ASIX AX88179 USB to GigE

bryan.paradis

Ok. Well I am redoing the environment I compiled that in. My new adapter will be here on friday.

Cable Matters SuperSpeed USB 3.0 to RJ45 Gigabit Ethernet Adapter

Huxy

Cool. Thanks for the response. I suspect you noticed, but I added the crash error to my previous post.
Hopefully, the new build environment will help, as will having the hardware for testing.

bryan.paradis

@Huxy:

Cool. Thanks for the response. I suspect you noticed, but I added the crash error to my previous post.
Hopefully, the new build environment will help, as will having the hardware for testing.

Thanks for updating that. What exactly did you do to produce the issue. So I can try reproducing.

Also here is the md5 for that module: F313B0FA8A7C38CF1E3A8A4DD39F2C22

Huxy

I checked the md5sum and it was fine. Here's the steps I took to cause a crash. 100% reproducible.

*** Welcome to pfSense 2.1-RELEASE-nanobsd (i386) on pfSense ***

 WAN (wan)       -> re0        -> v4/DHCP4: 192.168.1.162/24
 LAN (lan)       -> em0        -> v4: 192.168.1.6/24

 0) Logout (SSH only)                  8) Shell
 1) Assign Interfaces                  9) pfTop
 2) Set interface(s) IP address       10) Filter Logs
 3) Reset webConfigurator password    11) Restart webConfigurator
 4) Reset to factory defaults         12) pfSense Developer Shell
 5) Reboot system                     13) Upgrade from console
 6) Halt system                       14) Disable Secure Shell (sshd)
 7) Ping host                         15) Restore recent configuration

Enter an option: 1

Valid interfaces are:

usbus00   (up)
em0   00:16:3e:9c:ae:88   (up) Intel(R) PRO/1000 Legacy Network Connection 1.0.4
re0   00:16:3e:39:ad:93   (up) RealTek 8139C+ 10/100BaseTX
usbus10   (up)
ue0   00:24:9b:09:84:0f (down) USB Ethernet

Do you want to set up VLANs first?

If you are not going to use VLANs, or only for optional interfaces, you should
say no here and use the webConfigurator to configure VLANs later, if required.

Do you want to set up VLANs now [y|n]? n

*NOTE*  pfSense requires *AT LEAST* 1 assigned interface(s) to function.
        If you do not have *AT LEAST* 1 interfaces you CANNOT continue.

        If you do not have at least 1 *REAL* network interface card(s)
        or one interface with multiple VLANs then pfSense
        *WILL NOT* function correctly.

If you do not know the names of your interfaces, you may choose to use
auto-detection. In that case, disconnect all interfaces now before
hitting 'a' to initiate auto detection.

Enter the WAN interface name or 'a' for auto-detection: ue0

Enter the LAN interface name or 'a' for auto-detection
NOTE: this enables full Firewalling/NAT mode.
(or nothing if finished): em0

Enter the Optional 1 interface name or 'a' for auto-detection
(or nothing if finished):

The interfaces will be assigned as follows:

WAN  -> ue0
LAN  -> em0

Do you want to proceed [y|n]?y

Writing configuration...done.
One moment while we reload the settings... done!

bryan.paradis

@Huxy:

I checked the md5sum and it was fine. Here's the steps I took to cause a crash. 100% reproducible.

*** Welcome to pfSense 2.1-RELEASE-nanobsd (i386) on pfSense ***

 WAN (wan)       -> re0        -> v4/DHCP4: 192.168.1.162/24
 LAN (lan)       -> em0        -> v4: 192.168.1.6/24

 0) Logout (SSH only)                  8) Shell
 1) Assign Interfaces                  9) pfTop
 2) Set interface(s) IP address       10) Filter Logs
 3) Reset webConfigurator password    11) Restart webConfigurator
 4) Reset to factory defaults         12) pfSense Developer Shell
 5) Reboot system                     13) Upgrade from console
 6) Halt system                       14) Disable Secure Shell (sshd)
 7) Ping host                         15) Restore recent configuration

Enter an option: 1

Valid interfaces are:

usbus00   (up)
em0   00:16:3e:9c:ae:88   (up) Intel(R) PRO/1000 Legacy Network Connection 1.0.4
re0   00:16:3e:39:ad:93   (up) RealTek 8139C+ 10/100BaseTX
usbus10   (up)
ue0   00:24:9b:09:84:0f (down) USB Ethernet

Do you want to set up VLANs first?

