Onboard Realtek NIC - No lights?

Hi all,

I have my ADSL connection via a modem/router using ethernet cables. My mobo
is an old GA-7VT600 1394 running an Athlon XP 2800+. All has been working
fine for years, but just last week I have lost all the lights on the Realtek
NIC and my connection to the net..... Does lights out on the onboard NIC
mean it's dead? I haven't flashed the bios or done anything silly to the
system. Win XP just says that the cable in 'unplugged'. I have tried 3
other cables and nothing - still no lights. The LAN is enabled in the bios
OK as it has been working for literally years...... Does this mean I will
have to put in a PCI NIC card?

Thank you.

On Sun, 1 Apr 2007 10:44:00 +1000, "Ellie" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>Hi all,
>
>I have my ADSL connection via a modem/router using ethernet cables. My mobo
>is an old GA-7VT600 1394 running an Athlon XP 2800+. All has been working
>fine for years, but just last week I have lost all the lights on the Realtek
>NIC and my connection to the net..... Does lights out on the onboard NIC
>mean it's dead?

The mobo manual should mention the "status" lights for the on-board NIC. If you
don't have the manual you should be able to download one. That would be my own
first line of investigation

> I haven't flashed the bios or done anything silly to the
>system. Win XP just says that the cable in 'unplugged'. I have tried 3
>other cables and nothing - still no lights. The LAN is enabled in the bios
>OK as it has been working for literally years...... Does this mean I will
>have to put in a PCI NIC card?

Probably. RTFM.

On Sun, 1 Apr 2007 10:44:00 +1000, "Ellie" <(E-Mail Removed)> put
finger to keyboard and composed:

>I have my ADSL connection via a modem/router using ethernet cables. My mobo
>is an old GA-7VT600 1394 running an Athlon XP 2800+. All has been working
>fine for years, but just last week I have lost all the lights on the Realtek
>NIC and my connection to the net..... Does lights out on the onboard NIC
>mean it's dead?

Realtek (http://www.realtek.com.tw) have DOS based diagnostic
utilities (eg rset81xx) for their RTL81xx Ethernet chips. There might
even be one in your driver package.

http://europe.giga-byte.com/FileList...altek_81xx.exe

- Franc Zabkar
--
Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.

Ellie wrote:
> Hi all,

> I have my ADSL connection via a modem/router using ethernet cables. My mobo
> is an old GA-7VT600 1394 running an Athlon XP 2800+. All has been working
> fine for years, but just last week I have lost all the lights on the Realtek
> NIC and my connection to the net..... Does lights out on the onboard NIC
> mean it's dead? I haven't flashed the bios or done anything silly to the
> system. Win XP just says that the cable in 'unplugged'. I have tried 3
> other cables and nothing - still no lights. The LAN is enabled in the bios
> OK as it has been working for literally years...... Does this mean I will
> have to put in a PCI NIC card?

> Thank you.


Yeah, I'm afraid so, the NICs give out eventually after several years. I
had an onboard NIC in my ECS K7S5A board (which I'm still using now),
and it gave out about 4 years ago. Been using a PCI NIC ever since then.
They're pretty cheap, about $20.

Yousuf Khan

--
There is no failure, only delayed success

Yousuf Khan wrote:
> Ellie wrote:
>> Hi all,
>
>> I have my ADSL connection via a modem/router using ethernet cables.
>> My mobo
>> is an old GA-7VT600 1394 running an Athlon XP 2800+. All has been
>> working
>> fine for years, but just last week I have lost all the lights on the
>> Realtek
>> NIC and my connection to the net..... Does lights out on the onboard NIC
>> mean it's dead? I haven't flashed the bios or done anything silly to the
>> system. Win XP just says that the cable in 'unplugged'. I have tried 3
>> other cables and nothing - still no lights. The LAN is enabled in the
>> bios
>> OK as it has been working for literally years...... Does this mean I
>> will
>> have to put in a PCI NIC card?
>
>> Thank you.
>
>
> Yeah, I'm afraid so, the NICs give out eventually after several years. I
> had an onboard NIC in my ECS K7S5A board (which I'm still using now),
> and it gave out about 4 years ago. Been using a PCI NIC ever since then.
> They're pretty cheap, about $20.
>
> Yousuf Khan
>
I'm new here but I do have a suggestion. Buy a NIC card with its' own
processor on board and it will offload a lot of work from the CPU. I am
running a 3Com 3CR990 on a cable modem setup that runs up to 13Mbps
until they throttle me back to 7.5Mbps and the processor load remains
low. With a cheap card like the 3C905 the CPU has to do a lot more work.
The on board stuff tends to be the cheapest that the MB manufacturer can
find and is not usually that great. My MB is an ASUS K8N and both the
network port and the on board audio are jokes, even though ASUS is one
of the better MB companies.
E-bay might be the best way to find a NIC card as long as you get the
setup CD or can download it.
Best of luck.
Bill Baka

