!

rmh3093 · Post by **rmh3093** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 5:32 pm

does your machine have SMP enabled in the kernel, I am pretty sure there is an issue with the e1000.

have have and e1000 in a Core Duo laptop and I cant use the card in windows or linux.

schrippe · Post by **schrippe** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 5:35 pm

do have a switch or anything changed at the default driver properties (win & linux)?

It seems it is an interrupt error, I think.

You could try iperf?.

hetman · Post by **hetman** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 8:23 pm

experienced the same issue with 2 different motherboards (both asus)
problem in my case was caused by a bios setting.
i had 4gb of ram and i set 'software memory hole remapping' to enabled.
thats when the error started occurring.

i'll be looking for a solution and i'll let you know if i find something useful

gentoo_ram · Post by **gentoo_ram** » Mon Aug 25, 2008 10:30 pm

I had a e1000 card in my machine for a while. It worked great. x86_64, SMP, 2GB RAM. Then I upgraded it to 6GB RAM. After that I would get those TX hang messages. I eventually swapped the card out and used a different one with a different chipset. I don't know if this is an issue with my BIOS/motherboard or the card's driver. But something was funky on my machine with that card. And it happened after upgrading from 2 -> 6 GB of RAM.