[HOWTO] - Sk98lin (Marvell Yukon) Network Card

[cyblord]

Hey everyone!

Okay, here's the deal: you may have already read the issues elsewhere, which states that sk98lin is not supported by gentoo-sources (kernel), that there's a bug...etc.

I have tried to follow some of the guides which told me to patch my kernel, poke it, stab it...etc. The documentations were not clear, and it was a hassle.

The easiest and most straight-forward way is as follows:

1. Empty your /etc/conf.d/net file - to let the system automatically use dhcp. (optional)

2. Configure your kernel (under device drivers -> networking -> 1000 mbit), but DO NOT use the deprecated marvell yukon driver, but use the SKY2 driver.

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cd /usr/src/linux
make menuconfig
Device drivers -> networking -> 1000 mbit -> SKY2

Then recompile your kernel ( I won't go into that), and make sure your boot loader uses the new kernel.

3.Reboot, and hopefully eth0 will start

************************
So the bottom line is that you have to use the SKY2 driver

I hope that helped!

*Edit*

sky2 is only for yukon-2
users who have original yukon want skge

[dsd]

sky2 is only for yukon-2
users who have original yukon want skge

[cyblord]

Oh really? thanks, I didn't know that.

[skyPhyr]

hi cyblord,

I've tried the sky2 after upgrading to 2.6.16 and it's extremely unrealiable here - causes the whole system to freeze on boot quite often and drops the network after only minutes.

Anyone else experienced that?

The sk98lin drivers work for me on 2.6.15 so I've downgraded my kernel.

Cheers,

Alan.

[dsd]

you need to be running a very recent 2.6.16 for sky2 to work reliably

also, sky2 is not a substitute for sk98lin under 2.6.15, unless you were not using the in-kernel sk98lin?

skge is a substitute for the in-kernel sk98lin
sky2 is for the newer cards

the vendor-produced sk98lin supports both the old and the new (through huge hacks), this is not included in the kernel

[fangorn]

Sorry if I hijack the thread, but I use several Marvell yukon chips on Asus boards (K8M Deluxe IIRC) in machines of the "why would anybody want to reboot a machine" class.

What is the most reliable driver for these. I had some startup problems at boot when using kernel modules with both drivers and now have transfer dropouts when using builtin sk98lin of gentoo-sources-2.6.15.

I would be very thankful for your experiences.

fangorn

[dsd]

you have the original yukon chipset, you want to be using skge

[cyblord]

hi cyblord,

I've tried the sky2 after upgrading to 2.6.16 and it's extremely unrealiable here - causes the whole system to freeze on boot quite often and drops the network after only minutes.

Anyone else experienced that?

The sk98lin drivers work for me on 2.6.15 so I've downgraded my kernel.

Cheers,

Alan.

with the latest gentoo-sources (kernel), you should have any problems with it. that's what I'm using

[skyPhyr]

Using 2.6.16-gentoo-r8 was where I had the problem - didn't try kernel driver under 2.6.15 - just using sk98lin there

I think the card is correct according to lspci and the kernel help
02:00.0 Ethernet controller: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88E8053 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 19)

Any other ideas what it could have been? GCC 4.1.1? amd64?

Cheers,

Alan.

[dsd]

you have a yukon-2. you want to be using sky2. it is young but issues should be fixed in the latest kernels.

[Zyne]

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05:0c.0 Ethernet controller: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88E8001 Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 13)

This is the output of lspci for a yukon-1 NIC, Anything with a number different from 88E8001 is not yukon-1...
This said, I have been using skge since it was in the kernel, and never had a problem with it... No freezes/lockups/reboots whatsoever....

Just thought this could be useful for some ppl to find out if they have 1st or 2nd generation yukon cards

[cyblord]

I hope they'll fix up the legit marvell driver for the next gentoo-sources release

[dsd]

i assume you mean the vendor driver (sk98lin)? i think it is extremely unlikely that syskonnect will start adhering to kernel coding standards again.

skge and sky2 are the only drivers which we can get support for. i'd recommend that sk98lin users switch over.

[cfgauss]

i assume you mean the vendor driver (sk98lin)? i think it is extremely unlikely that syskonnect will start adhering to kernel coding standards again.

skge and sky2 are the only drivers which we can get support for. i'd recommend that sk98lin users switch over.

I'd like to switch, if possible. Here's my card:

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~> lspci -v|grep -i marvell
03:00.0 Ethernet controller: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88E8053 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 15)
        Subsystem: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. Marvell 88E8053 Gigabit Ethernet Controller (MSI)

Currently I'm using kernel 2.6.15-gentoo-r7 with the sk98lin driver patched by Syskonnect and it works wonderfully. I've got the 2.6.16-gentoo-r9 kernel and have tried compiling skge, sky2, and sk98lin into the kernel but none work. When I use the latest Syskonnect patch the sk98lin driver won't compile. When I load the kernel patch mentioned in another post, http://lkml.org/lkml/diff/2006/2/13/107/1, on top of Syskonnect's patch, it will compile but still does not work.

What am I doing wrong?

[dsd]

ignore every other driver (do not compile them), compile sky2 as built into your kernel. boot up, try to use your network. explain your problem in full.

[cfgauss]

ignore every other driver (do not compile them), compile sky2 as built into your kernel. boot up, try to use your network. explain your problem in full.

I did that and booted services in interactive mode. net.eth0, the Marvell card, seemed to boot OK as dhcp seemed to obtain an IP address after the usual pause. The first service to utilize the network after net.eth0 was ntp-client. This failed. I dropped to a shell. ifconfig for eth0 looked normal. However, I could not ping yahoo.com (which I can whenever the network is working normally). This has been my experience using sky2 for all 2.6.16 kernels, from r1 thorugh the current r9.

Any suggestions will be gratefully received. Thanks.

[verde]

Same problem here!!!

With 2.15-r8 sk98lin just works...

With 2.16-r7 sky2 works just a few seconds... and puff doesn't work again...

[dsd]

verde: 2.6.16-r7 is not the latest kernel
cfgauss: please file a bug with dmesg and /proc/interrupts attached

[Leegzuig3]

02:05.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c940 10/100/1000Base-T [Marvell] (rev 12)

2.6.16-gentoo-r9


Seems i cant get these things to work; anyone else same prob?

[cfgauss]

cfgauss: please file a bug with dmesg and /proc/interrupts attached

Done. Bug 136508.

As this is my first bug report, I hope I provided enough information.

[cyblord]

02:05.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c940 10/100/1000Base-T [Marvell] (rev 12)

eh? 3com?

[Galahad]

Code: Select all

05:0c.0 Ethernet controller: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88E8001 Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 13)

This is the output of lspci for a yukon-1 NIC, Anything with a number different from 88E8001 is not yukon-1...
This said, I have been using skge since it was in the kernel, and never had a problem with it... No freezes/lockups/reboots whatsoever....

Just thought this could be useful for some ppl to find out if they have 1st or 2nd generation yukon cards

yukon1 is at least 88E8001, 88E8003 and 88E8010.

Additionally the older SK-NET GE adapters based on the genesis chip:

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00:09.0 Ethernet controller: SysKonnect SK-9872 Gigabit Ethernet Server Adapter (SK-NET GE-ZX dual link) (rev 13)

even though that's a lie from lspci, that should be SysKonnect SK-9821 Gigabit Ethernet Server Adapter (SK-NET GE-T).