If you are not going to use VLANs, or only for optional interfaces, you should
say no here and use the webConfigurator to configure VLANs later, if required.

Do you want to set up VLANs now [y|n]? n

*NOTE*  pfSense requires *AT LEAST* 1 assigned interface(s) to function.
        If you do not have *AT LEAST* 1 interfaces you CANNOT continue.

        If you do not have at least 1 *REAL* network interface card(s)
        or one interface with multiple VLANs then pfSense
        *WILL NOT* function correctly.

If you do not know the names of your interfaces, you may choose to use
auto-detection. In that case, disconnect all interfaces now before
hitting 'a' to initiate auto detection.

Enter the WAN interface name or 'a' for auto-detection: ue0

Enter the LAN interface name or 'a' for auto-detection
NOTE: this enables full Firewalling/NAT mode.
(or nothing if finished): em0

Enter the Optional 1 interface name or 'a' for auto-detection
(or nothing if finished):

The interfaces will be assigned as follows:

WAN  -> ue0
LAN  -> em0

Do you want to proceed [y|n]?y

Writing configuration...done.
One moment while we reload the settings... done!

Try this one went a different route with it this time:

rename to if_axge.ko and check md5 afterwards.

if_axge.ko
md5: 69F1819099F9183865E5895D97A6E9EE

Also if it fails can you please setup the interface manually on the shell one step at a time. Maybe your system log showing the last error happening would be helpful as well. I don't know what part of the assign script actually triggered the problem. I figure though it must have been in the axge_ifmedia_upd() function it was calling a updated function from an updated file. This time instead of bringing in the update I switched it back to calling the original function.

if_axge.txt

Huxy

Boom! Great work!

This new version seems to work fine. I've now got a working connection.
I've yet to do thorough testing but it all looks good! Here's the ifconfig which I ran using a SSH login shell.

[2.1-RELEASE][root@pfSense.localdomain]/root(2): ifconfig ue0
ue0: flags=8843 <up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>metric 0 mtu 1500
        options=8000b <rxcsum,txcsum,vlan_mtu,linkstate>ether 00:24:9b:09:84:0f
        inet6 fe80::224:9bff:fe09:840f%ue0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x9
        inet 192.168.1.6 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.1.255
        nd6 options=1 <performnud>media: Ethernet autoselect (1000baseT <full-duplex,master>)
        status: active
[2.1-RELEASE][root@pfSense.localdomain]/root(3):</full-duplex,master></performnud></rxcsum,txcsum,vlan_mtu,linkstate></up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>

bryan.paradis

@Huxy:

Boom! Great work!

This new version seems to work fine. I've now got a working connection.
I've yet to do thorough testing but it all looks good! Here's the ifconfig which I ran using a SSH login shell.

[2.1-RELEASE][root@pfSense.localdomain]/root(2): ifconfig ue0
ue0: flags=8843 <up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>metric 0 mtu 1500
        options=8000b <rxcsum,txcsum,vlan_mtu,linkstate>ether 00:24:9b:09:84:0f
        inet6 fe80::224:9bff:fe09:840f%ue0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x9
        inet 192.168.1.6 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.1.255
        nd6 options=1 <performnud>media: Ethernet autoselect (1000baseT <full-duplex,master>)
        status: active
[2.1-RELEASE][root@pfSense.localdomain]/root(3):</full-duplex,master></performnud></rxcsum,txcsum,vlan_mtu,linkstate></up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>

Haha hardcore. First Freebsd thing I ever messed with. Maybe I didn't even need to buy one for $20 hahahaha. Can you test the throughput? There may be another change to get it to do usb 3.0 speeds. Are you on usb 2.0 or 3.0?

What is your output of usbconfig

stephenw10

Nice one! ;D
There's no USB3 support at all in FreeBSD 8.3 as far as I know so that getting that working would be significantly more complex.

Steve

bryan.paradis

@stephenw10:

Nice one! ;D
There's no USB3 support at all in FreeBSD 8.3 as far as I know so that getting that working would be significantly more complex.

Steve

The xhci(4) driver, which supports Extensible Host Controller Interface (xHCI) and USB 3.0, has been added.[r215944]

Are you sure? Seems like it started getting support in 8.2

I have compiled for amd64 now as well. I am posting both.


