network card "lost"

[tuxman]

Hi,

I am using debian Sarge (Knoppix 3.3 actually).
Everything used to work perfectly with my internet connection, using a modem connected via a standard network card into my PC.
One day I had a kernel "Oops" at system startup. When I booted again, everything was fine, except the network card, which seemed not to exist any more.
I know this is not a hardware issue as everything still works fine with M$ Windows (dual boot).

ifconfig only displays the local loopback "lo"
The kernel modules (using lsmod) only display reiserfs and apm.
eth0 seems NOT to be in /dev any more. Where exactly is it supposed to be ?

I confess I am a bit lost as I do not know the kernel very well.

Any ideas ???

Thanks a lot.

[mark]

Do you know what kind of NIC it is?
When you don't do

Code: Select all

lspci

then you see your NIC
then

Code: Select all

modprobe [module_for_you_NIC]


then use ifconfig to config your NIC

[tuxman]

lspci displays a line with :
00:07.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)

How should I use modprobe ?
I tried this:
#modprobe 00:07.0
/lib/modules/2.4.22-xfs/kernel/drivers/char/agp: Permission denied
/lib/modules/2.4.22-xfs/kernel/drivers/char/agp: Permission denied
modprobe: Can't locate module 00:07.0

Is it also normal that I do not have any /dev/eth0 ?

Thanks.

[MarkvD]

tell us what happends when you type:

Code: Select all

modprobe rtl8139

[tuxman]

modprobe rtl8139
modprobe: Can't locate module rtl8139

[MarkvD]

and

Code: Select all

modprobe rtl8139too

[rjsin]

lspci displays a line with :
00:07.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)

I'm a noobie, so take the following for what it's worth

First, The Realtek 8139 is notorius for premature death for any reason other then simply working (i.e. static, surges, cable disconnects...) It will still show up on 'roll call' but will not work.

That said, I recently loaded knoppix to my hard drive and found I had a similar problem;

I went back to XP and released the nic stats (i.e. ipconfig/release and ipconfig/flushdns)

Back in knoppix(su to root), I added the following line(s) to the /etc/network/interfaces ;

auto lo eth0
iface lo inet loopback
iface eht0 inet dhcp

.... and was finally able to see my network w/ ;

ifconfig eth0 up
pump -i eth0

~Good luck

[tuxman]

I did all you said and got:

ifconfig eth0 up
eth0: ERROR while getting interface flags: No such device

pump -i eth0
Operation failed.

also

modprobe 8139too
modprobe: Can't locate module 8139too

It seems that I do not have the same issue.

[Guest]

It seems that I do not have the same issue.

I have had experience with some cards that required me to reseat (take it out and put it back in) them in order for the discovery process to work.
You might try powering down and then disconnecting the power cord(as ATX will keep 5v going to the card if you retain the connection to the wall

~if you do delve into the box, remember to touch the power supply casing prior to touching anything else in there~

[tuxman]

I am quite sure this is a software issue as I can access the network with Windows or if I boot with Knoppix.

I ran apt-get upgrade quite often. I probably corrupted something.

I am afraid I will have to install it again. Just like Windows ...

Any other idea before that I do this horrible thing ?

[Linlord]

Don't install your system again (yet)

Look in :

/lib/modules/ [yourkernelversion] /kernel/drivers/net/

And tell us what you see.

[tuxman]

I found the solution guys!

I discovered I could not access the drivers directory correctly (I had error messages while doing a ls on subdirectories).
I booted on Knoppix and ran fsck on my filesystem. It talked about big corruption errors and told me to rebuild the whole filesystem tree. I did this and recovered the network at next boot.

I use a reiserfs filesystem. Should I change to another one (ext3?), as I got this corruption issue ?

Anyway, thank you guys for helping me.