Franc Zabkar wrote:
> On Sat, 07 Apr 2007 23:00:40 GMT, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put finger
> to keyboard and composed:
>
>
>> I'm new here but I do have a suggestion. Buy a NIC card with its' own
>> processor on board and it will offload a lot of work from the CPU. I am
>> running a 3Com 3CR990 on a cable modem setup that runs up to 13Mbps
>> until they throttle me back to 7.5Mbps and the processor load remains
>> low. With a cheap card like the 3C905 the CPU has to do a lot more work.
>> The on board stuff tends to be the cheapest that the MB manufacturer can
>> find and is not usually that great. My MB is an ASUS K8N and both the
>> network port and the on board audio are jokes, even though ASUS is one
>> of the better MB companies.
>> E-bay might be the best way to find a NIC card as long as you get the
>> setup CD or can download it.
>> Best of luck.
>> Bill Baka
>
> I don't know much about networking, but it seems to me that the extra
> processing capability of 3Com's 3CR990 NIC is tied up with security
> related tasks. Just how important are the following "offloads" for the
> typical home user?

Probably not terribly important but it does mean less work for any
security software you might have. I suppose I am overdoing it by also
going through a Cisco/Linksys WRT54G router and it's internal
fire-walling, but it does work with both XP and all the flavors of Linux
I have tried.
>
> http://www.3com.com/products/en_US/d...u=3CR990-TX-97
>
> Security offloads: 168-bit 3DES, 56-bit DES, SHA-1, MD5, RFC 2402
> Additional offloads: TCP segmentation, TCP large send, TCP/IP checksum
>
> I notice from your headers that you are using "Windows/20070221". Is
> this Vista?

XP. Every comment I have seen posted says that Vista flat out sucks.
Until I am forced to commit a hard drive to it, there will be no Vista here.

Are you using the above security features on your machine?
> If so, did Vista come with built-in support for your card? I notice
> that 3Com's web site only provides W2K and XP support for the
> discontinued 3CR990.

I did the setup under XP SP2+(a bunch of MS patches) and it works under
Linux. 3Com seems to have mostly dropped the NIC card business unless
you want to get into the hundreds of dollars. Now that the MB vendors
have put ethernet on the boards people seem to forget that a separate
and dedicated NIC co-processor really did help. My comment on cheap junk
on the MBs holds. My audio is Realtek and it is junk, hence a sound blaster.
That's all I can add.
Bill Baka
>
> - Franc Zabkar

On Sat, 07 Apr 2007 23:00:40 GMT, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put finger
to keyboard and composed:


>I'm new here but I do have a suggestion. Buy a NIC card with its' own
>processor on board and it will offload a lot of work from the CPU. I am
>running a 3Com 3CR990 on a cable modem setup that runs up to 13Mbps
>until they throttle me back to 7.5Mbps and the processor load remains
>low. With a cheap card like the 3C905 the CPU has to do a lot more work.
>The on board stuff tends to be the cheapest that the MB manufacturer can
>find and is not usually that great. My MB is an ASUS K8N and both the
>network port and the on board audio are jokes, even though ASUS is one
>of the better MB companies.
>E-bay might be the best way to find a NIC card as long as you get the
>setup CD or can download it.
>Best of luck.
>Bill Baka