1\. download
2\. rename to if_axge.ko
3\. place in /boot/modules
4\. md5 if_axge.ko and check against the md5 listed below


#i386
md5 if_axge.ko
MD5 (if_axge.ko) = 69f1819099f9183865e5895d97a6e9ee


#amd64
md5 if_axge.ko
MD5 (if_axge.ko) = afb51043416a0cc6cad7dfbe875a9809

if_axge.ko.i386.txt
if_axge.ko.amd64.txt

stephenw10

Hmm, fairly sure. There are many reports of the USB3 subsystem not showing up at all and I think at least some of them have been since 2.1 was released. Don't let me stop you trying though. ;)

Steve

Huxy

[[b]update] I wasn't able to get the host to see the USB3 PCIe Adapter. I'm guessing driver support isn't included in this kernel.

bryan.paradis

@Huxy:

[[b]update] I wasn't able to get the host to see the USB3 PCIe Adapter. I'm guessing driver support isn't included in this kernel.

Which one? :P

Also I got my Cable Matters adapter! Haha. Here are my results of some fiddling around.

Virtualbox -> freebsd passthrough = Deteched sends SOME packets SOMETIMES
ESXI -> debian = Works but limited to 12mbit in my setup. Verdict usable but needs some work
ESXI -> pfsense = Works much better than the debian passthrough for some reason. Verdict maybe workable

[2.1-RELEASE][root@pfsensedev.localdomain]/(12): ./speedtest-cli
Retrieving speedtest.net configuration...
Retrieving speedtest.net server list...
Testing from Electronic Box (xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx)...
Selecting best server based on ping...
Hosted by TELUS (Montreal, QC) [7.35 km]: 96.083 ms
Testing download speed........................................
Download: 44.66 Mbit/s
Testing upload speed..................................................
Upload: 9.64 Mbit/s

44.66 Mbit is not half bad! I am going to be moving away from esxi to ganeti (KVM maybe XEN) so I will see how it does in passthrough there later on.

[2.1-RELEASE][root@pfsensedev.localdomain]/(25): ./speedtest-cli
Retrieving speedtest.net configuration...
Retrieving speedtest.net server list...
Testing from Electronic Box (xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx)...
Selecting best server based on ping...
Hosted by Colo-Serv Communications (Montreal, QC) [7.35 km]: 83.923 ms
Testing download speed........................................
Download: 57.40 Mbit/s
Testing upload speed..................................................
Upload: 10.27 Mbit/s
[2.1-RELEASE][root@pfsensedev.localdomain]/(26):

This is with emulated E1000. It is just a VM with 256mb of ram and really low priority. It is not routing through its own wan but it is still routing through my main pfsense on the same atom box ;) Maybe I will do a LAN to LAN test later

Huxy

I did some testing with pfSense and m0n0wall using the USB adapter as my WAN connection.
Throughput on incoming traffic was really poor 0.5mbit/s but upload was fine at 10.5mbit/s.
The net connection also stopped responding on two separate occasions and I was forced to reboot the pfSense VM.

I installed a Debian based router instead as a test and I had full speed 125mbit/s and 10.5mbit/s speeds on my LAN clients. I'm not sure what the issue is to be honest, but it renders pfSense unsuitable for me at this point in time.

bryan.paradis

@Huxy:

I did some testing with pfSense and m0n0wall using the USB adapter as my WAN connection.
Throughput on incoming traffic was really poor 0.5mbit/s but upload was fine at 10.5mbit/s.
The net connection also stopped responding on two separate occasions and I was forced to reboot the pfSense VM.

I installed a Debian based router instead as a test and I had full speed 125mbit/s and 10.5mbit/s speeds on my LAN clients. I'm not sure what the issue is to be honest, but it renders pfSense unsuitable for me at this point in time.

FreeBSD integration ranges from very poor to not as poor depending on your hypervisor choice.

1. What are you using as a hypervisor?
2. Does the hypervisor host OS support the usb nic?
3. Are you passing through the usb device?

Huxy

1. What are you using as a hypervisor?

I've been using a Xen 4.3 Wheezy based Hypervisor. I backported Xen and added PVUSB support to a recent kernel version. The VM is a QEMU traditional based HVM.

2. Does the hypervisor host OS support the usb nic?

Yes the host OS has drivers for it. In a debian VM it also works fine with PCI Passthrough.

3. Are you passing through the usb device?

I'm passing through the USB controller directly to the VM. The pfSense VM is then in control of both the USB driver and the NIC driver. I think I downloaded a PVHVM build of pfSense somewhere. That might have better luck..

bryan.paradis

@Huxy:

I've been using a Xen 4.3 Wheezy based Hypervisor. I backported Xen and added PVUSB support to a recent kernel version. The VM is a QEMU traditional based HVM.

