FX5621 et0 netwrok card

lp76

Hi all,
I have this box (Fabiatech FX5621) with pfSense 1.2.2 (full install); one of the gigabit ethernet card (et0) doesn't
work correctly. I obtain a message like "et0: watchdog timeout" and I can't ping any host, but the other card (et1) works without
any problem.
I've tried with uniprocessor and smp kernel, with acpi enabled/disabled but without luck.
(I have also tried another different box but with the same result)
Any suggestions?
Thank you

Luca

Perry

Try with pfSense 1.2.3 as it's based on FreeBSD 7.1 http://snapshots.pfsense.org/ and make sure you have the latest bios version.

lp76

Hi Perry,
thank you for your reply.
I've tried with the latest snapshot (pfSense-1.2.3-20090506-1712.iso.gz) but with the same result;
The bios is the latest version (BuildDate 01/16/2009 V1.40 #3000)
Do you have any other hints?
Thank you for your help

Luca

Cry Havok

Try a Live CD of both FreeBSD 7.1 and something like Ubuntu 9.04. If neither of those can use that particular port then you've probably got a hardware fault.

aseques

Quite similar problem happens to me on 1.2.3rc1 with the gigabit nics

I keep getting the "et0: watchdog timeout" so I cannot use the two Gbit interfaces, using the other interfaces seems to work normally.

Another anoying thing with this same board on 1.2.3 is that it is extremely slow, it takes something like 5 minutes to assign the interfaces.

I will see what happens with the 1.2.2 version, altough I know I'm gonna miss the ping monitor improvements …
I tried also with the 2.0 Alpha Alpha version and it works out of the box

lp76

I've found a workaround:
disable the first gigabit ethernet card (LAN A) and it works ok.

aseques

Ouch, that's a ugly hack, I'll lose one of my precious interfaces :)

But it works, you saved my day :D

Note: For the next day onwards, I'd investigate a little more, I'll see if I can install de developers image and catch some errors on the spare machine I've got…

aseques

I've been looking at this problem since these devices, the Fabiatech FX5621 look quite interesting, but having to deactivate the ethernet is a huge problem, specially considering that there are only two Giga on board.

Well, following the story of the driver, no so easy condisering that there's no mention of it other than in the 7.1 errata, I found it was a port from DragonFly, and that it hasn't received much attention on freeBSD side last times (last rev. is from 2008-06-20)
Also I can see that in DragonFly there has been a constant flow of improvements, http://gitweb.dragonflybsd.org/dragonfly.git/history/2eb0d0694bd74032ad456be1c83b669b6b692b18:/sys/dev/netif/et/if_et.c
Could someone tell me if this changes in Dragonfly would fix the two ethernets not working?
Should I post this question on freebsd list?

thanks in advance

bellera

Hello!

Same problem with this box …

Please, see at:

http://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,16898.msg88743.html#msg88743

How can I deactivate et0 ?

Regards,

Josep Pujadas

aseques

In the "assign interfaces" menu, you just select not to use this interface, it will just disappear with some of your problems.
Take care anyway when using this hardware because it's not that stable.

Good luck.

bellera

Hello!

Last snapshot (June, 16 2009) works if I deactivate NIC 5 from BIOS (first 1 Gbit/s) interface.

Be careful, FX5621 works only with 5 NIC, first Gigabit causes pfSense not working!

Regards,

Josep Pujadas

bellera

aseques,

Did you try the FX5622? I have FX5620 working with old pfSense versions and no problem …

http://linitx.com/viewcategory.php?catid=79&pp=79

Information at linitx.com about FX5621 and pfSene is not correct!

I will ask them to change from FX5621 to FX5622 …

Regards,

Josep Pujadas

aseques

Well, the FX5622 should be fine, considering that the problem is due to driver maturity instead of hardware problems.
The FX5622 is quite more expensive, but at the same time it provides you with 8 intel slots (4Gb 4FastEth).

So If you want to pay the difference and you are still on time to get a replacement seems a goot change.

You could also wait for someone to port the changes (if they are improving something) from the original Dragonfly driver.

Regards

nippertje

I have had massive problems with the FX5621. I have spent the past 5 hours trying to install pfsense on this patform with no luck. Whatever I do it will not boot and crashes with Fatal Trap Error 9: General PRotection Error.

I have tried:

1.2.1 Live
1.2.1 Embedded
1.2.2
2.0A
disabled Gb nics
disabled all NICs
disabled APM/ACPI
new RAM

Can anybody help? I would be happy to use this without Gb nics as its only for a simle vpn gateway for us monitor a remote network

aseques

I booted without problems with 1.2.2 live (I don't recall if the Gb ethernets were working or not, probably not), I also coud install it into a sata 2,5" disk without problems.
After that I upgraded to various snapshots of 1.2.3, with both Gb interfaces detected and being able to use at least one to work.
The problem is that altough the hardware works, I cannot trust it much since all the stress testing I did, failed miserably (specially on the Gb side)

Good luck