SiS 190/191 on ASUS P5SD2-VM dont detect link status / dont send traffic

Ditto Leadro !!! Identical problem to the very last detail.

Loaded SEVENTEEN brand new PC's [ASUS P5SD2-VM] for our local school's computer center with Ubuntu 8.04 LTS [2.6.24-16] & Edubuntu when we discovered the problem connecting them to the network & not getting any reply from DHCP server.

We have tried:
-- loaded one PC with WinXP with m/b drivers; works perfectly
-- built new sis190.ko from sources on security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu; problem remains
-- loaded ndiswrapper & WinXP drivers; still no joy
-- tried forcing various settings with ethtool, mii-diag & mii-tool, according to what WinXP properties show; still no joy as most fail to set.
-- changed cables & switch (to eliminate negotiation/sync issues) but still not working.
-- loaded other LiveCD distro's who also complain about "no link" error

What bothers us most is
  RX bytes:300 (300.0 B) TX bytes:0 (0.0 B)
  Transceiver isolated from the MII!
  Transceiver powered down!

Have you found anything more?

Hy NixMan!

Your tests is like mine. I have tryed kernel 2.6.25, but its sis900.c is the same of 2.6.24. I´ve tried nidswraper too... and... dont work.

I´m not a kernel programmer, but I understand something about it. The kernel module dont reconize "power" status of network.

So, I will use a offboard network adapter until the kernel team correct this bug.

Some onde more?

Hi Leandro,

U're lucky to be able to use an offboard adapter. Our boxes are brand new and 'sealed' for warranty purposes, so we can't do the same. Also adding 17 NICs to the cost is significant, so we won't even go there.

Something that is funny, though it doesn't solve the problem, is that when we recompiled sis190.ko from the .c sources & .config on the distro, it ends up being 'huge' some 211kB whereas the one 'out-of-the-box' is only some 26kB ???

Go figure that one ??? One would have expected them to be the same size since they are compiled from the same source !!! Makes one wonder if the .c was actually used for the distro .ko ??

We also read up extensively on the net, and tried various patches/mods suggested to the sis190.c source, but without any luck. Must say that much of the stuff on the net is very outdated (referring to code no longer in the C source file). We even tried the 'original' SiS file [from 2005] but couldn't get it to compile. [understandably].

Hope the kernel team gets to it real soon !!

And the plot thickens even further !!!!

Got hold of a Mandriva 2008.0 DVD [2.6.22.9-1mdv-1-1mdv2008.0] and guess what : it has a problem with the SiS 771/671 graphics card but sees the SiS191 NIC no problem !!! Connected to the internet via LAN router like a dream !!! Fortunately the latest Linux drivers for the m/b from the ASUS website sorted the display problem.

So, also having the source rpms on the DVD, we thought our problems with Ubuntu was solved !!! WROONNNGGG !!!

Using the sis190.c from the Mandriva DVD and compiling it on Ubuntu makes ABSOLUTELY NO difference.
So we thought the problem could be in mii.ko, but also using the source from the DVD and compiling it on Ubuntu also makes NO difference.

So Ubuntu 8.04 LTS seems a lot more 'broken' than what meets the eye !!!

With ethtool, we interestingly also noted that under Mandriva the interface is indicated as PHYAD : 1 while under Ubuntu it's shown as PHYAD : 0.
Seems like Ubuntu misidentifies and then IS trying to talk to a non-existent interface !!!

Hi Nixman!

Mr Herton Ronaldo, from Mandriva, answer a post on kernel bugzilla. He said that problem is on phy link change status. See:

http://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11073
http://bugzilla.kernel.org/attachment.cgi?id=16963

I cant try it because my server is arealy in production.

Good look!

Leandro

Got this help from somewhere online forum. Forgot where. But it solved the problem of sis191
LAN port problem on ASUS P5SD2-VM motherboard. This involves re-compile kernel module.

In file drivers\nets\sis190.c, add one line of
           { "Atheros PHY AR8012", { 0x004d, 0xd020 }, LAN, 0 },

to mii_chip_table[], make it look like

static struct mii_chip_info {
        const char *name;
        u16 id[2];
        unsigned int type;
 u32 feature;
} mii_chip_table[] = {
        { "Atheros PHY AR8012", { 0x004d, 0xd020 }, LAN, 0 },
 { "Broadcom PHY BCM5461", { 0x0020, 0x60c0 }, LAN, F_PHY_BCM5461 },
 { "Broadcom PHY AC131", { 0x0143, 0xbc70 }, LAN, 0 },
 { "Agere PHY ET1101B", { 0x0282, 0xf010 }, LAN, 0 },
 { "Marvell PHY 88E1111", { 0x0141, 0x0cc0 }, LAN, F_PHY_88E1111 },
 { "Realtek PHY RTL8201", { 0x0000, 0x8200 }, LAN, 0 },
 { NULL, }
};

then re-compile it to sis190.ko. Copy this sis190.ko to /lib/modules/your_version/kernel/drivers/net and reboot. For example, on my ubuntu 8.04, the place is /lib/modules/2.6.24-19-generic/kernel/drivers/net.

This is tried on both kernel source version 2.6.24 and version 2.6.26. And they both worked.

I can confirm the patch posted by John Zhang fixes the issue on another ASUS P5SD2-VM motherboard.

Is there a bug associated with this question? (why is this a question in the first place?) The patch should certainly make its way into the Ubuntu and upstream kernels.

I've added a number of links to reported bugs in the Sis190 that all look similar to the problems noted here.

Related/Duplicates:

http://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=10994
http://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11073

You need to change the mtu value.

I've had the same problem, the solution is simple:

# ifconfig eth0 mtu 1492

on natty (11.04) the adapter works but has issue on certain connections. i confirm that changing mtu value to 1492 fixes the problem. i think this bug is relevant: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/799998