You are using Xen on wheezy with Qemu-dm is what I gather?

Yes the host OS has drivers for it. In a debian VM it also works fine with PCI Passthrough.

This is probably because the debian has proper passthrough support.

I'm passing through the USB controller directly to the VM. The pfSense VM is then in control of both the USB driver and the NIC driver. I think I downloaded a PVHVM build of pfSense somewhere. That might have better luck..

Why not just create a virtual wan network using that as the physical adapter on the host and then using a virtual nic in the guest pfsense?

Huxy

You are using Xen on wheezy with Qemu-dm is what I gather?

Yes, not the upstream version

Why not just create a virtual wan network using that as the physical adapter on the host and then using a virtual nic in the guest pfsense?

I'm guessing this would work, but I was keen to keep the WAN external to the main hypervisor. I'm not an expert but I would think by passing through the device it would be more secure and reduce the amount of overhead required to communicate between the hypervisor and the guest. Given that Xen support and FreeBSD seems immature compared to it's linux brethren so it might be easier to go that route.

With regards to the loss of connectivity, I think this might solve the issue with USB network interfaces.
https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,72019.msg393187.html#msg393187

bryan.paradis

@Huxy:

You are using Xen on wheezy with Qemu-dm is what I gather?

Yes, not the upstream version

Why not just create a virtual wan network using that as the physical adapter on the host and then using a virtual nic in the guest pfsense?

I'm guessing this would work, but I was keen to keep the WAN external to the main hypervisor. I'm not an expert but I would think by passing through the device it would be more secure and reduce the amount of overhead required to communicate between the hypervisor and the guest. Given that Xen support and FreeBSD seems immature compared to it's linux brethren so it might be easier to go that route.

With regards to the loss of connectivity, I think this might solve the issue with USB network interfaces.
https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,72019.msg393187.html#msg393187

I would keep it simple in regards to your WAN. Linux is far ahead in hardware support and integration with hypervisors that is for sure.

upgrayedd

Hello, I know this thread is a year old but I'm having similar issues. First I'm a Windows guy with 1 yr as a junior Linux admin and very little BSD exp, so take it easy on me ;D

So the system I am working with a Dell D620 laptop with a USB Gigabit AX99179 adapter http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00E44F3BO/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s02?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I'm running into the same problems. I downloaded the 64 bit driver posted earlier and tried to install.


[2.2-RELEASE][root@pfSense.localdomain]/boot/modules: kldload if_axge.ko
kldload: an error occurred while loading the module. Please check dmesg(8) for more details.

listing system.log I get


Feb  1 20:08:55 pfSense kernel: interface axge.1 already present in the KLD 'kernel'!
Feb  1 20:08:55 pfSense kernel: linker_load_file: Unsupported file type

So based on this I'm assuming the driver is already present. So I went to the FreeBSD site and look at this https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=axge&sektion=4 and added

if_axge_load="YES"

to the loader.conf.wrapper. Still nothing. At this point I really could use some help. Here is my ifconfig and dmesg:


