Yea yea I know, RealTek isn't reliable on PFSense..
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Just curious if the reason why RealTek cards are officially considered to be "unreliable" on PFSense is because no one is compiling and including proper driver support into PFSense?
Seems the "simple" fixes when there are problems with RE cards flapping is to just download and install the latest driver package from FreeBSD into your PFSense.
Which begs the question: Would this even be an issue if PFSense just updated the RE drivers and supported them?
This isn't intended as a criticism - just asking. Seems it would solve the issues to just support them?
RealTek is FAR more available than Intel cards at the moment. And seems most OEM hardware/motherboards use RealTek chipsets. So why not just build the drivers in and include updates when you update PFSense? And add the /boot/loader.conf lines?
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@gbitglenn said in Yea yea I know, RealTek isn't reliable on PFSense..:
Just curious if the reason why RealTek cards are officially considered to be "unreliable" on PFSense is
It all depends also on the support from the company
that is producing that card and how open they are to the open source community, or how much they are willing
that others write drivers for their devices.because no one is compiling and including proper driver > support into PFSense?
Writing code for a driver may be one of the most difficult things as I am informed. And it also depends on how much
reverse engineering must be done on top of all.Seems the "simple" fixes when there are problems
with RE cards flapping is to just download and install
the latest driver package from FreeBSD into your
PFSense.Not all devices (hardware) are offering the same functions
and comes sorted with the same options, so the driver will also be able to use what is given by the hardware first.Which begs the question: Would this even be an
issue if PFSense just updated the RE drivers and
supported them?If the code is from RE this might be not so easy as you think and if the drivers are from the FreeBSD team it
might be also not so easy to write them even all new.And with a point of view there are many other things
like open tickets, failures or misfunctions or plain other
"more" interesting drivers such as WiFi ones that will be
more getting priority from the FreeBSD or pfSense team.This isn't intended as a criticism - just asking. Seems it
would solve the issues to just support them?They are supported well as I am informed and the 1.97.00
pkg is supporting also new cards.RealTek is FAR more available than Intel cards at
the moment.If Intel is offering more details to the open source
community and RE is not really interested in to do so,
it is not really important how much devices are sorted
with their eth ports.And seems most OEM hardware/motherboards use
RealTek chipsets. So why not just build the drivers in
and include updates when you update PFSense?pfSense is using as a underlying basis FreeBSD and
and they are jumping from version 12.3 to 14.0 and
on top of all they jump also on PHP 8.1, that is hard
and much work for them, but for us all they do it.And add the /boot/loader.conf lines?
Add there lines may be only nice if you get problems
or you has to adjust your hardware matching to your
needs and software usage.Feel free to have a look on that list what all is to do
on top of changing to FreeBSD 14.0 and PHP 8.1
pfSense roadmap -
@dobby_ said in Yea yea I know, RealTek isn't reliable on PFSense..:
It all depends also on the support from the company
that is producing that card and how open they are to the open source community, or how much they are willing
that others write drivers for their devices.RealTek has drivers for FreeBSD - that are updated - here: https://www.realtek.com/en/component/zoo/category/network-interface-controllers-10-100-1000m-gigabit-ethernet-pci-express-software
So they are available for compiling and inclusion into FreeBSD and therefore should be part of PFSense updates, no?
NB: OPNSense provides updated drivers. There is also a plug-in that you can install for RealTek support.
To solve my problem I downloaded the RealTek kernel module from OPNSense and installed it. I mean, if they can do it.. ?
https://pkg.opnsense.org/FreeBSD:12:amd64/snapshots/latest/All/realtek-re-kmod-196.04.txz ; pkg install -f -y realtek-re-kmod-196.04.txz
Maybe the answer is for the vast number of RealTek cards out there and the people using them, to just use OPNSense.