How To Disable/Enable Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE)?

Maff

Hi sorry for asking for this to be simplified but apparently virgin media has broken there 2.5gig port with the latest firmware for the hub5 the thread on the forums say it is due to eee and would like to test this but so far can’t find out how to get info if it is enabled or not, am using an intel x710 card

Currently on pfsense 23.09-1

Can someone list the commands needed to get info about that state of eee my card is listed as ixl0 and ixl1, 0 is the wan port

Thread for virgin media https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Tech-Chatter/Hub-5-Firmware-Upgrade/td-p/5480079/page/2

stephenw10

On ixl it is set by:

[24.03-BETA][admin@7100.stevew.lan]/root: sysctl -d dev.ixl.0.eee.enable
dev.ixl.0.eee.enable: Enable Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE)
[24.03-BETA][admin@7100.stevew.lan]/root: sysctl dev.ixl.0.eee.enable
dev.ixl.0.eee.enable: 0

You can also check to see if it's sending or receiving LPI symbols:

[24.03-BETA][admin@7100.stevew.lan]/root: sysctl dev.ixl.0.eee
dev.ixl.0.eee.rx_lpi_count: 0
dev.ixl.0.eee.tx_lpi_count: 0
dev.ixl.0.eee.rx_lpi_status: 0
dev.ixl.0.eee.tx_lpi_status: 0
dev.ixl.0.eee.enable: 0

Steve

Maff

thanks for that

would i be correct in saying that eee is enabled?

sysctl dev.ixl.0.eee
dev.ixl.0.eee.rx_lpi_count: 1205843
dev.ixl.0.eee.tx_lpi_count: 1448892
dev.ixl.0.eee.rx_lpi_status: 1
dev.ixl.0.eee.tx_lpi_status: 1
dev.ixl.0.eee.enable: 1

stephenw10

Yes that's enabled and it's both seeing and ending LPI.

Maff

This post is deleted!

Maff

okay so managed to disable it but doesn't seem to be persistant through a reboot, but turning it off does solve the virgin media problem, just need to make it permament now

to disable it i had to use sysctl dev.ixl.0.eee.enable:0

and adding dev.ixl.0.eee.enable as a system tunable and a value of 0 survives a reboot :)

uplink

@Maff and @stephenw10

I think if you look at my 1st post in this thread I mention adding an option to the system tunables section in the pfSense UI so that the EEE option can configured/persisted. I think that's still a thing?

However, I thought @stephenw10 mentioned there was a bug (not sure it's fixed) that the EEE config below actually uses 1 to disable it, not 0. Although, this is for igc adapters, I'm not sure about your ixl adapter. Maybe @stephenw10 can chime in on how to use the system tunable for your adapter?

@stephenw10 said in How To Disable/Enable Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE)?:

EEE is disabled by default in igc in FreeBSD. The description text for 'hw.igc.eee_setting' is incorrect. That should be 1 to disable it as mentioned.

To check your current EEE configuration:

[23.05.1-RELEASE][user@router.lan]/: sysctl hw.igc | grep eee
hw.igc.eee_setting: 1
[23.05.1-RELEASE][user@router.lan]/: sysctl dev.igc.0 | grep eee
dev.igc.0.eee_control: 1

uplink

I see you found the system tunable! I guess I'm wondering if using a 0 actually disables it. Again, there was mention of a bug in this thread that system tunable uses a 1 to set EEE to disable (at least for my igc adapter).

@Maff said in How To Disable/Enable Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE)?:

and adding dev.ixl.0.eee.enable as a system tunable and a value of 0 survives a reboot :)

stephenw10

@uplink said in How To Disable/Enable Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE)?:

However, I thought @stephenw10 mentioned there was a bug (not sure it's fixed) that the EEE config below actually uses 1 to disable it, not 0.

That's true but that only applies to igc.

Maff

@uplink

How I’ve configured it works for my case and card and is easily tested as with it enabled I have 90% packet loss and with it disabled it works and zero loss

Thanks for all the help and to @stephenw10