[2.2-RELEASE][root@pfSense.localdomain]/boot/modules: ifconfig
bwi0: flags=8843 <up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>metric 0 mtu 2290
        ether DELETED
        nd6 options=21 <performnud,auto_linklocal>media: IEEE 802.11 Wireless Ethernet autoselect mode 11g
        status: associated
bge0: flags=8843 <up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>metric 0 mtu 1500
        options=8009b <rxcsum,txcsum,vlan_mtu,vlan_hwtagging,vlan_hwcsum,linkstate>ether DELETED
        inet6 DELETED
        inet DELETED netmask 0xfffffe00 broadcast DELETED
        nd6 options=21 <performnud,auto_linklocal>media: Ethernet autoselect (100baseTX <full-duplex>)
        status: active
pflog0: flags=100 <promisc>metric 0 mtu 33144
pfsync0: flags=0<> metric 0 mtu 1500
        syncpeer: 224.0.0.240 maxupd: 128 defer: on
        syncok: 1
lo0: flags=8049 <up,loopback,running,multicast>metric 0 mtu 16384
        options=600003 <rxcsum,txcsum,rxcsum_ipv6,txcsum_ipv6>inet 127.0.0.1 netmask 0xff000000
        inet6 ::1 prefixlen 128
        inet6 fe80::1%lo0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x5
        nd6 options=21 <performnud,auto_linklocal>enc0: flags=0<> metric 0 mtu 1536
        nd6 options=21 <performnud,auto_linklocal>bwi0_wlan0: flags=8843 <up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>metric 0 mtu 1500
        ether DELETED
        inet6 DELETED bwi0_wlan0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x7
        inet 0.0.0.0 netmask 0xff000000 broadcast 255.255.255.255
        nd6 options=23 <performnud,accept_rtadv,auto_linklocal>media: IEEE 802.11 Wireless Ethernet DS/1Mbps mode 11g
        status: associated
        ssid default channel 6 (2437 MHz 11g) bssid 08:10:74:18:1c:c2
        country US authmode OPEN privacy OFF txpower 0 bmiss 7 scanvalid 60
        bgscan bgscanintvl 300 bgscanidle 250 roam:rssi 7 roam:rate 5
        protmode CTS</performnud,accept_rtadv,auto_linklocal></up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast></performnud,auto_linklocal></performnud,auto_linklocal></rxcsum,txcsum,rxcsum_ipv6,txcsum_ipv6></up,loopback,running,multicast></promisc></full-duplex></performnud,auto_linklocal></rxcsum,txcsum,vlan_mtu,vlan_hwtagging,vlan_hwcsum,linkstate></up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast></performnud,auto_linklocal></up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>


Root mount waiting for: usbus4
ugen4.4: <o2>at usbus4
Root mount waiting for: usbus4
ugen4.5: <realtek>at usbus4
umass0: <ethernet data="">on usbus4
umass0: Get Max Lun not supported (USB_ERR_STALLED)</ethernet></realtek></o2>


ugen2.1: <uhci root="" hub="" intel="">at usbus2, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=FULL (12Mbps) pwr=SAVE (0mA)
ugen1.1: <uhci root="" hub="" intel="">at usbus1, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=FULL (12Mbps) pwr=SAVE (0mA)
ugen0.1: <uhci root="" hub="" intel="">at usbus0, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=FULL (12Mbps) pwr=SAVE (0mA)
ugen4.1: <ehci root="" hub="" intel="">at usbus4, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=HIGH (480Mbps) pwr=SAVE (0mA)
ugen3.1: <uhci root="" hub="" intel="">at usbus3, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=FULL (12Mbps) pwr=SAVE (0mA)
ugen4.2: <product 0xa005="" vendor="" 0x413c="">at usbus4, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=HIGH (480Mbps) pwr=SAVE (2mA)
ugen4.3: <product 0x7761="" vendor="" 0x0b97="">at usbus4, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=FULL (12Mbps) pwr=SAVE (200mA)
ugen4.4: <o2micro ccid="" sc="" reader="" o2="">at usbus4, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=FULL (12Mbps) pwr=ON (0mA)
ugen4.5: <usb 101001000="" lan="" realtek="">at usbus4, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=HIGH (480Mbps) pwr=ON (100mA)</usb></o2micro></product></product></uhci></ehci></uhci></uhci></uhci>


[2.2-RELEASE][root@pfSense.localdomain]/boot/modules: usbconfig -d ugen4.5 dump_device_desc
ugen4.5: <usb 101001000="" lan="" realtek="">at usbus4, cfg=0 md=HOST spd=HIGH (480Mbps) pwr=ON (100mA)

  bLength = 0x0012
  bDescriptorType = 0x0001
  bcdUSB = 0x0210
  bDeviceClass = 0x0000
  bDeviceSubClass = 0x0000
  bDeviceProtocol = 0x0000
  bMaxPacketSize0 = 0x0040
  idVendor = 0x0bda
  idProduct = 0x8153
  bcdDevice = 0x3000
  iManufacturer = 0x0001  <realtek>iProduct = 0x0002  <usb 10="" 100="" 1000="" lan="">iSerialNumber = 0x0003  <0023566C5827>
  bNumConfigurations = 0x0002</usb></realtek></usb>

bryan.paradis

All clues point to it being a realtek chip inside that usb ethernet adapter and not an asix88179. I personally have this one from amazon. There are many otheres. Amazon must have shipped you the wrong part or the specs are bad. I would stick with products with many reviews as there are know counterfit asix chips.

http://www.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-SuperSpeed-Gigabit-Ethernet/dp/B00BBD7NFU/ref=sr_1_60?ie=UTF8&qid=1422838559&sr=8-60&keywords=88179