I don't know much about networking, but it seems to me that the extra
processing capability of 3Com's 3CR990 NIC is tied up with security
related tasks. Just how important are the following "offloads" for the
typical home user?

http://www.3com.com/products/en_US/d...u=3CR990-TX-97

Security offloads: 168-bit 3DES, 56-bit DES, SHA-1, MD5, RFC 2402
Additional offloads: TCP segmentation, TCP large send, TCP/IP checksum

I notice from your headers that you are using "Windows/20070221". Is
this Vista? Are you using the above security features on your machine?
If so, did Vista come with built-in support for your card? I notice
that 3Com's web site only provides W2K and XP support for the
discontinued 3CR990.

- Franc Zabkar
--
Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.

On Tue, 10 Apr 2007 11:27:54 -0700, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put
finger to keyboard and composed:

>Franc Zabkar wrote:
>> On Sat, 07 Apr 2007 23:00:40 GMT, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put finger
>> to keyboard and composed:

>>> I'm new here but I do have a suggestion. Buy a NIC card with its' own
>>> processor on board and it will offload a lot of work from the CPU. I am
>>> running a 3Com 3CR990 ...

<snip>

>> I don't know much about networking, but it seems to me that the extra
>> processing capability of 3Com's 3CR990 NIC is tied up with security
>> related tasks.

<snip>

>3Com seems to have mostly dropped the NIC card business unless
>you want to get into the hundreds of dollars. Now that the MB vendors
>have put ethernet on the boards people seem to forget that a separate
>and dedicated NIC co-processor really did help.

Your original statement that typical NICs have no onboard CPU had me
wondering whether my Realtek cheapie was some kind of "win-NIC". Now
you appear to be saying that NICs *do* in fact have their own CPU, but
that the more expensive ones have an additional co-processor to
support non-standard features such as hardware based security. If
that's the case, then it seems to me that you are bagging a Volkswagen
for not being a Porsche.

>My comment on cheap junk on the MBs holds.

AFAICT, a typical NIC that sells for about $10-15 has the exact same
hardware as what is on a motherboard (other than a boot ROM socket).

- Franc Zabkar
--
Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.

Franc Zabkar wrote:
> On Tue, 10 Apr 2007 11:27:54 -0700, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put
> finger to keyboard and composed:
>
>> Franc Zabkar wrote:
>>> On Sat, 07 Apr 2007 23:00:40 GMT, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put finger
>>> to keyboard and composed:
>
>>>> I'm new here but I do have a suggestion. Buy a NIC card with its' own
>>>> processor on board and it will offload a lot of work from the CPU. I am
>>>> running a 3Com 3CR990 ...
>
> <snip>
>
>>> I don't know much about networking, but it seems to me that the extra
>>> processing capability of 3Com's 3CR990 NIC is tied up with security
>>> related tasks.
>
And that's a bad thing?
> <snip>
>
>> 3Com seems to have mostly dropped the NIC card business unless
>> you want to get into the hundreds of dollars. Now that the MB vendors
>> have put ethernet on the boards people seem to forget that a separate
>> and dedicated NIC co-processor really did help.
>
> Your original statement that typical NICs have no onboard CPU had me
> wondering whether my Realtek cheapie was some kind of "win-NIC". Now
> you appear to be saying that NICs *do* in fact have their own CPU,


Don't mis-quote me. How much processor do you think is on a generic $10
card? Not much.

but
> that the more expensive ones have an additional co-processor to
> support non-standard features such as hardware based security. If
> that's the case, then it seems to me that you are bagging a Volkswagen
> for not being a Porsche.
>
>> My comment on cheap junk on the MBs holds.
>
> AFAICT, a typical NIC that sells for about $10-15 has the exact same
> hardware as what is on a motherboard (other than a boot ROM socket).

No Duh, Ralph.
That's why I was hinting at not using the el-cheapo or whatever crap
they put in there and choose your NIC, same as a sound card or video.
>
> - Franc Zabkar

Bill Baka
Remember that ***ANY*** load your CPU doesn't have to process makes more
cycles available to you for your chosen program.

