Re: [gentoo-user] Ethernet card for puter

[Frank Steinmetzger]

Am Fri, Nov 05, 2021 at 08:03:32PM -0500 schrieb Dale:
> Manuel McLure wrote:
> > I highly recommend getting an Intel card. Back in the day the e1000
> > cards were the ones to get,
> > nowadays https://www.newegg.com/intel-expi9301ctblk/p/N82E16833106033
> > should be a good option for a single port card. Intel cards have been
> > well supported in Linux for a long time.

I have no idea how you came across that one first. Network cards are a
commodity and start in the single-Euro (so probably also dollar) range these
days. Intel cards start in the 20–30 range:
https://geizhals.eu/?cat=nwpcie&sort=p&xf=14063_Intel%7E14065_LAN-Adapter%7E14066_PCIe-Karte

> I was looking at the mobo manual and noticed the built in network port
> is a 1Gb chip as well.  It is a Realtec and the last time I tried to use
> it, it was a bit flakey.  Sometimes it would work but sometimes I'd have
> to restart the network to get it going again.  That was about a decade
> ago.

My PC is over 7 years old now and I’ve always been unsing its internal
ethernet port. Most consumer boards use Realtek chips, and so does mine,
because they are a little cheaper than Intel’s counterparts. Enthusiasts and
power users like Intel more because it does more in hardware and offers more
features, whereas the realtek driver puts some load on the CPU, AFAIK. But
in my view, that is counting crumbs, as we say in Germany. I’ve never had
bandwidth problems and always had the full 1 Gb to my NAS. For us normal
home user folk, it won’t make a difference, IMHO. (Except if you are a
purist and care about code quality; I think there were niggles with
Realtek’s code a longer while back.)

> I wonder, is the drivers better today than they were then?  I would have
> used it all this time if it worked well.  Anyone have experience with this
> in the last year or so that is showing it working really well and stable? 
> Keep in mind, I run 24/7 here.  If that works fine, I could just use it. 
> lspci shows this for the on board network:
>
> Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit
> Ethernet Controller (rev 06)

That’s the one veryone uses. I actually have two of those installed; one
one-board, the other one as a PCIe card that I got from my old employer.

> I have 2 PCIex1 and one PCIex 4 slots open.  The small ones are close to
> my video card and I'm not sure I can use them.

Sure you can. Are you a hardcore gamer? Does your card consume 100s of W all
the time? Usually the GPU is the top-most card except for cases that hold
the board upside-down (meaning hot air rises away).

> Can I plug these types of cards into the larger slots?

Yes. Speeds are downward-compatible. One PCIe 2.0 lane is fast enough for 1
Gb.

> I think I read once that can be done.  It's been ages tho. My old network
> card appears to be in a old PCI plain slot.  It's a really old card, works
> faithfully tho. 

If you change the filter in the link I gave you at the top, you can also
look for PCI-based cards (unselect PCIe first). It’s possible that PCIe,
though a faster interface, may be more frugal these days. When PCI was
invented, power saving was not an issue.

> This may require some rearranging.  Or using the on board network one. 
> I'd really prefer the card tho.  They just tend to work better.

Why should they? A hunch? The only real benefit is you can easliy swap them
in case of failure. But as long as you have it and it works – why not give
it a try with what you have before you spend more for something you may not
even need?

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