e1000 ethernet port intermitently works

[kc7zzv]

I am having trouble with the e1000 integrated ethernet port on "Inspiron 530s" towers. The problem is intermittent, happens under Lucid, and not under Windows. The same problem happens on all three identical computers.

The interface never acquires an ipaddress. I have tried 2 different switches, from two different manufacturers, and both times Windows is able to acquire an ipaddress, but Lucid is not.

ethtool says that the card is MDI-X instead of MDI. Typing "ethtool -s eth0 autoneg off" fixes the problem until next reboot. I do need to restart "networking" and "network-manager" to get a ip afterwords though.

I put this in /etc/rc.local as a workaround, but I'd really like a better solution:
ethtool -s eth0 autoneg off
service network-manager restart && true
service networking restart && true
sleep 3

Would looking at anything in a packet sniffer help at all? Also, Linux machines that are NOT a "Inspiron 530s" work just fine on my network.

Ubuntu version:
Description: Ubuntu 10.04 LTS
Release: 10.04

ethtool dump when working with workaround:
Settings for eth0:
 Supported ports: [ TP ]
 Supported link modes: 10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full
                         100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full
 Supports auto-negotiation: Yes
 Advertised link modes: Not reported
 Advertised pause frame use: No
 Advertised auto-negotiation: No
 Link partner advertised link modes: Not reported
 Link partner advertised pause frame use: No
 Link partner advertised auto-negotiation: No
 Speed: 100Mb/s
 Duplex: Full
 Port: Twisted Pair
 PHYAD: 1
 Transceiver: internal
 Auto-negotiation: off
 MDI-X: off
 Supports Wake-on: pumbag
 Wake-on: g
 Current message level: 0x00000001 (1)
 Link detected: yes

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. This bug did not have a package associated with it, which is important for ensuring that it gets looked at by the proper developers. You can learn more about finding the right package at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Bugs/FindRightPackage. I have classified this bug as a bug in linux.

When reporting bugs in the future please use apport, by using 'ubuntu-bug' in a terminal and the name of the package affected. You can learn more about this functionality at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ReportingBugs.

[Jeremy Foshee (jeremyfoshee)]

Hi kc7zzv,

Please be sure to confirm this issue exists with the latest development release of Ubuntu. ISO CD images are available from http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/daily/current/ . If the issue remains, please run the following command from a Terminal (Applications->Accessories->Terminal). It will automatically gather and attach updated debug information to this report.

apport-collect -p linux 601159

Also, if you could test the latest upstream kernel available that would be great. It will allow additional upstream developers to examine the issue. Refer to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KernelMainlineBuilds . Once you've tested the upstream kernel, please remove the 'needs-upstream-testing' tag. This can be done by clicking on the yellow pencil icon next to the tag located at the bottom of the bug description and deleting the 'needs-upstream-testing' text. Please let us know your results.

Thanks in advance.

    [This is an automated message. Apologies if it has reached you inappropriately; please just reply to this message indicating so.]

[kc7zzv (kc7zzv)]

I got a dump from apport. It can be found in bug #613200. (https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/613200)