On Wed, 11 Apr 2007 15:19:51 GMT, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put finger
to keyboard and composed:

>Franc Zabkar wrote:
>> On Tue, 10 Apr 2007 11:27:54 -0700, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put
>> finger to keyboard and composed:
>>
>>> Franc Zabkar wrote:
>>>> On Sat, 07 Apr 2007 23:00:40 GMT, Bill <(E-Mail Removed)> put finger
>>>> to keyboard and composed:
>>
>>>>> I'm new here but I do have a suggestion. Buy a NIC card with its' own
>>>>> processor on board and it will offload a lot of work from the CPU. I am
>>>>> running a 3Com 3CR990 ...
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>>>> I don't know much about networking, but it seems to me that the extra
>>>> processing capability of 3Com's 3CR990 NIC is tied up with security
>>>> related tasks.
>>
>And that's a bad thing?
>> <snip>

Of course not, but it begs the question, just how much does the
co-processor contribute to overall throughput?

>>> 3Com seems to have mostly dropped the NIC card business unless
>>> you want to get into the hundreds of dollars. Now that the MB vendors
>>> have put ethernet on the boards people seem to forget that a separate
>>> and dedicated NIC co-processor really did help.
>>
>> Your original statement that typical NICs have no onboard CPU had me
>> wondering whether my Realtek cheapie was some kind of "win-NIC". Now
>> you appear to be saying that NICs *do* in fact have their own CPU,
>
>
>Don't mis-quote me. How much processor do you think is on a generic $10
>card? Not much.

Well, for $30 I can buy a DVD player with a PSU, case, VFD, DVD
loader, RAM, flash EEPROM, remote control, etc, etc. Within that
package is an MPEG4 capable decoder chip which probably has ten times
the processing power of a $10 NIC. So no, I wouldn't be surprised to
find that I could buy a Gigabit NIC for around $10.

>but
>> that the more expensive ones have an additional co-processor to
>> support non-standard features such as hardware based security. If
>> that's the case, then it seems to me that you are bagging a Volkswagen
>> for not being a Porsche.
>>
>>> My comment on cheap junk on the MBs holds.
>>
>> AFAICT, a typical NIC that sells for about $10-15 has the exact same
>> hardware as what is on a motherboard (other than a boot ROM socket).
>
>No Duh, Ralph.
>That's why I was hinting at not using the el-cheapo or whatever crap
>they put in there and choose your NIC, same as a sound card or video.

>> - Franc Zabkar
>
>Bill Baka
>Remember that ***ANY*** load your CPU doesn't have to process makes more
>cycles available to you for your chosen program.

True, but whether this results in a significant reduction in CPU load
is something you need to test for yourself.

Regardless, it seems to me that motherboard chipsets have come a long
way since last time you (or I) looked. Having said that, your
motherboard may be bottlenecked by a 100Mbps PHY.

See http://www.nvidia.com/docs/IO/35382/...d_linecard.pdf

NVIDIA Native Gigabit Ethernet - The industry’s fastest Gigabit
Ethernet performance eliminates network bottlenecks and improves
overall system efficiency and performance

NVIDIA FirstPacket™ Technology - Assures your game data, VoIP
conversations, and large file transfers are delivered according to
your set preferences. Lowers your ping time for improved online gaming
NVIDIA DualNet® technology
- Two Gigabit Ethernet MACs with TCP/IP acceleration
- Teaming: allows two connections to work together to provide up to
twice the Ethernet bandwidth for large data transfers from file
servers to other PCs. It also provides network redundancy through
fail-over capability

TCP/IP Acceleration: - Delivers the highest system performance by
offloading CPU-intensive packet filtering tasks in hardware, providing
users with a fast networking environment

Checksum Offload - Improves networking efficiency by reducing CPU
utilization. Allows the processor to concentrate on other tasks

Jumbo Frame Support - Reduces the number of calls to the network
driver, thereby reducing CPU overhead and improves throughput

Windows Control Panel/Web-based Management - Provides easy access to
system set-up and configuration. Interface determined by software
version

IPv6 Support - Ability to future proof PC systems as standards evolve

- Franc Zabkar
--
Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.